In the afternoon of our arrival some friends asked me if I would like to join them for an excursion to the Cataratas, the falls on the Brazilian side. They are in a beautiful national park, full of luxuriant vegetation. I had been there 7 years ago, but now the weather was fine.

The public bus brought us right to the entrance of the park, where we changed into another bus which brought us closer to the falls. And then we saw them, the overwhelming range of cascades, large and small ones, falling from different heights over brown rocks, embellished by green spots.

Clouds of spray hovered over the falls, and the sun painted beautiful rainbows.

At the upper part of the Brazilian side of the falls looking at Garganta do Diablo / Devil’s Throat

It is a most enchanted scenery, with the continuous roar of the falling waters resounding over the valley. The path lead us closer and closer to the “Devil’s Gorge”, the big hole at the beginning of the falls, where huge amounts of water tower down into the abyss. The water sprinkled over us and gave a cooling feeling. The soul feels uplifted and inspired by all the natural beauty. Some coatis were running around, watching us tourists, and waiting for some food to be picked up.

The next day we went with some small busses to the Argentinean side, where you can go even deeper into the cascades, through forests full of tropical bushes. A little train brought us to a catwalk leading to the other side of the Devil’s Gorge. The waters seem to be so quiet before rushing down into the abyss – like in life, where surprises often come unexpected.

At the end you can look from a platform down directly into the white of the thundering waters, without seeing the bottom.

Flocks of birds were dancing in the clouds, sometimes disappearing in the waters. A friend said he had seen a film about these birds having their nests behind the falling waters, a safe place without any natural enemies.

We later went with a little ferryboat to the St. Martin’s island in the middle of the falls.

A boat in front of the rocks of St. Martins Island

Some huge black birds circled over our heads or sat in trees.

Some lizards darted over the rocks or enjoyed the sun. Signs warned of serpents, but we didn’t see any.

On St Martin’s Island there is said to be a power-spot, an entrance to the subtle Devic kingdom – and you could really feel the sublime presence, surrounded by the torrential cascades.

The sun painted horizontal rainbows into the mist over the rocks.

The energetic center is said to be around the rock in the middle – a superb, but inaccessible place.

For hours after the return there remained the impression of the thundering waters in my subtle bodies. It had such a strong impact of purification, power and upliftment.

In Eastern wisdom teachings the descent and ascent of water is seen as the movement of involution and evolution of creation. It is described with the “Narayana” mantram. A friend from Miami who was at the group living in Iguazú sent me today a picture of the falls writing:

“I selected this photo because for me it represents the synthesis of the message of the past group living: NARAYANA: Waters from heaven and waters from the earth. For me the mist that is produced from the fall of the water represent our souls going on the return path. Thousands and thousands of little drops that at the end merges with the immense, unlimited blue sky.”

Friday I was in a suburb of Zurich for a meeting with the web marketing agency with which we are cooperating in my office. On the way back I had a short stop at Zurich main station, where I had a look at the work of art about which I had read in the American tech-blog Engadget (and about which I had heard before…)

The Swiss Federal Institute of Technology ETH has installed in the main station hall a huge 3D LED display for its 150th birthday. There are 25,000 bulbs containing each 12 LEDs which are constantly changing colours and patterns. The project is called NOVA and wants to give the travelers a new visual experience: In a surrounding where people are flooded with visual stimuli they want to appeal the people emotionally, remembering them of dreams and visions. The NOVA-team has a fascinating website, which you can also explore with different shapes and colours.

The structure reminds me of group relations not only in technology, but also with human beings. When their patterns harmoniously cooperate, a beautiful lightful structure can appear.

Some days ago I came across the website of the Kalliopeia Foundation, a private philanthropic foundation, located in San Rafael, California. (Kalliopeia or Kalliope is one of the Muses of ancient Greece, the goddess of music, song and dance. They chose this name as a symbol “of the intuitions and faculties centered in the higher self which call on us “to remember.”).

Kalliopeia is giving grants to support a cultural shift towards a recognition of oneness of life within diversity: “Kalliopeia Foundation contributes to the evolution of communities and cultures that honor the unity at the heart of life’s rich diversity.” They “support projects which bring together the voices of those who are inspired to create, express and define an emerging consciousness of oneness through many areas of human endeavor”.

They have very inspiring principles and areas of sponsorship:
“Kalliopeia supports projects that contribute to a growing awareness of what unifies, rather than divides, all people. Through our grantmaking programs we support the work of people committed to holistic personal, community and planetary transformation and healing based on the recognition that we are at the core one humanity, expressing itself through myriad ways and forms.

We are particularly interested in projects that help to deepen our understanding of what it means for humanity to live in harmony with the whole of life. Central to this question is the need to evolve local to global systems of living that are founded upon a recognition of the oneness at the core of life and what that means in terms of how we live, both individually and collectively.”

You find interesting projects when looking at the page with the organisations they sponsored. One of the projects they supported with grants is the Kosmos Journal (“An Integral Approach To Global Awakening” – ” KOSMOS is an ancient Greek term meaning the harmony and beauty of the universe wherein all parts have their place within the Whole”).

An Argentinian friend living in Spain yesterday sent me a link to this journal writing: “I know the people and they are well-intended seekers, to my humble understanding.” I also saw that a lady whom I met 8 years ago at a seminar is working for the journal … A small world.

A forest cosmos of anemones

Some days ago I read in the NZZ Folio-Magazine an article by Luca Turin on “The sound of impossible objects” (also translated into English). It is about William Sethares, a researcher from the University of Wisconsin at Madison (“Each of us plays several roles in life. Some of my favorite are: researcher, teacher, and musician”) .

Sethares did experiments where he electronically stretched the musical octaves and observed what happened with the chords: Some combinations sounded very dissonant, while others produced an astonishing consonance. Some scales he used were more harmonious for the ears than others. So in 19-tone, the “octave” on the keyboard is a fifth larger than the normal one.

Sethares calls this “Xenotonality” (from the Greek word for “strange” combined with tones). The results are described on his website as “strange and somewhat eeri. The effect was so different from the tempered scale that there was no tendency to judge in-tuneness or out-of tuneness.” Some of the songs sound quite normal, some leave an alienating feeling.

You can listen to some example from his CDs, like Incidence and Coincidence. I got a strange feeling from these sounds, like being a bit “off the track”, and the effect lasted for quite some time afterwards. It is not just the kind of vibrations I would love to expose myself to over a longer time, but and interesting transgression of the boundaries of the sound-range of physical instrument. In this context see the next blogpost on “Silence, Speech and Sound”.

Loudspeaker in a little forest ashram in Andhra Pradesh, India

I yesterday got some pictures from a friend with inspiring words coming from “pravsworld.com“, which “through its content strives to create a better human being, by cultivating ideas and values, spreading love & peace in this World to make it a better place to live; nurture peace and harmony, to have a human understand other, more importantly understand himself and realize his true potential.”

The header of the site “Pravs World”

They describe themselves as “The World’s most popular and the largest Web Group over the internet. Its probably the only that features a extensive collection of content that relates to inspiration in life and is dedicated to enrich and spread human values. It’s an inspiration to open your mind and touch your heart with words that makes positive impact. It’s an emotion felt by millions of individuals from over 120 Countries.”

You might be astonished about the name – it is the nickname of the initiator, who lives in Mumbai, India, but who doesn’t want to give his personality name because “I believe you should be known for the work you do, and your work should not be known for who you are. Let me be known for the work I do, and once you read this entire page I would seem more like a friend than some stranger.”

Have a look at the site, you find a great number of inspirational messages, and you can subscribe there to different mailing lists with daily inspiring thoughts.

Image Copyright – Pravs World & its photographers

While the rest of the family went skiing today, I stayed at home. Since the sun tinged everything in a soft, misty light and brought back a spring feeling after a few days of a winter backslide, I took my bike and went to the nearby Elfenau park in the afternoon. There was a beautiful spring magic around, which I tried to capture in a few photos.

Crocuses heralding the approach of spring

A meadow full of violet and white

The fish of a fountain – is he drinking the waters of spring light? – The right ambiance of the present Pisces time.

Statue of a maid in a meditative mood enjoying the rays of the sun

Statue of a child playing with a fish -another symbol of the Pisces time

Some elves playing in the bushes of the Elfenau (the name meaning meadow of the elves)

Promenaders enjoying the sun, with view of the Alps and the Aare river in the valley

A totally different magical world in the greenhouse of the botanical garden just 50 meters away.

Water dripping into a little pond

Fiery flames of vibrant life

Violet flames of radiant beauty

Depth of the heart

View into a cactus – creative unfoldment

Beauty is a profound expression of spirituality. In the beauty of nature you can discover depths of your own soul.

Today I came across a hint to the website about the “water footprint” and the “Virtual Water Project“. Virtual water means the amount of water used in the production of a good or service. The water footprint is generally expressed in terms of the volume of water use of an individual or a community per year. The concept has been developed in 2002 by Arjen Hoekstra from UNESCO-Institute for Water Education IHE. You can calculate your individual water footprint (or that of a nation), based on your country and your consumption pattern, to get an idea of how much fresh water you consume. Or you can see here, how much fresh water is being produced for the production of an apple (70 litres), a glass of beer ( 75 litres) or a hamburger (2400 litres.

Designer Timm Kekeritz from traumkrieger Gmbh, created a double-sided poster, where he visualised the findings of the Virtual Water Project, “to make the issue of virtual water and the water footprint perceptible”, as he writes. Have a look at his impressive visualisation, which you can also order online.

Poster (c) Timm Kekeritz, traumkrieger GmbH.

The Creative Review Blog has posted 4 images showing “The Bible According To Google Earth”. The pictures have been realised by the Sydney-based creative collective ”The Glue Society“, visualising scenes from the Bible as if captured by Google Earth. Four key Biblical events are portrayed as if seen from above, in “God’s Eye View”: Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, Noah’s Ark, Moses parting the Red Sea, and The Crucifixion. The Glue Society has realized the pictures commissioned by Pulse Art for the Miami art fair.

James Dive from the Glue Society says: “We like to disorientate audiences a little with all our work. And with this piece we felt technology now allows events which may or may not have happened to be visualized and made to appear dramatically real. As a method of representation satellite photography is so trusted, it has been interesting to mess with that trust.”

Noah’s Ark, by ”The Glue Society“, from (c) Creative Review Blog (extract)

Is really seeing still believing? There is so much “virtual reality” and “reality shaping”. On the other hand, many so-called “new” imaginations and ideas exist since long in the storehouse of the global mind, even from previous ages. Many of the computer games tap on these imaginations for their visual illustrations.

The Eastern wisdom knows a state of very refined inner perception, where an initiate can “read” in the Akasha. Akasha is meaning space or ether, and the initiate who can see the Akashic recordings is said to be able to zoom back and forth in time and space, to whatever location in the present and past, thus also to “Noah’s Ark”. Even if the authenticity of Akashic reading cannot be proven by objective science, being a “subjective” research method, the many different reports about it hint at its existence.

See also the Google-Earth related blog-posts “Looking from Space into the Garden“, “High Resolution Zooming – with Google Maps or Visualisation“, “Google Online Mapping Initiative against Darfur Genocide” and “An Atlas of our Changing Environment“.

In the morning after prayer there was a fire ritual in the retreat centre, conducted by Sri Kumar and Srimati Kumari. The mantric chanting accompanying the ritual charged the air, while the flames of the fire were growing high, invoking the presence of the Devas, Agni. After the ritual some flavoured rice with sweets was distributed to the participants.

At 10 o’clock the bus came to bring us to the Planetary Healing Centre Harmony, beautifully located near the road running along the seaside. Last year it was still a small road, now 4 ways were giving a much faster ride.

The Planetary Healing Centre

Sri Kumar explained: “This Healing Centre is energised by a seer who lived here long ago and whose energy is present here and vibrates much healing energy. It is therefore an important place for healing purposes and healing meditations. The centre is perceived, conceived and constructed according to the solar principle which is the basis for all life, the Solar Lord functions with number 1 and 7. He bestows health, he bestows the light of wisdom, he is seen as the basis for the life and light to pay homage to this seer we gather once a year amidst so many programs, once in a year we gather.”

In the shade of the old cashed trees there is an old Maitreya statue, around which the group gathered for the lecture of Sri Kumar.

After the lecture (I’m typing my notes to make them available after the seminar) we moved into the healing centre. There are circles around an onyx globe where we gathered for singing 21 times the holy word OM and meditation.

After lunch we went to a nearby beach to enjoy the beauty of the Gulf of Bengal. I had a short swim in the ocean – a beautiful refreshing feeling.

Four days ago we went to the Simhachalam temple beautifully located on the hill above the village where the Guru Pooja festival took place. Through rows of shops and beggars we entered the temple, went through the outer and inner parts into the innermost, where in a dark room there is a huge lingam – an oval shaped stone representing the power of divine will – covered with yellow and orange cloths. The group stood around the silver shrine, in which a priest conducted a little ceremony for us: He waved some camphor light around the lingam and offered the light to us, as a sign of inner purification through fire. He gave some flowers and water to each one of us.

We then went around the temple, the walls of which are covered with sculptures with numerous lion-figures (Simhachalam means Lion temple, the temple of the Lion of the Heart, where the sign of Leo is located) and scenes from the 10 avataras of Lord Vishnu. When leaving the temple, some sweets were distributed as “prasad” – gift after a ceremony.

Afterwards we went down the stairs into the valley. The way runs along huge banyan trees with their air-roots hanging all around, little shrines and statues, and the air was filled with some rhythmic Indian music – a beautiful scenery.

Beggars on the way to the temple, waiting for pilgrims

In front of Simhachalam temple

The seat of the Lion in the inner court of the temple

The Narasimha-Avatar of Lord Vishnu – the Man-Lion, symbol of opening the heart centre

The way down to the valley