Today at Kauai Aadheenam

Road Around Iraivan Temple Progressing Well

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The contractor team is close to two thirds done with building the eight-food-wide road around Iraivan Temple. They started at the front entrance with the apron connecting hillside steps to the granite staircase, and have since been working their way around both sides of the temple at once. Three concrete trucks came a couple days ago, four yesterday, two more tomorrow, and some more will come several days after that.

  • They are creating water drainage in a few places

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Kauai Springtime

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  • One of our monks took this image at the ocean.
    The Sun is on one horizon with the full moon behind us on the other
  • Kadavul starts to receive the early morning light
  • Just after sunrise, Ganesha receives his daily abhishekam
  • Our family of Nēnē like to land wherever an open, grass field is found in the gardens
  • Several flowering trees are blooming bright with thousands of colorful flowers
  • Brightly colored dragon flies frequent our streams and ponds
  • A light morning shower makes this firework-flower sparkle

Aum Namah Sivaya

Recently Kauai has been having bright sunny days with a few clouds and perfect temperatures. It’s our spring time and the flowers have started blooming everywhere, while the birds and insects are happily enjoying the clear air. During the full moon our monks observed a three day retreat—a good time to appreciate the ocean side, and to take longer walks throughout the monastery gardens. This is the season is when we have Nēnē (our special endemic Hawaiian geese) visiting the property. A specific group (see slideshow) has chosen to make the Aadheenam a consistent stop in their migration cycle. Aum.

“I am the waves. I am the ocean. We are all waves-there is no higher wave or lower wave. The waves and the ocean are one. You have to plunge yourself in the ocean.” – Siva Yogaswami

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Hinduism Today Final Stage

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  • This is the Quad main page where we will upload all the articles according to its page number
  • Ready for review

Jai Ganesha!

We are now working diligently to finalize the Hinduism Today July/August/September 2026 issue. Saravanathaswami will soon begin uploading all the articles to Quad, where they will be professionally formatted into the final magazine layout. At this stage, all the monks will carefully review the final copy of each article to ensure there are no errors and that everything reads clearly, accurately and in its best possible form.

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Before & After

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  • The concrete team is forming up the path. The narrow white lines are the 2 x 4s they are installing.
  • A happy Gurudeva celebrates the concrete pour of the foundataion, which took 108 cement trucks!
  • The temple is marked on top of the engineered fill (which is four feet deep in the ground) to guide the forming of the above ground concrete foundation
  • For form takes shape on three sides following the careful markings.
  • Concrete trucks line up all day long delivering the special fly-ash concrete mix.
  • It’s hard work but the crew is strong and skilled.
  • Showing the installation of the lava rock plinth, which took years to complete.

As the Garden Path surrounding Iraivan Temple takes shape (the first concrete trucks arrive tomorrow), we reflect on how far it has come in recent years. Building such an architectural gem on a remote island presents special challenges, and those challenges have been overcome one by one with Gurudeva’s inner guidance and blessings and Bodhinatha’s practical genius.

The Garden Path has several purposes. First, it will provide safe, mud-free walking access to Iraivan. Second, it will make maintenance in and around the temple (such as landscaping and stone cleaning) more efficient for our electric vehicles. Third, it will provide an elegant circumambulation path for pilgrims and for the annual chariot parade which carries Satguru around the temple on Guru Purnima. Fourth, it is the last unfinished major component of the temple, tying together the mature and beautiful landscaping that took decades to create and the completed-three-years-ago granite Siva temple.

Before & After Slider

Below is a shot of the foundation pour in 1999 and almost the same angle photo of the completed temple. Slide back and forth to see the changes.

Part way through the foundation in 1999 The same angle after completion in 2023

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How to Realize God, Part Three

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Satguru Bodhinatha Veylanswami gives his weekly upadesha in Kadavul Temple at Kauai’s Hindu Monastery in Hawaii. It is part of a series of talks elaborating on the inspired teachings of Satguru Śivaya Subramuniyaswami as found in his book Merging With Śiva.

“We must live in the now to follow the path to enlightenment. In the lower realms of the mind, where time and space seem very real, we are worried about the past or concerned about the future. These two intermingle and limit conscious awareness. Living in the past or the future obstructs us in this way: the past, by reliving old experiences—mainly the negative ones, for they are vividly remembered—clouds our vision of the future. Living in the future overactivates the intellect, the emotion and the desires. The future is little more than another form of mental fantasy. Past and future are equally unreal and a hindrance to spiritual un­fold­ment. A person functioning in the now is in control of his own mind. He is naturally happier, more successful. He is performing every task with his fullest attention, and the rewards are to be seen equally in the quality of his work and the radiance of his face. He cannot be bored with anything he does, however simple or mundane. Everything is interesting, challenging, fulfilling. A person living fully in the now is a content person.“

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Iraivan Temple Road Day One, & Chitra Puja

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A contractor team has arrived to begin two to three weeks of work to create a concrete road around Iraivan Temple, replacing the temporary crushed asphalt we have there now. Some time after they are done, another team will cover the road with quartzite tile. Besides allowing vehicles to conveniently drive around, the road can serve as a circumambulation path for pilgrims doing sadhana, and occasional parades.

Today the main focus was to dig out the area that will connect the stairs coming up the hill to the temple granite staircase, where more technical precision is needed to ensure that the eventual quartzite tile layer will be at just the right height next to the first granite stair. They will pour this area on its own first, then the rest of the road later.

Auspiciously, today also happened to be the monthly Gurudeva Chitra pada puja.

Also, we continue to have a flock of nene geese moving about the property.

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