Blog Archives
May 27, 2001 
Just when temple architecture is in the forefront of our minds and our Ganapati Sthapati is here at the Aadheenam, an elderly Indian couply who knew nothing about Iraivan were on Kauai and saw something about the temple in a local magazine. As it turns out Mr. Baidyanatha Chattopadhya who now spends half his time in New York and half his time in Rishikesh, has built 5 Siva temple along the upper Ganges river. Not only that, but he adopted a similar patten of operation as Gurudeva is doing. He had all the temples made of marble from Rajasthan and then shipped them to their sites along the Ganges.
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transcription begins
Date: May_16_2001
Title: Pets in the Home
Category: Family
Duration: 58 seconds
Date Given: April 28, 2001
A cyberspace devotee wonders about pets in the home, like dogs and cats. It seems that a lot of Hindus are against having dogs and cats in the home.
In Hindu villages all over India, there are no veterinarians to take care of cats and dogs. It is rather a luxury. Western educated Hindus often have beautiful cats and dogs within their home and take care of them according to the western way - sanitation, veterinarian help and all the modern faculties to maintain the luxury of a cat or a dog.
There is nothing that I know of in Hindu scripture that prevents one from having a pet in the home, except that sanitation according to Ayurveda, is extremely important for the health of the family.
transcription ends
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Yesterday was the couples 36th wedding anniversary and Gurudeva blesses them with a shawl.
Another young couple from San Jose, California, Narendra and Prabha Seshadri.
David Englesby, nephew of one of our swamis, came from Idaho to visit the monastery and be on Kauai. He lives in Boise and works for a microchip company. As it turns out Idaho is the top of the wired states in the whole nation, turning out a lot more than potatoes. David got a tour of the publications facility, met Gurudeva and said he is having a great time in the water. "Kauai is quite different from the arid area I come from which has desert like conditions.... there is so much green here!"
Sadhaka Japendranatha hosts Dr. Thom Yarema (right of center) and his friends. On the far right is Summerjoy from Kauai and on the far left is Bobbie, an ayurvedic doctor from Maui, and Madhu, a Vedanta student who just returned from India. "Dr. Thom" as we refer to him, while a licensed "western" allopathic physician, also avails himself of a variety of alternative health therapies to bring healing to his patients. He helped a lot to see Gurudeva through the difficult ordeal last year when he hurt his back. Thank you Dr. Thom!
Sadhaka Tyaganatha, performing the Sun One Homa. At one point during the ceremoney a powerful japa is performed by the priest and the entire assembly of devotees. The powerful bija mantra "Aum Hum Haum Sivaya Svaha!" is sounded by everyone. The priest passes his mala (rosary) through his hands, marking the 108 repetitions for the whole group. This is always a powerful invocation, raising the energies of the whole group to a very high level.
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Discussions continued today with Ganapati Sthapati, his apprentice Selvanatha, Acharya Palaniswami, Acharya Ceyonswami and Deva Rajan. Today's focus was on the roof of the temple. A careful analysis of the water flow was made to be taken into consideration during the building process. Kauai is known for its torrential rains, as one would expect since the mountain above the temple is the wettest spot on planet earth. Being an open building we have to make sure the water sheds well and of course does not end up flooding the inside of the temple hall.
We also took Sthapati to our small Guru temple where he got to see Gurudeva's meditation hall and the shrine for our Paramaguru Yogaswami. He said "Every room of the Aadheenam is like a small temple. Through Gurudeva, the original human culture is being lived once again."
Speaking of culture! Our Kauai Mission sent in this wonderful photo series of the Ritu Kala samskara ceremonies for Priya Alahan. This ceremony blesses the important change into womanhood in a way that western culture never does. The ladies sent these captions:
"Priya resembling a youthful Parvati in the beautiful setting of nature after her ceremony of multiple blessings."
"Sitara Alahan and Selvi Katir helped with all the preparations and planning. They also provided a brief carnatic vocal concert for our guests. They were very encouraging and shared stories of their Ritu Kala experiences with Priya throughout our preparations."
"Two married ladies of the community offer a tray of tropical fruits. One of many trays presented before Priya during her ceremony."
"Priya waiting for her ceremony after her Aunty and sisters helped get her dressed up in a sari with decorative jewelry and makeup."
Traditionally, the sari is not worn by a girl until she has come of age.
"Priya with her mother,Isani, sisters,Neesha and Sitara experiencing the bliss of a celebration of the fulfillment of stree dharma."
This is Priya a few days later on her 13th birthday.
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