Vesak Day: The Best Cigars To Celebrate With
As online media we tend to pay attention to the big Western holidays, but there are very important religious holidays in other parts of the world, just as big or even bigger than Christmas in the Western world.
For example, Chinese New Year causes the biggest temporary mass-migration in the world, each year, while Hari Raja (the religious pilgrimage of Muslims) is bigger than any Christian holiday too. That’s why we, at Cigarinspector.com, decided to list a few cigars for Vesak day.
Vesak Day, also known as Buddha Day or Buddha Purnima, is one of the most important festivals in the Buddhist calendar. It commemorates the birth, enlightenment (Buddhahood), and death (Parinirvana) of Gautama Buddha, the founder of Buddhism. These three significant events are traditionally observed on the same day, which varies depending on the lunar calendar used in different countries but typically falls in April or May.
Vesak Day is marked by various activities and rituals, including:
- Ceremonial Practices: Devotees visit temples to participate in ceremonial rituals, which may include prayers, chanting, and offerings of incense, flowers, and candles.
- Acts of Generosity: Buddhists engage in charitable activities such as donating food, clothes, and other necessities to the needy. This practice reflects the Buddha’s teachings on compassion and generosity.
- Releasing Animals: Some cultures have the tradition of releasing caged birds, animals, or fish as a symbolic act of liberation and compassion.
- Meditation and Reflection: Many Buddhists spend the day meditating, reflecting on the Buddha’s teachings, and striving to incorporate these principles into their daily lives.
- Decorations and Festivities: Temples and homes may be adorned with lights, lanterns, and decorations. In some regions, there are processions and cultural performances.
Vesak Day serves as a reminder of the Buddha’s teachings and an opportunity for Buddhists to renew their commitment to the path of enlightenment and compassionate living.
Cigars can be used as a meditation tool, so let’s list a few cigars fitting for Vesak Day. Since nobody releases a specific Vesak Day cigar, we choose brands with Indian roots.
Rocky Patel
Does Rakesh ‘Rocky’ Patel need any introduction? At the age of 15, Patel moved with his family from his native India to America where his high school friends nicknamed him Rocky. He became an entertainment lawyer but after falling in love with cigars he sold his practice and started making cigars under the name Indian Tobac. After a few years, and finally happy with the blends and quality control, he renamed the company to Rocky Patel Premium Cigars.
Gurkha
Another brand with links to India. Kaizad Hansotia, Indian by birth, bought the Gurkha brand name from a Portuguese cigar vendor on the beach of Goa, India and with a lot of marketing he created a household name, loved by some, hated by many due to the inconsistent quality and the posh marketing. If Gurkha would focus on making cigars at one high-quality factory instead of using many different ones, the quality would improve. But guess what, the company is one of the biggest names in the industry so they don’t need my advice anyway. Just don’t let Hansotia anywhere near social media.
SP1014 Black by Sanj Patel
Sanj’s Smoke Shop in Bloomfield, New Jersey has a much bigger name and reputation than you’d expect from the small building. Owner Sanj Patel also owns the copyrights to the black, yellow, white dot design of Cohiba in the United States. That’s the reason why the Non-Cuban Cohiba’s have different artwork.
Sanj’s uses the design on his private label cigar, SP1014 including the Black line. Black is a premium blend crafted by Eladio Diaz at Tabacalera Diaz Cabrera. Eladio, renowned for his tenure as the master blender at Davidoff, has a storied history of creating exceptional cigars, including the luxurious Oro, Davidoff’s $500 cigar, and the acclaimed Master Selection series.
The SP1014 Black features a Dominican wrapper, a barrel-aged Mexican San Andres binder, and five undisclosed filler leaves, making it a unique and intriguing addition to any aficionado’s collection.
Mbombay cigars
When IT professional Mel Shah was looking for a change, he bought a cigar shop as smoking cigars was a passion. And he wanted a store exclusive cigar, so he founded Bombay Tobacco to make a new brand which he called Mbombay. A decade later the brand has several different blends on the market and the cigars are not just a store exclusive brand anymore but available in multiple stores all over the United States.
Indian cigars
If you want to go really all-in on the Indian Vesak Day theme, you can try to find some Indian cigars. Yes, there are cigars being produced in India. Mostly cigarillos or other small vitolas, with or without clove added for flavour. Adding clove is also popular in Indonesian cigarillos, cigarettes and pipe tobacco and gives the product a very distinct aroma.
Indian cigars are mostly made in Trichinopoly. The city prides itself as one of India’s oldest and culture filled Cigar Manufacturing locations. This historic city prides itself of supplying Cigars to the likes of Winston Churchill and many other great Cigar aficionados and to this day, continues to do so but since we all know Churchill smoked Cuban cigars I don’t know how much truth there is to this claim.
