The Lights of Belfast: My Bonfire Night and Diwali.

Around the world right now, people are celebrating Diwali (Deepavali); the festival of lights. A religious celebration based on the lunar calendar celebrating good over evil and various other human values tied to light over those tied to darkness. I'm not religious but I do appreciate the sentiment and good will behind many such tradition. According to one of my Hindu work colleagues it is a big hit amongst children because of the pretty lights and sweets. To be honest I like both sweets and lights too! So on Friday the 5th of November, a date also well known across the water in England for being Bonfire night (the English celebration of the foiling of the Gunpowder plot of 1605 which is celebrated with bonfires and fireworks) I was feeling somewhat left out. Shattered and not in the spirits to head to Jordanstown to join in the Diwali celebrations there, I needed another outlet. So to address this, on my way home from work I took a walk around Belfast City centre to take some pictures of the prettiest lights I could find. Here is what I found...

What's that small moon shaped ball in the sky?

Tonight I finally managed to get a half decent photo of lunar proportions and that was before I'd even seen the news. That news was highlighted to me by a friend on Facebook... yep, that high quality source of information... that tonight's full moon is the Sturgeon Moon. That means that our favourite natural light reflecting satellite is at its peak of veering off course for a wee while before twirling a little closer again soon. Here is the National Geographic's description of the wee moon in the sky which gives a little more detail of such events. According to the Farmer Almanac, it is a full moon named after the slippery scaly water dweller which the fishermen seemed to catch a lot of around the time.

To say the moon was meant to be smaller,  it seems its absence managed to make me notice it even more, even through the glare of the street lights of lower North Belfast. Maybe a vague absence really does make the digital camera zoom closer? No, that's not right...