Asians Pray, Play to Greet Eclipse
GENERAL SANTOS CITY, Philippines — Millions of Asians prayed, pounded drums and danced in the streets Friday to greet a total eclipse of the sun that drew a curtain of darkness across land and sea.
Young Filipinos shot rifles and tossed firecrackers at the blackened sky. In northern India, thousands of naked men and women jostled their way into huge, sacred pools to cleanse their souls in a massive Hindu ritual.
“I am at peace today,” said Ram Avtar, dripping beads of sacred water in Kurukshetra, India. The 27-year-old businessman had journeyed 450 miles to the site of the two holiest pools to fulfill his late father’s final wish--a dip in sacred waters to seek salvation for his forefathers. About 1 million people waded or dived into Kurukshetra’s holy pools.
The eclipse was the most spectacular along a 108-mile swath that moved from the Indian Ocean across Indonesia and the southern Philippine island of Mindanao.
But a partial eclipse could be seen as far west as India and eastward into parts of Australia.
Along the 108-mile path, the shadow of the moon darkened the sun for up to four minutes. Clouds obscured the view in Jakarta, Indonesia, Hong Kong and in the eastern Mindanao city of Davao, where thousands of tourists and scientists had gathered.
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