What's your Holi - avatar?

As these songs swim in the colour laden breeze this Holi, let us have a quick look at the various ways in which we celebrate the festival of colours. With a whopping population of 1.3 billion people in the country and some generalised categorisation, we have come up with some variants of people and how they celebrate Holi. The list includes all: the ones who run from colours, the ones who are so open to colours that you can identify them for the next one week, the ones who never step outdoors pretending to be not at home and the ones who prefer to enjoy the natural spill of colours in the lap of nature. Pick your Holi avatar from the list!

The escapist: Always running away from colour smeared hands on Holi? Yes you are the one who finally gets attacked in the worst possible ways and return home with an unidentifiable face. Here's a tip: it's better to join the cheerful crowd than to run from it! Be one of them and shoot your pichkari passionately tainting them all who come your way, but not the helpless stray cats, dogs and cows. They cannot scrub their bodies with soap and water you see, so they might develop skin ailments from your chemical colours. Spare them.

The over enthusiast: They will pick anything and everything to get the job done (paint one's face). They will choke you by throwing gulal over your head making you inhale the powdery air, stuff handfuls of it in your mouth in order to smudge your face with the powder. They also go the extent to splashing you with buckets of water-based colours and if they don't have colours handy, they can just honour you with water all for the sake of 'playing Holi' with 'no negative intentions'.

The don't-give-a-damn-about-Holi group: This category of people prefer to sit back and watch movies or binge watch television series to experience the festival without being a part of it! They are usually the victims of the corporate mayhem – the ones always seeking holidays to simply sit back and do nothing. For them, it's just another day when you get to relax before heading back to the stressful part of life called 'work'. The number of members is gradually increasing in this section with more people demanding to have some 'me-time' or planning to bunk work in order to feed their binge-watching addiction.

The photographers: It is as if they are about to sing it out aloud: 'Do me a favour, let's play holi, rangon mein hai pyaar ki boli...' They would plead you to pose like this and like that, make you throw an innumerable number of water balloons, and waste all your gulal for the sake of a perfect photograph which they can eventually put up at an exhibition. With extreme care for the camera and quest for the perfect Holi photograph, these are the people who spend hours standing, being victims of your colour spree, and walk down the road in ridiculously colorful clothing, with their cameras held away from all possible attacks. The outcome of this strenuous task is what we google for to find out more about Holi!

The foodie: A foodie needs no special occasion to demand extra good food, therefore with Holi comes an opportunity of gorging into some gujiya, malpoa, pakodas, thandai and bhang! The foodie does not care about the rituals of an occasion, all they look forward to is the food, so much so that even if you rub colours on them while promising them some tasty dishes in return, they would probably raise no protests and cooperate peacefully with you in exchange for a pista kulfi.

The balloon throwers: These are the most horrific of all the Holi celebrators. Like bombs they drop balloons from terraces and throw them at you like a soldier would throw shells to the other side of the border! As you scream 'Ouch!' in pain, they enjoy the burst of coloured water drenching you. Well, what are you waiting for? Grab some water balloons and throw them back and count how many of goes down.

The virtual Holi player: This category of participants remain busy in portraying the aesthetics ofselfie and social media posts. Holi for them is bound in the lines of safe playing. You'd get to see photos flooding Facebook and Instagram where smiling faces would have three streaks of colours on their cheeks and a thumbprint tilak on the forehead. That's Holi for them. Dare you to attempt to discolour their face, you'd get swearing threats of death!

The fearless one: This group of players can be identified for the rest of the week or two with innumerable marks on their face, ears, hands, and hair. They are too brave to turn around from aggressive attackers, hence they welcome them all with wide open arms, literally. Some even come home smiling with green and yellow teech after a playful celebration. You can spot shining silver, startling red and purple, and various other coloured heads in the crowd when you walk down the staircases in various metro stations! With a dash of sunshine, these colourful hair shine glamorously making a mini ramp walk in every gloomy bylane!

The traveler: As soon as there's a red mark on the calendar, this soul sets free on a journey out of the city. This year with Holi falling on Monday, the wanderlust is brimming all over cities like New Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai as people travel to Agra, Jaipur, Mussourie, Mathura, Khandala, Disha, Shantiniketan, Puducherry and other travel worthy places surrounding the busy metro cities.

Ping! A tiny weather forecast: with an indication of rain and a chilly Holi this time, get ready to wash off the colours with blessings from heaven (until of course it is acid rain).