2HAIKU
10/19/05
10 amazing, fun and hardworking Bangladeshis, at a rate of three 15 Kilo baskets a minute, nine hours a day for two days remove the thick plug of Ganga silt from the sinking temple, just near Manikarnika Kund. She hasnıt been cleaned for years. We expose 13 lingams, six in the center fount. This is after 3 days of using the power washer from a generator pump in a boat from the river, blasting away the meter or so high burm that had built up around the temple in the last monsoon.
Also freed is the apathy of the Brahmin, the curiosity of those that inhabit and work at the ghat and the gratitude and sheer devotional pleasure of the elders that live in the neighborhood. The scorn backlash is now eroded by the amount of visitors daily. Plus the pagal gora, or crazy honky if you prefer coming each dawn to draw water from Mother Ganga and perform his clumsy puja. Devotion is always trump, you canıt hide from God.
Itıs sometimes, no always, difficult to be sure where honesty and unconditionality lies in this city. The oldest living city in the world, it has many lies and more truths forgotten then youngsters like Paris, Rome, London and New York combined. There are simple chai shops older then most of those cities here on the banks of the most worshipped River in the world. The footprints of Vishnu are encased in stone steps from the Manikarnika Kund just near the sinking temple. Vishnu goes way back if you didnıt know.
This cleaning project started from a dream, of course there may have been better ways from some perspectives to use ones money, it in fact has made me live even more Spartan but I guess thatıs part of the offering. How can you gauge what the cash value of an experience is? It may be years before I can even absorb, much less comprehend what it means.
Itıs from here that I will start the Panchcoshi, the walk of the five temples, to be begun on Shiva ratri and finished the same night. Yeah 50 kilometers in no shoes wandering through this city, not sure really where all the temples are sounds crazy but right now with the energy of the full moon in me it seems the only walk that I really want to take.
************
It's not just mud, there is puja trash, city trash and undeclared items in the much wherever it pools and comes to a stop. In this case it's at the door to the mandir. We pull the trash out as to not just flush it into the Ganga, I had to fight for this method and I still think behind crazy babaji's back it got tossed anyway. This is where the ghat kids were really interested to see what we turned up. Many coins, one cheap gold plated necklass and lots of alter items came our of this spot.
One advantage of the big preassure hose it that we can wash all of it, spraying down the columns the atrium and all of the outside. It's a beautiful aged stone color and the carvings are gorgeous, all flying goddess with differant mudras they are flying. Each bit that is exposed gives us more pride and more energy. still day two goes slower than we expect as we have to be a bit more careful than just blowing the silt off the flat stone surface surrounding it. There are problems with the brahmins and the pump but we get a full day of work in.
The strange thing is it's just where you look how you feel about it. Now all around is fresh and clean stone, a bidi or chai cup stands out and screams that it's trash where before you couldn't really focus on just one piece. If you look forward on the project it's daunting, so much work and now this is the end of day two, you see a clean temple entrance or a huge hole that's filled with
Mercy Corps puts 91% into the field
NW Medical Teams 91% goes into the field
100 years of natural disasters
So is the temple half clean or half dirty? It doesn't matter it's what's in front of you not it's description that you have to deal with. Whether or not the motivations are in the right place at this point it's straight up seva and daunting, not only is it filled with thousands of baskets of heavy silt also it's full of water. I'm feeling it as holy as it's been in the temple since monsoon and last year I got to watch it fill up.
John Perkins "Confessions of an economic hit man"
ABOUT US | CONTACT | TIP JAR
Copryright 2004, ItsALLLove.com. All rights reserved. But you know how it is; if you really gotta borrow something without asking, remember where you got it, and put it to good use.
BLOG ARCHIVE
02/22/06
01/27/06
11/24/05
11/09/05
10/19/05
06/07/05
05/16/05
02/01/05
01/19/05
12/29/04
12|06|04
11|24|04
11|08|04
10|14|04
09|11|04
09|07|04
08|23|04
Today Teelu, Madan's brother, Madan who got married, and I began the cleaning of the Mandir temple- at the Manikarnika ghat. The main burning ghat that takes it's name from an amrit pool where the water is of unknown source, hot in the winter and cool in the summer.
Day to day, moment-to-moment, breath to breath is the method for the synthesis of time recommended by therapists, gurus, rickshaw wallahs and talking mirrors everywhere.
I'm really thankful. Yes it's 'made up' holiday. On this day I always wonder
If they had asked the pilgrims for visas and passports then scanned them for virus'. All those that love the great white American Dream should just thankful that they fed them. Clealy now for many the dream has always been the American Nightmare So maybe if the Teya or Iroquios had an immigration department if would have slowed but been no different. It's a fact that the first thanksgiving is may not be the starting point of the genocide of 100 million peoplesbut it's good referance point.
Will somebody impeach my president, please?
He's a two time election rigger, didn't get my vote but I respect the game of democracy and the rules are he took the oath, he's the president. But its impeachment we want and he has to be in office to get the honor of the fourth president to be impeached.
Is fear terroring U.S. apart?
Yeah I hear it all the time. How can it all be love? -Suicide bombers, Asian flu, killer hurricanes... It's easy to make a fear and terror list. Do you have a list of things you would stake your life to defend?
Memorial Day? Mainly this is just a day off, let's face it, most Americans think it's a signal that summer is here. Airfares go up, the sun is back, and the BBQ gets fired up. I got dead FAM, have some in my circle with recent war dead. When you have dead you knew by eye contact that Memorial Day is every day. These dead and especially this war, the freshest war, are painful in so many ways;are the recent dead the deadest?
Scripture in the toilet; now that's news! Flushing the Koran!? What's the counterpunch; garbage disposal the Bible, shred the Sutras and Vacuum up the Vedas. Looks like the World Conflict Inc. marketing department is working overtime.
This is an open letter to the children of Abraham. Okay I know I'm goyish and an infidel, hell I'm even from the left coast of America but stil... You Abrahamites have a family fight going. We can see since Sarah conceived the rift began, or so we're told. By the time Abraham got to the sacrificial alter the trend had been set. You don't even agree which child he dragged up the hill to sacrifice. It is the same voice from the clouds isn't it? Ultimately do you think you're speaking to the same God?
Not one damn dime? Divest from the economy for the day as a method of sending a message? Believe me, I'm behind all protest to the coronation of King George Bush, the 44th President of the US. I'm going to stock up at the farmers market, invite friends for food but my divesting will not bring much satisfaction or I believe much influence on the powers that be.
Death and destruction, birth and evolution; these are our daily polarities. These are more than interesting times. We set records every day as a species. Of all in the animal kingdom we prey on our own more than any other animal.
C'mon if you could rub a cream on your butt that shifted you to being smarter, pain free, sexy and strong would you lather up?
What sort of meal would it have been if the Iroquois nation had a terror alert of red and stopped the pilgrims at the beach, searched them and checked passports?
So you think Kerry took a dive? Like Sonny Liston, took the hope flickering in the hearts of the poor, the unemployed,
disempowered, young and old and flopped onto the canvas. After that whole time telling us it was on the way. That it got way closer than they thought they would get.
11|04|04
Lies straight into the face, vote spoiling in battleground states, the knowledge that our village is ripped down the middle and still I Love America.
To the attention whores out there masquerading as 'undecided' voters in America: find a new pick up line.
Nine one one. Numbers here in the usa you call for emergency. It's now a wobble in our calendar.
If you bought some orange juice futures in august stop rolling in your dividends and hand someone a century note!
Golden temples smokin' in Najaf, gold medals danglin' in Athens. It swirls at the pace of a surprise hurricane.