Sadhana, My Heart is Yours

Hello to all of you that comprise Tobin's wide world of blog readers. This is his humble traveling companion/friend/brother Josh with a guest post, which I hope will come close to meeting young Tobin's impressive level of writing. We are currently sitting in an Internet cafe in the small town of Kullyapallayam, (Sp?!) outside of Auroville in Tamil Nadu. It is about five degrees warmer in this facility than outside, making it about 100 degrees Fahrenheit in the room. No complaints here- one from the Northern latitudes just must be quite cautious about roaming around under the intense Indian sun during the afternoon hours.
Tobin and myself have been working/staying/interacting/sharing ideas and knowledge/meditating about a 15 minute scooter ride from here in a small, volunteer-driven community known as Sadhana Forest. Sadhana is magic. Sadhana Forest strives for, and creates in a very tangible way, what human communities can be in these crazy, confusing, and often destructive (socially, environmentally, et al) times of the early 21st century and beyond. Sadhana Forest shows that groups of people from all ages and ethnicities, with incredibly disparate backgrounds can come together to build and live in a completely ecologically sustainable and organic environment where the stresses and striving of the rat race are non-existent.
Sadhana Forest is a reforestation project, organic farming project, sustainable living environment, and international community-amongst other descriptions- begun in 2004 by an Israeli couple by the name of Aviram and Yorit. Aviram was a clinical psychologist who sold his home and belongings and moved his family to the south of India on land owned by the Auroville community. Aviram and Yorit have an eight-year old girl and 16-month baby girl who are being raised in Sadhana and around all of the many volunteers who shuffle in and out for two-week stays or longer. The children, Osher and Shalev, are some of the happiest, sociable and most well-adjusted children I have ever been around.
The main goal of the project is a reforestation effort to help reinstate the Tropical Dry Evergreen Forest ecosystem that once existed throughout large swaths of southern India and Sri Lanka. Prior to Auroville's coming to the area, the landscape was completely barren and dusty, and very few remnants of the Evergreen forest actually grew. Today, only .oo1% of the original area of the forest exists, but it has been steadily reappearing in Tamil Nadu since the community of Auroville was founded in 1968 and the work of bringing about the ecosystem once again began. Sadhana is completely green throughout much of its territory and there are eucalyptus trees, palm trees and date shrubs, amongst so many others. There are even a couple kinds of plants, including the jatropha shrub, whose seeds can and will be pressed into clean biofuels for diesel engines and which don't require the use of prime agricultural land, like America's ethanol fields of the Midwest. The indigenous tress, plants, and shrubs that the Sadhana Forest community has planted since its inception have had 80-90% survival rates. All of the mulch for the plants and trees is completely organic and there is absolutely no use of nitrogen- based fertilizers for the soil or ammonium-nitrate based pesticides for the fruits, vegetables, and herbs grown within the Sadhana community. The fertilizer consists of dead leaves and twigs from the forest trees, food remnants (banana peels, orange peels, vegetable remains, etc.) from our 100% vegan meals, and a nice, heaping mixture of humanure and sawdust, scooped from the dry compostable toilets within Sadhana. These organic methods of fertilizing work quite well, as evidenced by the high survival rates of the various plants and trees on Sadhana's lands, and really make our fossil-fuel based system of soil upkeep in the West look like a very avoidable tragedy. If you ever want to try stirring and scooping composted human waste and sawdust, it is actually quite pleasant and relaxing, and not as aromatic as one might think. I am a big fan of the method, to be completely honest. As well, various swaths of land have been put in production for the growth of various herbs and spices, tomatoes, carrots, bananas, yams, potatoes, etc. All of the edible products grown in Sadhana use organic systems to sprout, including crop covers, a wide variety of natural pests, and multitudes of different crops farmed in the same areas.
Sadhana receives electricity from two solar panels located in the middle of the community and they provide more than enough power for cooking, social gatherings, etc. The excess electricity is stored in a battery and one day will be used to provide power for volunteers and guests' electric-powered vehicles.
There are several thatched-roof huts, made of locally harvested wood and stuffed with dried leaves for insulation, that comprise the sleeping quarters for all the volunteers. It is quite like living as a Lost Boy in Peter Pan in a wonderful, peaceful, and eminently enjoyable environment. There is a large hut, known as the Main Hut, where the volunteers gather for meals together, for free classes and workshops ranging from Yoga to Non-Violent Activism to Creative Writing, and to just chill out and read or play the guitar or socialize. The energy surrounding Sadhana Forest is incredible and light and all the volunteers, while very unique and on their own journeys, really seem to embrace the ideals and the reality of the Sadhana . We can all connect with a common love and concern for our Earth. We can never be apart from Nature, we are a part of Nature.
Tobin is waiting for me, possibly to get some ice cream nearby, so I will wrap this up. Never before have I been around such a group of people, an international group of people from America, Britain, Israel, India, France, Sweden, Germany, Holland, etc. who bond so quickly and who are trying to live a certain ideal. Sadhana Forest is a wonderful discovery, a veritable ecological oasis in the heat of Southern India. It is truly beautiful and can serve as an inspiration for the West, a new way of living that allows us to reconnect with the Earth and to interact in a positive way with friends, where money and possessions are of no importance or use (unless you want to go into town) and where truly important issues and connections can and are being made. It is possible to not live a materialistic and solely convenience based-life and still be happy and at peace.
Until Tobin takes over, goodbye.

Tonight We Board a Train

So I'm sitting on the floor in my underwear, while strains of John Lennon stream behind me, preparing to board a train to Chennai. We've been here in Hyderabad with the Nandula crew for the last two weeks. As I said earlier, being around this little family is just so calming, inspiring, energizing, and still goes deeper than that. The first week was spent mostly at home while the rest of the family went off to work or school. Our days were filled with many important matters: napping, reading, snacking, and gazing down on the small herds of water buffalo lazily making their way across the fields out back. A lot of quiet time--provided Josh wasn't discussing the implications of our infinite cosmic architecture or the apocalyptic possibilities of environmental inaction. We went to a cultural performance and fashion show at Shim's old University (National Institute of Fashion Technology)... not sure how to describe this, other than a strange mix of young western musical influences combined with Indian youthful traditions and expressions. Does that make any sense? It didn't to me... But they were still entertaining performances and if that was the aim--it was dead on. The next night we went to a little performance by Mayukh's school, which also had dancing and singing and feats of "chess-strength" by 6 and 7 year old boys. Vijay leaned over to me and whispered, during one such feat, "I can't play that boy...he'd kill me." We met Shim's parent's: a 73 year old man, who looks like he's 50, grinned widely and gave Josh and I an extremely tight handshake, three hugs where he squeezed us slowly as hard as he could and then another hard, prolonged handshake...this was apparently a very traditional Hyderbadi greeting, one with Muslim influence, that older locals have done all their lives. Her mother is a quiet, pleasant, and crisp looking woman who gave us soft smiles and caring glances. We met Vijay's father at a train station. He was twirling his cane, waiting for the train, smiling and would ask us a question or two in between long silences. Vijay and him quietly caught up on how meditation and yoga are going, how their health is, etc. At one point I guessed that his age was 55, he said he was in his 70's, then told me and Josh to feel his arm (like gripping a 40 pound bag of sand) and his thigh (like tree trunks). Then he smacked Josh hard on the back (Josh doubled over a bit) and said, "Any children?" It went on like this until his train arrived and he promptly picked up his things and got settle on the train. We went out to the Krishnamurti Center again to hear a talk by a Buddhist scholar who was a contemporary of Krishnamurti, ate out at fancy restaurants a couple times, went out on some drives, visited a nearby temple at sunrise, went to Vijay's office, and generally try to pass on bad habits to Mayukh and joke with Shim and Vijay.

Every so often I'll get pangs of homesickness. I'll miss groggy zazen with the Choboji folks, sleeping next to Sunny and laughing with the family around Grandma's dinner table...Josh, too, said he misses certain things (notably, Caesar Salad). But there are many more things to see here, many more experiences to be had, heard, felt. And there's nowhere else we'd rather or should be (there's a recession back home anyway). Everything seems Just So.

Our next stop is Auroville. After we get settled, Josh will put in a "guest-post" and we'll let you know how things are progressing. Not much more to share. Hope you're all well and enjoying the snow that I was told fell in the Northwest last week (It's been a constant 95 everyday here... which brings a pain of its own I guess). Thinking of you often--

Mayukh (second boy from right) in the final performance of the night.