After a very active monastery cleaning day yesterday, all the monks went back to their regular duties today…

Today, being Sun Four, the Siddhidata Kulam gave their report. Sannyasin Yoginathaswami detailed the Iraivan temple progress. Sthapati has set himself a mini “deadline” to finish the current stone setting in time for the crane to lift stones on Monday when we hope to put up about 19 small stones destined to go around on top of the snake course of the Chinna Gopuram.

In other areas, Sadhaka Adinatha described the kulams on-going maintenance routine which goes all around the property attending to various grounds task for the first part of the month and then they turn their attention to building, vehicle and machine maintenance for the second part of the month. Plumbing and water issues always seem to be an issue… Sadhaka Nilakantha says that the with the recent sunny weather and break from heavy rains, the garden is starting to produce well again and the vegetables in today’s lunch were all home grown. They are in the process of amending all the mounds, with minerals and other supplements… something they do every two years or so.

The team is working hard to finish setting all the stones on the “snake” course, that is on top of the sun shade course.

They need to be ready for the lift Monday…

The lovely cornice just below the snake course… our intrepid photographer climbed up onto the scaffold for a close view.

Our crane man, Larry Conklin will be gone for a week, so if the team misses their deadline, they will be left without much to do for a whole week.

Oh, Monday is tomorrow! Sthapati is putting a little fuel on the fire to keep things moving

A look down the side of the snake course.

Today’s photo shoots in the afternoon sun… the stones of Iraivan stand out in sharp light relief.

The Pillars of Iraivan.. coming to a coloring book soon!

One day we will all sit here and worship…

Bhadra pillar

Sages on the pillars

The lion with the ball inside his mouth that children cannot believe, “How did they put that stone ball inside his mouth!?”

Flag of Hindutva…

Standing up proudly in a brisk breeze

A totally awesome, fully in bloom, jade vine….