Holi, Bhang, and My Adventurous Experiment!

Jyoti Agrawal, MBA, PhD

“Kimiya of Bhang: The Ancient Preparation”

I grew up in an Indian village surrounded by an endless cycle of festivals, fairs, rituals, and celebrations. While major festivals like Holi, Diwali, Dussehra, and Raksha Bandhan are recognized nationwide, every region, village, and family adds its own distinct flavor, food, and beautiful chaos.

For us, the most awaited festival of the year was always Holi.

Mid day madness with color on Holi

In the morning, someone would inevitably launch the first stealth attack before sunrise. Nobody knew exactly who started it, but suddenly color would appear from nowhere — dry gulal on the face, colored water launched from rooftops, or water balloons flying across terraces.

Looking back now, I have a strong guess that the secret instigator was often my grandmother. I can picture her waking up before anyone else, quietly coloring the house maid early in the morning just to set the festive mood in motion. Still, it remains a beautiful mystery. But once that first drop hit, the entire village entered full war mode.

People prepared buckets of pakka rang using concentrated dye crystals dissolved in small amounts of hot water, almost like brewing an espresso concentrate. This thick liquid would later be diluted into buckets, pichkaris (water guns), and steel containers.

Guests were never safe:

My mother had her own tactical methods. She would lightly apply harmless-looking dry color onto guests’ heads while graciously serving them gujiya, samosa, mathri, and mithai. They would relax, thinking they had escaped lightly. Then, out of nowhere, someone would pour the liquid pakka rang.

The guests would scrub for days post holy wondering: “Yeh rang jaa kyun nahi raha?” (Why is this color not going away?) And somewhere in the middle of all this madness came the bhang.

The Ancient Preperation — Kemiya:

In our home, bhang was never treated like something mysterious or dangerous. To me, it was simply a delicious, refreshing Holi drink — watery, cold, sweet, aromatic, and incredibly comforting after hours of playing under the hot sun. At the time, watching the elders prepare it felt completely normal — just another standard event in a calendar packed with celebrations. But looking back now, especially from the structured, modern landscape of the USA, that entire process feels like an ancient, beautiful ritual from a completely different era. Melon seeds, soaked bhang, fennel seeds, mishri (sugar candy), almonds, milk, and water were ground slowly on a heavy stone sil batta into a smooth paste, then filtered through a crisp cotton cloth into large vessels.

For the children, a special version was poured into smaller cups — mostly sweet milk and aromatics with just a tiny whisper of the festive mix so we could feel part of the grand adult ritual without any of the actual effects. After hours of Holi madness, everyone would drink their share and eventually disappear into a peaceful afternoon nap.

That was simply Holi. I never thought of it as “getting high.”

Fast forward several years later.

The Hostel Experiment After my undergraduate studies, I was staying in a women’s dormitory during the holidays. Most students had gone home, leaving only a handful of us from distant states like Bihar, Tamil Nadu, Punjab, and Maharashtra who couldn’t travel back or someone like me who had no one.

Someone suggested: “Let’s order mithai with bhang tomorrow.” One girl’s boyfriend brought the sweets; another arranged the drinks. The next day, we played Holi on the terrace — laughter, flying water balloons, and wet clothes drying under the sun. Then, one of the girls offered me a piece of mithai and warned carefully, “Be careful. It has bhang in it.” I laughed confidently:

“Mujhe nahi chadati. Main har Holi me peeti hoon.” (It doesn’t affect me. I drink it every Holi.)

I casually ate two pieces.

A little later, another girl brought the drinks. This time, the group looked at me with genuine concern. “Don’t drink that too.”

But by now, my confidence had evolved into a full performance. I smiled, raised my glass, and said:

“Watch me. Nothing will happen.”

At that exact moment, the girls started looking at each other with a sudden realization: I wasn’t the one speaking anymore.

The Empirical Data Fallacy

Looking back, my reaction that afternoon wasn’t just about bravado. It exposed a profound, lifelong pattern in how my brain operates: I have a serious issue with listening to warnings until I have physically run the experiment myself.

My entire life and academic journey have been driven by a relentless need to test variables, analyze systems, and find out the truth first-hand. Tell me a machine is volatile, and I will study its mechanics. Tell me a process is flawed, and I will dismantle it to find out why. But tell me a legendary festive botanical kemiya has the power to override my conscious brain? Absolutely not. My system required empirical data. I refused to let anyone else’s theory govern my reality until I had tested my own boundaries.

What I completely failed to realize at the time was a massive flaw in my baseline data: my childhood “tolerance” was a complete myth. At that age, I had no idea that the festive cups of bhang prepared by the village elders were easily 100 times diluted compared to the concentrated, unsupervised collegiate dosage I had just casually consumed. I had unknowingly jumped straight from a micro-dose to well engineered mega does.

Minutes later, the universe delivered its empirical data. And the results of the experiment were memorable — not just for me, but for whoever watched me that afternoon. Yet, had I listened to the girls, I wouldn’t have this lifelong wisdom about bhang, or these incredibly moments to look back on.

The Operational Breakdown

Within minutes, I started laughing uncontrollably. This wasn’t normal laughter. It was the kind of laughter where your body completely breaks off diplomatic relations with your brain. Every sentence became a comedic masterpiece. Every face looked theatrical. Every small movement triggered a new wave.

Then suddenly, without warning, the emotional switch flipped violently. I started crying — not a graceful misting of the eyes, but a full-scale emotional collapse. I couldn’t comprehend how I was laughing one minute and mourning the next.

In the middle of this internal cyclone, my brain locked onto a completely new emergency: What if I die? More specifically: What if I die, my mother comes for my funeral, and she sees my room dirty? The logic felt perfectly airtight at the time. I immediately grabbed a broom and began sweeping the hallway and my room with absolute dedication. In my intoxicated mind, this had become a critical, end-of-life operational task.

The girls on the floor watched in utter fascination as I moved furniture, scrubbed corners, and swept the floor with intense gravity, randomly sobbing in between bursts of cleaning.

The hostel hallway had rooms on both sides, with one end opening toward third-floor balconies. Sensing the impending danger, an elderly hostel staff member quietly instructed a few girls, “Keep an eye on her. Don’t let her go toward the open side.”

Meanwhile, I continued wandering dramatically through the corridor like a philosopher trapped inside a cleaning operation.

The Safe Havens

Someone eventually announced, “She needs food. Eating will help.” A few girls gently grabbed my arms to guide me toward the kitchen. I protested with wounded emotional dignity:

“Meri koi shaadi nahi ho rahi hai. Mujhe chhodo. Main apne aap chal sakti hoon.” (My wedding is not happening. Leave me alone. I can walk by myself.)

In my warped perception, being escorted by multiple girls closely mirrored the ceremonial handling of an Indian bride during a wedding procession. When they finally got me to the dining area, I realized I had completely lost coordination between intention and execution. I wanted to eat. I was staring at the plate. But I was no longer capable of performing the complex task of feeding myself.

One of the girls tried to hand-feed me. I immediately snapped with deeply offended self-respect, “Main bachchi nahi hoon. Mujhe mat khilao.” (I’m not a child. Don’t feed me.) All while completely failing to eat independently.

Then, a mess worker arrived carrying plain dal chawal — simple yellow lentils and rice.

To this day, I remember that moment vividly. In the middle of the emotional chaos, the hallway drama, the cleaning campaign, and the battle for self-dignity, that plain, warm dal chawal felt like the safest, most comforting thing in the universe. Not biryani, not festive sweets. Just plain rice. Something about it grounded me back to reality. The mess worker, likely an expert in managing overconfident hostel students on Holi, instinctively knew exactly what I needed — sleep.

I was taken to my room. I would leave my bed, check all around and verify if the bed is okay, the moment I would lay on the bed, the bed would move. The girl who was watching repeatedly assured me everything is alright I just need to close my eyes and rest.

I would rest, try again, and instantly become emotional and disoriented all over again and try to fix the bed.

Eventually, exhaustion defeated the drama, and I slept.

When I woke up, it was already late evening. The hostel girls were still monitoring me like I was a volatile lab experiment that might malfunction at any moment. Before letting me shower, they ordered: “Don’t lock the bathroom door.” Every few minutes, someone would knock to check on me. At the time, I found it mildly insulting. In hindsight, they were probably terrified I would faint or fall asleep standing up.

I had long, thick hair back then, and it was completely saturated with sticky Holi color. The texture bothered me intensely, so I started washing it out. That was when I discovered the true, terrifying property of bhang: it comes back in waves as you take shower.

The cool water, the steam, and the physical exertion combined with the lingering intoxication in my system to trigger repeated waves of delayed re-intoxication. I would feel completely sober for a while, start washing my hair, and suddenly find myself floating again.

By the end of the two-day cycle, my lifelong confidence — “Mujhe kuch nahi hota” — had been thoroughly, professionally disproven by an entire hostel floor.

Childhood village Holi taught me that bhang was a delicious festive drink followed by a peaceful nap. College hostel Holi taught me a much more valuable corporate lesson: dosage, overconfidence, and unsupervised students are three variables that should never be combined.