The smoky smell of crackers is what reminds me of diwali and here in US, I was yearning for that smell to feel at home. Like me were thousands of Indians who got together at the Aurora Temple in Chicago to the get feel of being ‘at home’ and celebrate diwali.

Last night, with clear skies the temperature dropped to 30s. Despite the icing cold, the sky was lit with huge fireworks at 8:30 pm. Catcalls and the Indian trademarked finger-in-the-mouth whistles deafened the whole temple. Never before had I celebrated a diwali with thousands of people with full of joy and a brightly lighted temple. Though there was a huge lines for the Perumal koil Puliyotharai and the Royal Indian Thayir sadham.

But the night went long after that and we were playing the card game, Literature. We also had one hour more to spare. So as we turned back the clock from 2:00 am to 1:00 am to accommodate the daylight saving, we realized we had 2 more hours to go before the next diwali.

Willow TV was helping us to watch the India vs Australia match live on the Internet. But the package was huge. Priced at $70 for all the matches of the TVS Triangular Series, we watched the match live, on a laptop connected to a cable modem. The broadcast was fantastic without much clipping so we could witness clearly how Sachin celebrated a revengeful diwali against the aussies. With Shewag giving his wicket cheaply to the second slip many of them crashed out under the blankets.

But the determined like me who sacrificed our sleep were paid back by Sachin and VVS Laks with the powerful knocks. This wasn’t the most classy century of Sachin but was certainly a good one after a long time. Though both Sachin and VVS struggled in their 90s, they managed to touch the century. While Sachin had couple of lives at the fag end, he threw his wicket at 100. Sent in perfectly on time was Yuvraj Singh who played a swashbuckling innings again.

So as we knocked the aussies, what everyone were whispering was that we should have done this 8 months back. But that’s long gone.