At lunch today, the Siddhidata Kulam reported on the on-going work at the temple; our efforts to get visas for the next silpi team; and the constant work on Anna Purna Gardens which supplies so much of our fresh food.

We really have to give a big thanks to the team for their constant work in caring for all the equipment and keeping a flow of abundance from the land going along so well!

Two lovely young families came today.

Ramakrishnan and Meenakshi with their two young children, Sudharman (4 yrs) and Sukriti (14 months). Ramakrishnan said he had waited so long to make this trip to see this temple and he is so glad to be here. Originally from Delhi. They moved to Chennai and then to Nashville, Tennessee.

Originally from Calcutta, Pranab and Deepa Chakraborty now live in New Jersey with their young son, Soumik (age 21 months). They are here for several days and will return to visit the Iraivan Temple.

In the Arjun and Ellen Natesan with their two beautiful children, Sanjana and Rajiv. Originally from Madras, they now live in Redwood City, California.

With motherly attention Sanjana (age 6) poses with her young brother Rajiv (age 2) near silpi Pandi as he carves a border of beautiful flowers in stone.

Sadhaka Satyanatha has recently entered into a formal training to join the Hinduism Today editorial team and get his regular complement of page assignments for each issue and help carry the load of what Gurudeva called, “The Prow of the Ship” Hinduism Today magazine.

It is a rite of passage that has been going on in the Ganapati Kulam for 30 years: a new member inducted into journalism training. Sannyasin Arumugaswami, our managing editor is guiding him.

One of his is page assignments this issue required taking photos of the silpis at Iraivan. For this they decided to use the new Nikon SB-600 camera, which is surprisingly inexpensive, but takes really incredibly good shots. It is slated to go to India eventually to take shots of the 500,000 ola leaves in Pondicherry, but, in the meantime we thought to put it to use.

If you had a tight budget but wanted a fairly high end tool this might be a good choice.

One rarely gets this kind of focus and clarity from a “point and shoot” camera.

You would need to see the full resolution image to get an idea of the amazing resolution and sharpness the camera delivers.

Cats sleep 16-18 hours a day. Puli is making sure he stays well within those specifications.

He asks: “Do you need something? Oh, just another photo? OK. I ready, go ahead, shoot!”

Now back to business. Hmmm where was I?

We have more from today’s shoot at Iraivan coming to you in a slide show tomorrow.