Coming of age in Toronto

Thulasi Srikanthan

As the drums beat, 12-year-old Niroshi Ravichandran steps through the towering white doors, her face masked by a translucent white veil, body wrapped in a pink-and-gold sari.

With white flowers pinned to black hair and brown cheeks reddened with blush, Niroshi walks silently up the aisle, through a guard of more than 24 flower girls, to a garland-draped platform.

It has been almost six months since Niroshi got her first period and now, after the congratulatory visits from her relatives and a small religious ceremony at home, her coming-of-age celebration at Toronto's Princess Banquet hall is about to begin.

"It wasn't my idea," says Niroshi, who has been up since 5 a.m., getting primped by a pair of makeup artists hired for the occasion. "But it's really cool."

And as her parents wished, the party for 260 guests has come with the works, including white stretch limo, a televised mini-biography of Niroshi's life and three giant screens filled with live feed from onsite cameramen. The price tag is more than $10,000.

This ritual, often written in English as pooppunitha neerattu vizha, is observed by Hindu Tamils in India as well as Sri Lanka. In Canada, among Sri Lankans, the celebration has taken on a distinct identity, not only growing more opulent but also becoming a way for families to pass on their traditions.

"When you are at home, you'd realize a lot of these traditions. You are a part of it. It was there," says Dharini Sivakumar, secretary of the Tamil Cultural Association of Waterloo Region. "When you are away from it, you see the difference from the Western culture. You want to maintain this to your own children to a certain extent. That way, they can say, `This is who I am. This is my identity.'"

In keeping with these traditions, when a girl in Canada gets her first period, her family phones all their close relatives. On the same day, they give her a bath at home with saffron and milk – considered an auspicious act.

The girl then stays at home to rest. Though in Sri Lanka, girls could be absent from school up to 10 days, in Canada, it's only for two to three – if at all.

Some people think treating the girl like Lakshmi, the goddess of prosperity, during this time will mean good fortune and happiness for the family. Relatives bring rich, nutritious foods, including eggs and special oil, so she recovers her strength.

A big ceremony marks the end of this first period. A priest comes early that morning to bless the girl. Another aspect of her moving from girlhood to womanhood is that she wears a sari for the first time.

In Sri Lanka, "the customs vary slightly from village to village," says Mani Pathmarajah, a community activist and elder. In Canada, she says, the ceremony takes place anywhere from one week to several months later, depending on the auspiciousness of the date, the availability of the hall and the parents' preferences.

In preparation, the family has to clean the house, give the girl a second bath and prepare 11 trays of sweets, fried snacks, fruit and coconuts. If the event takes place at a hall, the caterers do the cooking.

The family dresses the girl in a new sari for the occasion and two married women perform arthi, a religious ceremony, using the 11 trays to ward off the evil eye. A key component of arthi involves rotating in a vertical circle a tray filled with three banana pieces, burning wicks in the middle. The girl's maternal uncle breaks a coconut during the ceremony to remind those who are present to let go of their ego, Pathmarajah says.

If the event takes place at a banquet hall, music that represents the blooming of the girl is played. "We do not play any sad songs," says Harry Pathmarajah, who supervised the song selection for Niroshi. Anything that is flower-related is a big draw.

Along with embracing the culture comes the big bucks associated with performing this ancient ceremony.

In the Greater Toronto Area, business owners from the Tamil community say they have seen anywhere from 250 to more than 1,200 people come out for these parties. Costs range from less than $1,000 for at-home ceremonies to tens of thousands of dollars at local banquet halls.

"They do it in a huge way, like a wedding in Toronto," Sivakumar says. "Back home, it's a very family-oriented tradition. You don't invite the whole world, you invite your family and very, very close, close friends."

In the GTA, however, there are more than 100 banquet-hall ceremonies a year. Like many others working in the industry, Jeya Ponnuchamy says this is just the beginning.

Ponnuchamy, co-owner of the Princess Banquet hall on Pharmacy Ave., has been running around organizing Niroshi's ceremony, from telling the teen how to pose to telling the waitresses and flower girls where to walk.

Ponnuchamy says, at his hall, the prices for the ceremony for a party of 350 go up to $25,000 (a wedding of the same size could be in the $35,000 range). Expensive extras include stretch limousines and elaborately decorated platforms (mandaps) costing $4,000, as opposed to one that costs $250. Part of the reason the community is spending more money and inviting more guests is that it can.

Canada has the largest Tamil population outside South Asia, an estimated 250,000, and the community is well-established and increasingly affluent.

"I came in '84. At that time, you couldn't even get a bag of (basmati) rice in the grocery store," Sivakumar says.

Now, families can buy Sri Lankan mangosa leaves, used in the rituals, from their Tamil stores.

The other reason for the opulence is how the occasion is perceived in Sri Lankan society, Pathmarajah says. "In a girl's life, this is the first major event. Later comes the marriage."

Half a century ago, the ceremony was to identify girls as ready for marriage at 17 or 18 and the gifts were used for the girl's dowry, Pathmarajah says. Now, parents see it mainly as a point of pride that "from today, my daughter is a young woman," as many women in Canada don't marry until they reach their mid- to late 20s.

Pride is why Niroshi's mother Chandrakumary says she and her husband, Ravichandran Sabaratnam, have no regrets, despite the high price tag. "These are my customs, my traditions," she says. "I spend more money but I am happy."

The sense of identity borne of these ceremonies is something Grade 12 student Babitha Thampinathan understands well. Though she was slightly embarrassed to be dressed up and taken to a banquet hall in front of 150 guests when she got her period five years ago, she says she will never forget her ceremony.

"It represents your background and what makes you up," she says.

There was another consideration. Thampinathan received more than $3,000 for her ceremony in clothes, money and jewellery.

"I was kind of excited, because you get so much money," she says.

Not everyone splurges.

Sasi Kanarathnam intends to have a small home ceremony for his daughter. As a party planner, he could probably go all-out but he doesn't believe in putting so much money into this event.

"It's ridiculous," Kanarathnam says.

He's reluctant to do lavish age-attainment ceremonies. When he does do a party, he encourages the parents to spend less.

Sivakumar says some people skip the event, particularly if the children are uncomfortable.

That's not the case with Niroshi. Back at the banquet hall, she sits down to eat rice and curries after her ceremony ends.

When she looks back, she is sure she will remember how happy she was on this day.

"It's to know that we are not forgetting our culture, even though we are in Canada."