At times ...

(St. Lucia log)

Yesterday I felt to go to the sea. The idea of it was cleansing in a way that nothing else could be. I felt for a quiet beach, but Rodney Bay, which is walking distance from where Mel lives, was crowded with a pack-load of tourists. We had a light lunch at Spinnakers, then walked along the beach and found a fairly quiet spot toward the end of the bay. The sea was gentle and warm and I went in alone. At times I just floated, surrendering to what is unimaginably larger than I am. At times I folded up like a foetus and was submerged and drifting in a massive womb. At times I tried handstands (which more ended up being flips) - and turned myself upside down like a salt shaker, emptying out. At times I just gently breast-stroked my way through the water. At times I went under the water and, as it supported me, I stretched myself out into whatever pose felt good ... Neptune yoga, maybe? At times I went under the water and spoke into it, knowing it was listening and understanding, even though I didn't really know what to say or how to put the essence into words. It, in itself, is beyond words. At times I just lay down or sat cross-legged in the shallow, allowing the gentle waves to shift me slightly. Then, when I felt to, I came out.

Immaculate

(St. Lucia log cont'd ...)

Stained glass in the Cathedral.
*

Yesterday after a deep and reflective lunch in Castries, we went and sat in the cool darkness of the massive Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception. It felt like being in the belly of what I imagine Noah's ark would look like if it was upside down. The intricate artwork on the high, arched wooden ceilings is amazing. How do they clean it and care for it at such a height? This question baffled me and Mel for a while as we sat on a front pew chatting and gazing around us.

I only took photos of the stained glass windows though.

Divali (short video)

Location: Adam Smith Square, Woodbrook, Trinidad
Shot using video function on digital still camera.

*

Members of the public came off the streets and gathered in the square, co-operating to pour coconut oil into the hundreds of deyas, twist and place wicks in the deyas and light up. Indian music played softly in the background. Cotton candy, popcorn, snow cones, soft drinks and water were on sale from little vendor carts. It was wonderful seeing so many different people - young and old - helping each other and working in harmony to get all the deyas lit. The atmosphere was peaceful and the laughter of many small children filled the square.

With elections having been just a few days ago, of course the night couldn't pass without some election-type comment being made. Someone, struck by the peaceful, harmonious atmosphere, said: "This is a COP Divali."

Light over Darkness, Truth over Untruth

The Temple in the Sea lit up like a Deya at sunset on Wednesday.
*

Today is the celebration of the Hindu Festival of Divali. I may spend the afternoon by a river with a friend, doing some light yoga/meditation, looking for crystals and relaxing. This way we will be 'lighting up ourselves. When darkness falls we will hopefully be somewhere lighting deyas and eating curry and Indian sweets.

I recently read a newspaper article in which makers of deyas were saying that they produce less and less of these clay vessels every year. This is because people are opting for electric Christmas lights ... I suppose due to modern laziness and the quest for 'convenience'. I'm not fond of electric lights for Divali. They don't have that humble feel and earthy beauty, plus they make the place look like Christmas. A few Divalis ago, I was driving around 'looking at lights' with friends. However, there were no lights to look at and the place was pitch black. There was no electricity that night. So much for light conquering darkness.

For those who want the look of deyas but don't want the 'hard work' of pouring oil and placing wicks into hundreds or thousands of deyas and lighting them after, there are those modern deyas with candle wax and wick. They look okay ... but nothing beats the old time authentic deyas with coconut oil, along with the act of dipping the wicks and lighting up. The smell of the oil is comforting and warm and (I find) also builds up more of an appetite for the Divali delicacies.

A strange dream that somehow makes sense

Last night (until early this morning just before waking) I had a long dream which makes me think of something George Orwell could have written.

I remember it vividly, as if it actually happened to me. Maybe it did.

I was in an extremely large warehouse type of building. It was full of women of every imaginable type: nationalities, race, size, age ... you name it, a woman was there representing her. I was "a new one" and was the only one wearing normal clothing (I had on blue jeans and a black top). The other women wore dark green tent-like poncho-like pullovers with white fringes and ties, like what you would see someone wearing in a hospital - only this was not a hospital. I still don't know what it was.

The women were all sitting or standing around in groups, talking with each other and observing me as I was led through the space by the dark, squat female 'guard' (if she can be called that, because it wasn't a prison either) into whose care I had been placed.

My guard/caretaker was kind, which I found out as the dream progressed. Her kindness was not obvious by just looking at her because she never smiled. I think she was Trini, as she had that way of walking slowly with an expressionless look on her face, reminiscent of a reluctant store attendant who would rather be chatting on her cellular phone than attending to the customer. She led me to the centre of the large space and placed me above a small round drainage grill in the floor. These drainage grills were all over the floor of the 'warehouse'. When she told me to take off my clothes and get ready for 'the shower' I realised that this was why the women were all wearing the kind of hospital robes. They had all already been through the showers.

At first I was hesitant, not knowing why I was there and feeling strange about stripping and being bathed by someone else in a room full of women staring at me. My caretaker told me to relax: that everyone had done it and when I take off my clothes it will be "what everyone else has".

I decided to go with the moment and took off all my clothes. The other woman who was with my caretaker took my clothing and disappeared. It didn't feel strange standing there fully exposed to everyone and it was not threatening. The thousands of women around the warehouse continued chatting with each other ... although I noted I was hearing nothing - no murmur of voices. Their chatting was completely silent. The room was silent. Some of these women were looking at me, but not in an ogling or 'macocious' way. Their eyes just naturally rested on me and then went back to their companions. I felt that it was natural to be in this state.

There was one woman who stood out. She was tall and white (the transparent kind of white like a gekko, where you can see the blue veins under the skin) with short, 'zogged' brown hair. At one point the dream skipped and I was walking behind her down a long corridor. There was a moment where she slowed down so that I was walking next to her and, without saying a word or even looking at me, she told me something important ... then quickened her step and walked ahead back into the room with 'the showers' where everyone was.

The dream skipped back to me being bathed by my caretaker. (N.B. Even though I was being 'bathed' by her she was not actually bathing me and I was not physically bathing myself either. Not sure how it was happening, but I was 'being bathed'). She was more like someone just watching over me, 'in charge' of me, attending to me.

Suddenly we were no longer in the warehouse, but out in the open air, on some sunny green grass, away from everyone. As I (was being) bathed, she lowered her voice and said to me: "If you are looking aware and conscious, some may try to stop you. That's why I walk around looking vacant so they don't know." It was the first time anyone used audible words in the whole dream. Only then did I realise that all other talking had been in complete silence.

In a cryptic way I felt that she was telling me that she meditates, so I asked her: "You meditate?"

She said: "Yes. It only looks like we're just cleaning the outside ... but it's the inside."

I understood that the washing in the showers was not a physical, external thing. It was internal. Maybe it was a way of enlightening all of the women in a way that was not obvious to others ... and maybe that's why the women could have spoken with each other without having to use audible words ... and why the tall transparent woman could have told me whatever she did - without using words or looking at me. We were communicating on other levels. And standing naked in front of all of the women was not about 'being naked' because it was not about the body. Perhaps in taking off my clothes, only my spirit was left standing there in the room full of women.

My caretaker took me back inside and gave me two injections. Like everything else, nothing was explained, but I trusted her and trusted the process. One injection was to my upper right arm, the other was in the region of the skin of my upper left back just above the shoulder blade. This felt necessary in the grand scheme of things.

Devotion and Destruction

I don't know anything in T & T that is like the Temple in the Sea. Temples are synonymous with devotion ... and indeed, when you think of how Sewdass Sadhu (an indentured labourer who came to Trinidad in 1907) built the Temple single-handedly in the sea (because he was forbidden to build it on land), it is clear that devotion went into the Temple even before devotees did. (I will copy and paste the Guardian article at the end of this post, for those of you who don't know what Sewdass went through to build this holy landmark). Now to think that vandals recently desecrated the Temple and destroyed the murtis really raises more than the question: Is anything sacred?
*
You may remember my recent collaboration (THE WIND) with Gary and his wife, Susanne. The video footage was shot at the Temple.

*

Treasure in the sea

The Temple-in-the-Sea evokes an image of wonder and awe, not so much for its architectural uniqueness but always for the sacrifice that went into the building effort.

A well known site of worship for Hindus and a tourist attraction, the Waterloo temple was built by Sewdass Sadhu, an indentured labourer who came to Trinidad in 1907.

Community and Social Development Minister Joan Yuille-Williams, at a function last Saturday to help Sadhu’s widow repair her house, remembered the struggle to build the temple as she described the man as “a national icon to be emulated as an example of persistence and struggle”.

The story is well-known: Sadhu built his first temple in 1947 on lands owned by the sugar cane company, Tate and Lyle. It was broken down and Sadhu was charged with trespassing and fined £100 or 14 days in prison.

Declaring that if he couldn’t build his temple on the land then he would build it in the sea, Sadhu began the work that would realise his dream. With two buckets and an old lady’s bicycle with a carrier at the back, Sadhu began the laborious and painstaking task of building the temple in the sea.

Five hundred feet into the quiet waters of the Gulf of Paria, it today continues to stand on the very spot Sadhu first built it, if not in the same condition since repair works were carried out with help from the State and private business in 1994.

Over the years, Hindu devotees and tourists alike have made the journey to the Temple-in-the-Sea, once described as the first of its kind in the western world by Dharmacharya Pundit Krishna Maharaj.

Even then, at the 1995 consecration ceremony of the newly rebuilt temple, Pundit Maharaj had noted that the temple has opened up “a treasure box for the country as a whole as, apart from serving Hindus, it could very well be used as a potential for attracting tourists to the country”.

Still others have remarked on the significance of the Temple-in-the Sea, with at least one visiting swami commenting that it must remain a landmark in T&T’s history, and that visitors should have the chance to see it.

It is heartening, therefore, even as we wonder why it took so long, to learn that Government, through Tidco, has decided the site will be a major tourist attraction in central Trinidad.

If nothing else, this decision could help generate the income to maintain the Temple-in-the-Sea so that it endures as strongly as does the story of a man’s faith and determination to fulfill a dream.

(Source: The Guardian Newspaper).

My Drum Spirits Prayer

Sacred Heart, where the drum class I'm going to is held.
I'm the only person in the class.

*
Spirit of Animal
Spirit of Tree
Spirit of Maker
Spirit of Me
*

Just now as I pulled out Dandelion to practise, I felt the need to connect in a special way and settle myself, as I was feeling scattered. Immediately the little prayer (written above) entered my head. Maybe more will come of it, but for now that's all. It is in honour of the Spirits that come together to tune me into myself so that I can connect with Dandelion and vice versa.

Spirit of Animal - whose skin is the drum skin
Spirit of Tree - whose wood is the body of the drum
Spirit of Maker - the maker who made the drum and also the Supreme Maker
Spirit of Me - Elspeth

I guess everyone has a different way of doing this. Muhtadi did a long drum roll to become centred. The teacher I have now (Peter) puts his hand on his drum and one on his heart and says something ... and he also puts a hand on my drum and says something. Other drummers must have other ways ... and maybe as time goes on these methods evolve until they settle as one thing to that one person. I don't know, I'm new.

For now ... from now on I'll say my 'Drum Spirits' prayer and envision the circular flow I usually see before starting.

Maitreya Project Relic Tour (Blessings of the Buddhas)

My bottle of saffron water, most of which I had consumed by the time I took this shot.

Yesterday I went with my friend Rosanna to the Divali Nagar to see the Maitreya Project Relic Tour (Blessings of the Buddhas). It was a special experience. (Below, I’ve included explanatory extracts from the pamphlet we were given upon entering).

Upon entering the room where the Relics were displayed, we joined a short line in front of a golden Baby Buddha and a photograph of the Dalai Lama. Before viewing the Relics, we each ‘watered’ the Baby Buddha with saffron water – as a respectful form of peace and prayer. The guide told us that the Buddha had given the monks some saffron which, until now, has not diminished. It had made the saffron water we were using. This special saffron water is used for cleansing and it was all around the room in little clear bowls, close to the Relics, which were encased in special glass boxes.

The Relics look like small, greyish, crystal-like grains (see below for explanation). Some are the size of rice grains or smaller, some are the size of pigeon peas.

After viewing the Relics, we lined up for blessings from one of the three people who had come with the tour: two men and a woman. I can’t recall where the men are from, but I remember reading in the papers that the woman is from Canada. Her face really reflected ‘loving-kindness’, and when she gave the blessing, that was what I felt.

For the blessing: one by one you go forward and kneel before her as she sits slightly elevated. She places a golden object (I don’t know its name) on the crown of your head, places her other hand slightly to the side-top of the head and mouths the blessing for what feels like a minute or more. Afterwards, both Rosanna and I felt light and at peace, as though our heads had been cleared.

Upon exiting, there was some of the special saffron water being given to those who had viewed the Relics. Luckily I had bought some bottled water earlier, so I had that empty vessel to be filled with the saffron water, which we drank throughout the rest of the evening.

After the feeling of peace we got from being in the room with the Relics and blessings, we didn’t feel like we could go anywhere that would disrupt the light feeling. So we went up to Mount St. Benedict (monastery) and sat on a tree stump, drinking our saffron water and looking out over the plains as the sun set and darkness gradually fell.

*

(The following extracts are from the pamphlet):
What is the Maitreya Project Heart Shrine Relic Tour?
A collection of more than 1,000 sacred relics of the Buddha and other Buddhist Masters which is now touring the world. These relics will be permanently enshrined inside the heart of a magnificent Maitreya Buddha statue being built in Kushinagar India, due for completion in 2010. (Their stop in T & T is the end of the tour, the last opportunity for the public anywhere to see the relics before they are enshrined in the 500 foot Maitreya Buddha).

What are Relics?
... When the bodies of spiritual masters are cremated, beautiful pearl-like crystals are found among their ashes. Tibetans call these Ringsel. These Ringsel are special because they hold the essence of the qualities of the spiritual master. His inner purity appears in the form of relics. The relics are physical evidence that the teacher attained qualities of compassion and wisdom before death.

What are the benefits of seeing Relics?
The relics provide a unique opportunity to make a personal spiritual connection with enlightened beings. These Masters deliberately chose to leave Relics behind so that we can create the causes for our own happiness.