After all these preparations are completed, there commences the preliminary ceremony called Vani pati (house decoration), which takes place a day before the festival. The interiors of the houses are decorated profusely with coco-palm leaves, goian (Arum) plants, and flags. Bunches of tender coconuts, areca-nuts and plantains are tied all about the posts of the house outside, that the guests may partake at pleasure. Several pieces of chintz, red cloth, and calico are hung from strings in the interior, and beneath the house as well, and the meráhta, with the ornamented canoes, are placed on either side of the ñá-kopáh. The bamboo pig-pens are also decorated, and when all this is completed they kill a pig, sprinkle the blood over all as a sacrifice, and dance and sing around the house, with their guests, for the first time.
Now comes the first act. On the festival evening the people bring, with songs, numbers of pigs from their jungle piggeries, and placing them in the cages, dance before them. Those animals put in the cage beneath the house are merely for exhibition, as a proof of wealth, though, at the same time, they are dedicated to a future festival. In the cages outside are left those pigs that are to be slaughtered for the present occasion, and there is yet another cage in which are confined those brought to them by their friends as a festive gift.
Kiriam Hetpat (dancing in bright light) is the second and chief festival. By eight or nine in the evening, the village is filled with almost the whole of the islanders; a group of one village in one house. The special and general guests assemble in gangs in their respective quarters.
The men are adorned with new loin-cloths of various kinds and colours, with the tá-chökla, or chaplet, and tasses—necklaces made of silver coins.
The women wear necklaces, "ear-distenders," bangles—made by twisting silver wire round arm and leg—and strings of silver coins as head ornaments. A pair of red Madras handkerchiefs, or two yards of red cloth and two of Chinese blue, stitched together, are worn as the principal garment.
Some come already dressed, others bring their attire with them, and don it on the spot.
The special guests bring ten or a dozen pigs of moderate size, as presents to those by whom they are invited. (Here it may be said that the people, although well acquainted in general, never call each other friends promiscuously. Whoever contributes a gift during this festival to another, is alone his true friend. There is a regular agreement about this, and special invitations for any occasion are only given by turns.) The women bring with them baskets of prepared food—pandanus bread, boiled yams, rice—and with this, and with pork presented by the hosts, they refresh themselves during the night.
Dancing and singing then take place. The men give their performance first, and when they are fatigued, they make way for the women, and so it goes on, turn and turn about. The former in their dance go through various motions of sitting, rising, bending, and jumping, but the women only attempt a series of steps.[206] This proceeding continues in the compound of each festival party throughout the night.
In the morning, while dancing still continues, there are brought forward some strong wooden cages, about 4 feet long and 3 feet in height and breadth—some in shape like a palanquin, and some dome-shaped like the houses. These cages are gaily decorated with flags, chintz, and gilt jewellery. On the top of each a platform with curtains is prepared, and on either side stout bamboo poles are fastened. A huge long-tusked boar adorned with jewellery is placed in each cage, and a man, woman, and boy, seat themselves on the platform with a quantity of plantains and betel-nut.
When everything is ready, new red loin-cloth and tá-chöklas are supplied to the guests. Then the cages, with the pigs inside, and with the people upon them, are carried round from house to house in a procession, with singing and dancing, each borne by about forty men or women. Those who are not able to construct a cage, carry, as a substitute, long bamboos, across which the pig, with bound legs, is fastened. As they proceed, betel-nuts and plantains are distributed by those on the cages. In this way they march round the village, and return to the starting-point, viâ Elpanam, the teams of women as they stagger along with their heavy burden giving rise to much amusement.