New neighbors
Our church has had a synagogue across the street for many years. Since our services were on different days, we didn't really notice they were there, although I know they would park in our lot if their lot got full. (Their lot is not in sight of our church, so we never used theirs.) Last summer a for sale sign went up, and we read in the paper that they were selling because no Jewish families had moved into town for many years, and their membership had fallen. So they have moved to a nearby town with a higher Jewish population. After a while, we saw a "sale pending" sign and heard that the building had been purchased by a Hindu Temple. The asking price was $1.275 million, I wonder how much they actually paid?
Yesterday there was an article in the Courant that said the temple would be dedicated today. According to the article, they expected more than 1,000 people to attend. It's a good thing we had some advance warning, because I think that estimate was correct! Our service begins at 10:30, and their festivities started at 11:00. We came out of our service, and they had already completely overflowed their parking lot AND our parking lot. There was a large group of people in colorful clothing milling around in our parking lot with flags, banners, and some kind of musical instruments. When they started setting off fireworks our pastor went outside to get them to stop. There were canisters all over the place. When I left, there was an enormous traffic jam on the street between us and the temple.
After lunch I decided to go back to the church in case more help was needed at the pumpkin sale. They had things pretty well in hand, but I stuck around anyway. People kept coming and trying to park. We turned away most of them, because our lot was full, and we needed to keep a few open spaces for people coming to purchase pumpkins at our fundraiser. After a while I walked across the street to see if I could watch some of the festivities. However, when I saw the pile of shoes at the entrance I turned back. (I really don't like to go barefoot since I broke my foot.)
Hopefully this parking melee is a one time thing, and we will be good and friendly neighbors to each other.
http://www.courant.com/community/newington/hc-vaishnav-temple-pictures,0,7198077.photogallery?index=hrt-hc-hindu018420101010174344
Yesterday there was an article in the Courant that said the temple would be dedicated today. According to the article, they expected more than 1,000 people to attend. It's a good thing we had some advance warning, because I think that estimate was correct! Our service begins at 10:30, and their festivities started at 11:00. We came out of our service, and they had already completely overflowed their parking lot AND our parking lot. There was a large group of people in colorful clothing milling around in our parking lot with flags, banners, and some kind of musical instruments. When they started setting off fireworks our pastor went outside to get them to stop. There were canisters all over the place. When I left, there was an enormous traffic jam on the street between us and the temple.
After lunch I decided to go back to the church in case more help was needed at the pumpkin sale. They had things pretty well in hand, but I stuck around anyway. People kept coming and trying to park. We turned away most of them, because our lot was full, and we needed to keep a few open spaces for people coming to purchase pumpkins at our fundraiser. After a while I walked across the street to see if I could watch some of the festivities. However, when I saw the pile of shoes at the entrance I turned back. (I really don't like to go barefoot since I broke my foot.)
Hopefully this parking melee is a one time thing, and we will be good and friendly neighbors to each other.
http://www.courant.com/community/newington/hc-vaishnav-temple-pictures,0,7198077.photogallery?index=hrt-hc-hindu018420101010174344