The Festival of Shiv 2011: Grand Opening!

Today on UCP we again for the 2nd year running open what for sure is one of our favourite blog series...The Festival of Shiv! We open it on a Monday...Somvaar...a day named after the Soma of the Vedas...and as we discussed last year on The Festival of Shiv...Hinduism is a religion of twists and tales and about the big and the small! So at one point in Hinduism the Soma known in the Vedas as this important drink ...like a divine nectar of sorts becomes equivalent to the moon and then in such a form he got into some trouble and then well Baba Shiv being the compassionate kinda guy he is granted him forgiveness (shamaa) and so Baba Shiv is also known as Som Nath or Soma Nath...the Lord/Master of the Moon God.

So we felt it fitting to kick off the series today i.e. on a Monday...Somvaar! Also as is no secret on this UCP blog we at the desks of UCP consider Baba Shiv to be our Supreme guru...Super Shiv if you have it and so we hold particular reverence to Baba Shiv on a Thursday as well...also known as Guruvaar in Hindi. So these days are important to note because the Festival of Shiv will run from today until the day of Maha Shivratri-3/4 March 2011...depending on your location on planet earth! But don't be bogged down by the dates for as we noted last year on our very same Festival of Shiv...we should be allowed to worship Shiv when we so Shiv willing please! But yep we will try to run our festival of Shiv daily but if it doesn't become possible we will for sure have a blog up every Mon and Thurs until Maha Shiv Ratri is upon us! So the Soma and Gura vaar or the Mon and Thurs will be some important dates to mark on UCP's Festival of Shiv 2011! :)

So let the Shiv flow! :)

And to kick of the festival this year....in song...Sonu Nigam sings what has now become one of our favourite Shiv things! Gosh every time we hear it we see Shiv dancing before us and doing yogic stretches at our favourite Shiv place! And we also feel like we ourselves could just get up and dance along with Baba Shiv as well...so it is such a lovely tune and really embodies all that is Shiv so come dance with us here on UCP or as we always say dance forth with us in this thing we call UCP-Universal Collective Prayer! :) As Sonu Nigam sings of all that is Shiv and his attributes as outlined in the Shiv Maha puran (the great story of Shiv)!