This morning we were at a sublime exposition of orchids and ikebana art in the Elfenau Park, Berne, with a rare presentation of thousands of orchids and many exquisite flower compositions.

I arranged a powerpoint (10.1 MB) with a selection of photos I took there. Though the exposition was very crowded, the flowers radiated such an extraordinary beauty, delicacy and silence which may bring you inspiration.

A friend sent the following joke:

Conversation with God

Man: God?
God: Yes?
Man: Can I ask you something?
God: Of course!
Man: What’s a million years for you?
God: A second.
Man: And a million dollars?
God: A penny.
Man: God, Could I have a penny?
God: Wait for a second.

Man phoning with God at the Wailing Wall, Jerusalem. Photo: Wikipedia

There were some turbulent days after our landing from India: 4 days later we moved to a new apartment in a neighbour village. Though we had prepared a lot in advance it was an intense course. The time of leaving the old place where we had lived for 16 years and now establishing at the new location reminds me of the interlude between two incarnations: All lessons learnt in the past life get stored into the permanent atoms and then the old sheaths are thrown off. Then new sheaths gather around the centre and the cells build up the new body as the dwelling place of the soul.

Many things were left behind, given to the waste disposal… In the new apartment many things did not fit in the way we had it in the old home: How to arrange the furniture, the home office, the meditation place, where to hand up the pictures, which new order to establish in the bathroom or the kitchen? A lot of decisions had to be made in common, and now, 10 days later, many things have found their new places, but a number of boxes with numerous articles still have to be emptied… So the “soul” has taken possession of its new body of incarnation.

Not only in the house, also in the surroundings adaptations have to be done: New neighbours, new places in the garage or the basement; The way to the office or to the shopping centres have changed, the distances and the perspectives are different. The new flat offers a wider horizon, a panoramic view through some trees and over some houses to the Alps. The house is located at the foot of a hill and we yesterday discovered some streets and paths… The ringing of the church bells gives us the time and meter of the day (it is just ringing while I write these lines). A new rhythm unfolds the dynamics of which we are still to discover. A new beginning, a new phase of our lives.

Saturday morning sunrise over the neighbour farmhouse, seen from the office room

View from the bedroom: a little stone cave with a meditating Buddha

View from the balcony: Some old timbered houses and the Alps in the background

The house seen from the neighbour farmhouse; we are living in the ground floor apartment.

View down from the hill behind our home

View of the Alps from the hill.

Late last night we returned from India – still a bit tired, but well. It was a deep and fulfilling journey, but no time remained for blogging. The the seminar with Sri Kumar on The Cosmic Person was intense, and we did several small excursions. And above all there were lot of exchanges with the group members, besides the meditations etc. So here come some extracts from my notes, as a continuation of the previous blogpost, and here a slideshow with some pictures.

Friday, 14 January in the afternoon we went to the house of Sri Kumar for a ceremony of blessing the children. It is done on the lunar winter solar eclipse day and a long story is linked to it – the incarnation of the Divine as the Dwarf Avatar, which Sri Kumar told us afterwards.

Monday, 17 January 2011 we went with a bus on a 2 hours ride to Vizianagaram to visit the Angirasa Mithila Vidyalaya (free school of the WTT for children of a rural area wit now about 130 children). We received a very warm welcome – all members were garlanded with flowers and received a coconut to drink.

There was a celebration inside the school, and afterwards a person told us how the school came about: The school started September 2002, now it has about 130 children.The school is recognised by the government of Andhra Pradesh and has been expanded up to 7th class. Besides, free homoeopathic medicine is distributed to patients.

After a beautiful Indian lunch and a group photo we continued our ride to Sri Kakulam, where we visited the Bala Bhanu school, another school of the WTT.

Wednesday, 19 January 2011, in the morning there was the fire ritual for Capricorn full moon.

Afterwards the group visited the Mithila school in the fishermen colony of Visakhapatnam, located in a very poor slum area. About 60 children are taken care and receive free clothes, food and school in three classes. The school is run by the Circle of Good Will, India, who finances all the activities. The school is called the “Mother of the Sea”, since the people around totally depend on fishing and the nourishment nature gives them.
The children recited several verses and sung a prayer to Mother India.

After some coffee the group continued to the Krishna Ashram multi-service centre. At that place the Circle of Good Will conducts a number of service activities, which Navaneetam presented to us: “The house was donated by a lady who lived here for a long time. She departed in 2006. In the beginning it was a totally different place. The Circle started there the main homoeo centre, different doctors are taking care of homoeo activities and also cardiac consultation and surgery totally for free.
There is a vocational training for unemployed women. Daily they cook food there and take it to people in difficult situations and to children. In the backyard there are several cows as a service to go-madri, the cow as mother. At the place they are taking care for over 700 people, giving food, clothes and also professional education to selected students totally free.

Thursday the group went to the Daspalla Hotel to listen to Dr. G. Bhakthavatsalam, chairman of K.G. Hospitals, Coimbatore, who spoke about Health and Healing. Sri Kumar presided the meeting organised by the Circle of Goodwill, Visakhapatnam. Dr. Bhakthavatsalam gave a very inspiring and humorous talk about good living as the basis for good health.

In the afternoon we went to the temple site of the WTT, Ramadri. Since the last time we had been there in January 2010, the site had been further developed, with beautiful flowers, and also an enlarged cow worship: The cows are taken care of as a ritual and whether they give milk or not, they are well kept. We went around the compound to visit the different little temples and the Mithila school, where free classes are given for children from the neighbouring villages, together with fundamentals of spirituality. The children from the school presented a beautiful rose to each one of us.

Later there was the installation of new Ramanama-boxes, a ritual done there. Afterwards we had a silent meditation together with Sri Kumar. A man who came to the ceremony invited the whole group for the evening to the Sri Venkateshvara-temple in Visakhapatnam. So on our way back we visited the temple and  joined a ritual worship of the Lord of the 7 hills. It was a colourfull worship with a vibrant atmosphere, where we all offered flowers, waved camphor lights and received some presents. In the evening Saundarina, the daughter of Navaneetam and Uma, gave a beautiful Indian dance performance in the prayer room.

Friday, 21 January the group went to the Planetary Healing Centre for noon meditation and then returned home.

The Planetary Healing Centre near Visakhapatnam

Maitreya Statue in the garden

Meditation inside

Due to the cold of Sri Kumar, there was no lecture at the Healing centre, but in the afternoon the Master surprisingly gave a final lecture at the Retreat Centre. In the evening after meditation there was a good-bye ceremony as the end of the beautiful seminar. Each one who liked could express a word of thanks, and then clothes as the traditional presents were distributed.

Saturday morning we started our homeward journey together with some other members. We had a short stay in Chennai where 2 Indian friends received us. They had arranged our stay there. In the afternoon we visited the Headquarters of the Theosophical Society in Adyar, the place where H.P. Blavatsky had been teaching for a while under the huge Banyan Tree. Though on the outer the place gave an expression of crystallisation and rigidity of the guardians, on the inner is was filled with subtle experiences.

Portal with the old banyan tree in the background, which expands over a huge area

Statue of Helena Blavatsky and Henry S. Olcott, founders of the Theosophical Society

Mandala decoration in front of a Mithila school

Since a week now we are in India at the seminar and the 3 day “50 Years Guru Pooja Celebrations” of the World Teacher Trust, which ended last Thursday.Guru Poojas are done in honour of the great spiritual masters – at this place every year in January and some more at other places

Time is so filled here that I don’t find much time to blog… And when I wanted to send my notes to the groups, the server of the mailing list didn’t work. By now the provider found out that someone has intruded into the server and deleted the infrastructure, so that it has to be set up anew – also the mailing lists (my backup of the list is some month old…)

Besides that we have a very beautiful stay here in India – with a group of 47 members from the West. It’s now for me the 11th time here, but I love it still. It is always like a family meeting with inspiring exchanges with friends some of them we meet just once a year here in India.

Last Sunday, the day before the start of the Guru Pooja we visited the old temple of Simhachalam. There in the Sactum Sanctorum a lingam (oval-shaped symbol of the Divine) is worshiped with a little ritual with camphor and Tulsi leaves. Focusing on the inner I could feel the uplifting vibrating energies of the place.

A waterfall on the way through the forest back to the vailley

On the compound of the Guru Pooja the preparations for the celebration were in full swing. Members of the Indian brotherhood were setting up the altar, fixing lights, prepareing meals in huge pots over open fires. The joyous ambiance of Guru Pooja was spreading all around.

I’m not going to report here in detail what was going on there during the 3 days. Those who are seriously interested might ask me for the seminar notes. You can see some pics here.

Fire ritual last Tuesday morning

A final view of the tent-hall before leaving.

A friend sent a collection of YouTube-links to Indian mantrams, songs and videos, which I would like to share (didn’t yet find time to go through all… Since we are leaving to India in half an hour, a good tuning in…

OM RAM RAMAYA SWAHA (DEVA PREMAL)

OM NAMAH SHIVAYA
peaceful
by Jagjit Singh
Siva Sahasranama Mantra

VISHNU MANTRA

THE FLUTE OF LORD KRISHNA

The Flute of Krishna (1925)

Hey Ram Hey Ram (JAGJIT SINGH)
Another version

Hey Govind Hey Gopal (JAGJIT SINGH)
live

Jai Radha Madhav (JAGJIT SINGH)

Saanwariya Mann Bhaya Re (JAGJIT SINGH)

Bolo Ram Jai Jai Ram (JAGJIT SINGH)

Jai Ragunandan Jai Siya Ram (JAGJIT SINGH)

Hare Krishna Hare Rama (JAGJIT SINGH)

Tum Meri Rakho Laaj Hari (JAGJIT SINGH)

Deenan Dukh Haran Dev (JAGJIT SINGH)

Hari Tum Haro Jan Kee Peer (Jagjit Singh)

Prathameshwaraa Ganadheeshwaraa (Jagjit Singh)

Jai Jai Ganapatti Bhaktan Hitkaaree (Jagjit Singh)

Pratham Sumir Shri Ganesh (Jaggit Singh)

Ram Simar Ram Simar (Jagjit Singh)

Bisar Gaee Sab Taat Paraaee (Jagjit Singh)

Megh Barse Subanee Thaaeen (Jagjit Singh)

Kavan Gun Praanpat (Jagjit Singh)

He Krishna Gopal Hari (Jagjit singh)

Gaaiye Ganapati Jagavandan (Jagjit Singh)

Vande Ganapati Vighnavinaashan (Jagjit Singh)

Hay Shiv Shankar Hey Karunakar (Jagjit Singh)

Guru Manyo Granth (Jagjit Singh)

Ganapati Bappa Moriya (Jagjit Singh)

Om Shreem Hreem Shreem Kamale Kamalaleyi Praseed Praseed Om Shreem Hreem Shreem Mahalaxmiyei Namaha

Om Mahalakshmyai cha vidmahe Vishnu patnyai cha dhimahi Tanno Lakshmihi prachodayat

Aum Hrim Shri Lakshmi Bhyo Namah

Mahalakshmi Stotram
(Hrīm Tám ma ávaha játevedó lakshmím anapa gáminím yasyám Hiranyam prabhūtam gávó dásyó aśván vindeyam purushan aham|| (15)
Śrīm Ǒm mahá-devyai cha vidmahe, vishnu-patnaiya cha dhímahi Tanno Lakshmíh prachódayát || (16)
Ǒm Shántih, Shántih, Shántih

Mahalakshmi Manosthute
Another version

Gayatri Mantra
Another version
DEVA PREMAL

Om Jai Jagadish Hare

Instrumental

Music of the Soul -Full Moon

Boxes are piling up in our living room – end of the month we are moving to a new apartment and, before leaving to India end of this week, we must be ready with the biggest bunch of materials…

Sunday evening I took down the mirror hanging at the entrance, a beautiful mirror with flowers painted on it. The story of this gift came to my mind – over 22 years ago an elder friend gave it to us on the occasion of our wedding. And there was another story behind:

The mirror

Easter 1984 this friend invited me to his house in Canadel at the Côte d’Azur in Southern France (Google street view from the place). He was a British-German architect who was constructing a very nice villa mainly by himself, and I spend about 3 beautiful weeks there helping him.

One day he asked me, “Don’t you have a girlfriend?” I said, “No”. – “I’ll get you one.” – “You are crazy.” – “I will see.”

Some weeks later he was at a spiritual seminar in Switzerland where he met a couple with their daughter. He told her that she should get to know me. She was curious and didn’t have a friend at that time. So he invited her and me to another seminar in Switzerland. I was living at that time in Northern Germany and told him, “No, I don’t come.” However, he invited me for another visit in Southern France for the time of the following New Year and I accepted.
I wasn’t aware that he also invited her, I didn’t want to be made a match, but that way I came to meet my future wife… We had four days together, and that was the beginning.

The only occasion I met our friend again was 3 years later when he came to see us in Switzerland – I had moved there in the meantime – to bring us the mirror as a wedding present.

We lost sight of the man. Time ran by. About 15 years later we were camping with our children near that place at the coast and had a look at the villa – it looked different. There was a French name at the premises and there was no sign of our friend. Some years later I googled his name, but there was a number of persons, none from the place in Germany where they lived.

Yesterday I did another search and came across a newspaper article about the 80th birthday of our friend, who in the meantime was living near Lake Constance in South Germany. This way it was easy to find his address and phone number. I rang him up yesterday evening. The voice at the phone was a bit surprised but sounded the same like 26 years ago. We quickly entered into a vivid conversation. He said he had sold the house to a Frenchman from Lille years ago… He still was working with geomancy, dowsing, experimenting with energy fields and air ionizing. He told me about his experiments. And he wanted to know more about what I’m doing now.

I told him that last summer I had been on a seminar of our spiritual teacher just in his neighbour village. He was astonished and we quickly found out that he knew 2 of my friends living very close by with whom I had been in India last year. He was about to meet one of them today. A small world.

And he told me: “There are guardian angels,  who do in the world a largely unknown work of protecting and connecting people, of weaving links of light. They had woven the link between you and your wife, and I just got the idea to bring you into contact. I tried to do it with other people, but it never worked.” Probably because it was his trying and not the work of the angels.

He added: “A clairvoyant person just told me that today would be a bad day for me, with negative influences.” (By the way, it was the night of no-moon, just before the solar eclipse of today.) I answered, No, I will do my prayers, and they will overcome all negative influences. I had a very good day, and your phone call was just the top of it.”

I smiled and thought, yes, the guardian angel has done a good job to reconnect us.

Read here a follow-up of the story and a later continuation.

An angel in the house of a friend in France.

This night we are passing from December 31st, 2010 to January 1st, 2011, and start, in our counting, a new year. At the threshold stands Janus, the god of gates, doors, doorways, beginnings, endings and time in Roman mythology.

Bust of Janus from the Vatican (Wikipedia)

There are many different new years, and it is good to remember the relativity of our social convention as per the 1st of January, a date which is neither a threshold on the planet nor in cosmos. It took quite a long time before 1 January became the standard start of the civil year.

Here are some thoughts of Master EK (Ekkirala Krishnamacharya) about “The Beginning of the New Year” and how it is celebrated in traditional India as well as some thoughts about purification:

“Where does the year begin or end? Cyclically seasons emanate from it to blossom and come to fruition. In this gyration of the year all living things – trees, as also creatures that are aquatic, earthly and airborne – have their own individual beginnings. It is natural for each to consider its own emergence as the beginning of the year. It is a similar line of thinking that made man come up with the idea of “Samvatsaradi” (adi=beginning, Samvatsara = year). Men brought up in different regions have taken a different approach to this concept of the New Year. People residing on the equator have a different New Year different from those of people residing at the North and South poles. This has given rise to the differences in the customs and habits of people belonging to different continents and countries.
Various traditions connected with the New Year have come into vogue over the years. By the earth’s going round the sun once, the solar year is formed. Depending on the movements of the Sun and the Moon, the full moon and the new moon, the lunar year is formed. In this way, a total of nine types of measurements of years as also the astrological knowledge required to arrive at them were available from lakhs of years to a few countries like India. What are widely in use in a majority of the nations are solar and lunar months. What is now regarded as the beginning of the year, January 1st, is based on the astrology of Huns. What is observed as the beginning of the year in India, ancient Egypt, Greece Mesopotamia and all the Arab countries is based on lunar calculations. This is “Chaitrasuddha pratipat.” Usually this falls around 14th or 15th of April.

There is a scientific principle behind considering April as the first month of the year. Every year in the sun’s course from the south to the north crossing the equator, is referred to as vernal equinox. It is considered a sacred day. It is from this day that fresh tender leaves appear on the trees and a new quickening of life all round occurs. That day also marks the beginning of what in a solar calendar is called the month of “Mesha”. This corresponds to March 21st in the present age. Our ancient people in India accepted as the beginning of the year the day following the first new moon that occurs after this date. They called it springtime may be because fresh impetus for life is activated during this time all over the cosmos. This impulse lies dormant like the oil in the human body or the ghee in milk. It is said in the Rigveda that if the year were to represent the yajna of life, then, this impulse is like the offering of ghee made during yajnas. Treating that as the beginning of the year ancient scientists identified six seasons based on the laws of nature operative during each of those seasons.

March 21st tallies with our solar calendar. Not only that, the human year seems to abide by the ancient astrological calculations of other nations also. As proof of the fact that the solar calendar was followed by many other nations in determining the beginning of the year, we may examine the names of few more months. September corresponds to “Saptama” which means “Seventh”. September will be seventh month only if March were to be the first month. Similarly, October corresponds to “Astama” or eighth month, November to “Navama” or ninth month and December to “Dasama” or tenth month, only when March is taken to be the beginning month of the year. These are months whose names have not been polluted by the encroachment of politics. All the others are changed so drastically as not to leave even a trace of the earlier names or forms.

It is an age old tradition in India washing one’s hair on New Year’s day wearing new clothes and eating chutney made of tender neem flowers. In the olden days, ten days prior to the New Years’ Day used to be declared as holidays to all the departments pertaining to all professions. People were expected to tone up their bodily systems in accordance with the time honoured rules laid down to safeguard one’s health. They were encouraged to get all defects and shortcomings rectified so that perfect health may be re-established. This is not to say that they were forced to swallow medicines. Medicines may alleviate diseases but they can never improve health. Scientists have always been emphatically declaring that protection and promotion of good health depends on the informed care one takes of one’s food and recreational habits. In keeping with the in built nature of each of the seasons, spring time always causes a thorough overhauling of the entire body. This takes place in a gentle way in the case of a healthy man. In diseased people this forces the diseases to flare up. This discovery made our ancient scientists to evolve a technique that can ensure the smooth working out of this springtime “scrutiny”. Ancient sciences like Ayurveda have been saying time and again that everyone should start using such health techniques at least ten days before the New Year’s Day. Those techniques are; one should take an oil bath everyday preferably using gingelly oil, new sprung neem flower should be eaten every day. Pieces of raw mangoes (not pickle) should also be eaten. Tamarind fruits just plucked from the trees should be eaten. Sugar cane juice should be drunk. It is as a symbolic representation of all these rules that the tradition of eating “Ugadi pacchadi” has come into existence. Only as a token of past tradition, little quantities of tamarind water and neem flowers are added now in ugadi chutney. Sometimes raw mango pieces are also used. Some people use jaggery in the place of sugar cane juice. At present, even these little quantities of prescribed health foods are eaten not on all the ten days but only on the New Year’s Day morning, and that too, as a chore to be attended to perfunctorily. The scientific principle behind this technique is now lost in the womb of time, leaving behind only a ‘token’.

This does not mean that the token should be discarded. It only means that the proven scientific truth should be properly followed so as to gain maximum benefit. The ultimate objective of the techniques mentioned above is to enhance the quality of bodily fluids, blood, minerals, flesh etc. These techniques are called elixirs, that is aids that give a tonic boost to the physical body. But this perspective of “rasayanams” is changed now. “Rasayanam” is now understood as a tasty to eat Ayurvedic medicine. Well, coming back to the Telugu New Year and the health techniques enjoined to be practised on that day, we have to admit that they are passing on a tradition that has the backing of science. On that count, let us put these techniques to good use by our implementing of them in our lives.”

Walking into the New Year. Photo of a friend

Winter has the country in its strong grip. Through a snow and ice-storm we arrived two days ago in North Germany, and all the roads are covered with high snow. Walking into the town of the place where I spent my childhood I helped three times pushing cars to get running. Today, Christmas morning, I will meet an old friend with whom I lived together a number of years during the times of my studies. We had “wild times” together. In the meantime he has become a professor of literature, but somehow he remained young in his heart. Whenever I meet him we have a long walk and exchange what has happened over the years.
The two last weeks in Switzerland I took a few winter pics with enchanted impressions.

Merry Christmas!

Christmas tree in the evening sun

Artificial solstice – a black sun hanging between the trees of the park

Villa Mettlen with a christmas tree in the park

Snow balls and black sun

Sun on a stone pile

Enchanted garden

Fountain of light and black sun

Sinking gardens (work of art)

Donkeys in the snow

Setting sun over a farmyard

Christmas scenery at a farm entrance

Santa Claus at the farm entrance

At the moment Christmas or winter related videos are flourishing, and mails with seasons greetings.

Here is a nice video with a song about the snowman and a boy walking in the air:

And here is a beautiful version of the song by “Celtic Woman”.

Another funny video is “The Digital Story of Nativity” or “Christmas 2.0” 🙂

But if you want to write someone a nice e-card, you find 5 themes on the Good-Will site.

A Christmas tree in our village