Venkat and Jeyashree from the Bay Area in San Francisco were among our Maha Sivaratri pilgrims. They were here last year and returned this year specifically to share in last night’s event.

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END OF PHASE<>br />
Today is the last day of our phase.
This edition of TAKA will remain posted
over our coming two-day retreat,
until Tritya Tithi, Sun One, Wednesday, March 1st.

We bring you photos and video from Siva’s great night. …our captions will be brief as we’ve been spending our TAKA time getting some video ready for you….

Bodhinatha arriving for the homa…

The temple ground lit and decorated…

Bhajans were followed by a powerful homa…

We all sat quietly and listened to a talk about Siva by Gurudeva and then from Bodhinatha.

The everyone took a break and next the Siva Linga Abhishekam and puja were done. We bring you video from the Abhishekam and the video of the final puja, but since picture of Nataraja are not allowed you see the fire where prayers are burned while listening to the final chants.

Paramacharya’s Palaniswami and Ceyonswami begin the abhishekam…

Vibhuti…

Other monks, Arumugaswami, Muruganathaswami, Saravananathaswami and Natarajnathaswami are chanting Sri Rudram…

Acharya Kumarswami and Sannyasin Sivakatirswami take the next shift, pouring milk….

It is a mystical moment… for the devotees in the temple it is far away, up in the inner sanctum…we are happy to bring this to you now very close up.

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The following two videos are from the Abhishekam and then final ashtottara and arati. The first is 45 megabytes and may take some time. The second movie opens to a white screen. Click the controller to start. If you do not have quicktime, try right clicking on the movie to save to disk and play with Windows Media Player.

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Sadhaka Jivanandanatha and Yogi Japendranatha are next…The takes place during the final hour of our Sivaratri worship, at the feet of Lord Nataraja whose peedam is decorated with giant yellow hibiscus flowers.

Special giant conches are used, and the crystal lingam is bathed continuously for about thirty minutes.

Seldom do we take photos outside at night, but on this Night of Siva we find ourselves in the dark during the short breaks. Here Saint Tiruvalluvar scribes his verses on ola leaves.

The anthuriums look different in the dark.

As does this giant cluster of staghorn ferns, hanging from a tree in the temple garden.

And a bromeliad named “Picasso” comes to life under the flash.

Offerings for the puja arrayed in the Guru Peedam awaiting their turn for decoration.

Sivaratri day today… lots and lots of water falling from the heavens!

Then, following the Great Night… Sadhaka Tejadevanatha’s father visiting with his family….

Hong Wongji Mission from Lihue came to visit as well.

Mark Anderson and his wife… they are subscribers to Hinduism Today.. discussing the California text book issue and the lamentable place in the global media given to Hinduism and how we can find way to correct it.

Mark is a consultant in internet applications and he and Sivakatirswami were talking the same language… only a few could understand. “Do you think Quicktime will be ubiquitous by the end of 2006? Or do should we consider the near 100% penetration of Flash as something to take seriously?”