Today is Ashram Sadhana Day for this month. All the monks are out cleaning. Here is Bodhinatha with one of our feline companions, named “Shanti.”

At lunch the Pillaiyar kulam shared their news and activities. We are happy to announce that the books that Sister Chudikadevi had been warehousing for us in Malaysia have finally been retrieved. Shanmuganathaswami related some of his work in painstaking care of our Hinduism Today subscribers, Muruganathswami told of his work in accounting and travel coordination for future trips this year. He deals with our travel agencies, plane and hotel reservations. Sadhaka Jothinatha shared news of event promotions on the mainland and the release of a film on Iraivan that was done in Bangalore and will be distributed by Aashta TV in several nations. Sadhaka Jivanandanatha told about his work in setting up the web store on our new web server in San Franscisco…

Here is a movie of our Tamil New Year flag raising, followed by pictures from our members in India and Sri Lanka.

Adi Shankara and his wife are from Mauritius. They are studying music at Kalashetra on a grant from the Mahatma Gandhi Institute in Mauritius.

Adi sends captions:

Without forgetting our precious Natchintanai book.

Satguru Siva Yogaswami

Adi Sankara, Anne Gunalen and Parvathi.

Anne and Akka Gunalen and Parvathi participating

Pooja room at Adi’s place

Premila(eldest) and Danialaksmi singing Natchintanai

Sri Lanka: Sri Subramuniya Kottam’s School Children’s Outing

Children love outings. In Jaffna however, children rarely get a chance to go on outings. So the Sri Subramuniya Kottam occasionally sponsors free outings for the children who come to study at the Kottam. The last outing for the children was organized in December last year during their school holidays. The children left the Kottam in the afternoon accompanied by two parents, two kottam teachers and Kulamata Sivaloosani Kanagaratnam. Their first stop was the Jaffna Sivathondan Nilayam where they sang Natchintanai and listened to a discourse by the late Sri Selladuraiswami (Selladuraiswami, one of Sage Yogaswami’s swami initiates attained Maha Samadhi on April, 12 . 2006). Then they went to Nallur Kandaswami temple for worship before going to a playground to play for a couple of hours. The outing ended with a stop to an ice cream shop.