The Media studio renovation is steadily coming along. Just recently the large glass window wall was installed. The Glass is very thick and heavy, so our professional team had to work hard to get it in, but they've done a wonderful job.

A wedding party from Tennessee visited us several times while on Kauai for a wedding, first to join the weekly grounds tour and then again to have darshan blessings from Satguru Bodhinatha. Suvarna and Nilesh got married on May 25th. The priest who performed their wedding on the ocean at Marriott hotel in Lihue also participated with enthusiasm in our Vaikasi Visakam evening puja.

Bodhinatha and Arumuganathaswami are currently in DC for Bodhinatha's prayer which will open the House of representatives tomorrow. Here the are in front of this statue of Ghandi. The following photos are of a beautiful statue of Goddess Saraswati in front of the Indonesian embassy, across the street from the Indian Embassy. It's just been completed by Balinese workers. The child in front on the left is Barack Obama, who went to elementary school in Indonesia for two years; he's seen here, sitting with two Indonesian girls. This statue has yet to be dedicated, so hasn't been in the news.

The sacred fire is one of the oldest forms of worship and communion with the inner planes, spanning across many of the worlds religions and traditions. Anyone can write prayers to the devas and Gods to be burned in the sanctified Homa, asking their assistance in the smallest of worldly needs or invoking their help towards the greatest of spiritual pursuits. Today Bodhinatha is traveling in DC, so Sadasivanatha swami burned prayers and gave a talk afterwards. He discussed upcoming travel as well as the pros and cons of the massive spread of yoga worldwide, including the harmful effects of prematurely awakened kundalini.

Click here for photos of the June Ganesha homa event

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRNNzMZgrzs This Portuguese video was uploaded to youtube with an English translation in May and has quickly become very popular. It's well worth watching the whole way through.

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFKTNHKNt2Q

The 2013 celebration of Vaikasi Vishakham, held at Kauai's Hindu Monastery in Kaduval Temple. A festival in honor of Lord Murugan, God of will, direct cognition and the purest, child-like divine love, commemorating his creation and birth. On this day (Visakha nakshatra in May-June) elaborate abhisheka is conducted in all Muruga temples. It is a time of gift-giving to panditas and great souls, weddings, feedings for the poor, caring for trees, spiritual initiation, diksha, and conclaves of holy men.

We are pleased to announce today that our 2014 Mauritius Innersearch is now open for registration.

This program, which will take place July 2-14, 2014, on the resplendent island of Mauritius, will be our first travel-study program to visit this island nation, one of few in the world that has a majority Hindu population, home to hundreds of Saiva Siddhanta Church members and Himalayan Academy students, as well as our Saiva Dharmashala and Spiritual Park—the only Saiva Siddhanta Church center outside of Kauai. Presenting an opportunity to learn from a living satguru, taking place on an island with a rich and varied Hindu culture, this program promises to be full of blessings and invigorating experiences.

Thanks to the latest technology, this time the registration process will take place completely online. If you're ready to sign up, you may fill out the online application. If you haven't decided yet, you may wish to find out more about the program.

We have room for only 50 participants on this program, and we expect it to fill up quickly. So we recommend signing up soon!

Every few months the monks take part in Guruthondu Day, a rare time when nearly all of them are able to band together and work on one or two large projects. This time the focus was on the rapidly advancing solar project and on the tree planting at Himalayan Acres. The Solar panel racks have been fabricated and secured and the next step was installing the micro-inverters which control each individual solar panel. This system allows each panel to utilize the maximum sun exposure and transfer that power to Monastery. After the micro-inverters were installed, grounding wires are needed for each individual panel. The panel can then be secured to the Solar panel racks. One interesting aspect of solar panels is that from the moment the panel is exposed to the sun it generates electricity. Safety is very important as you can imagine. Recently the SK carefully transported the panels and hand carried each panel up three scaffolding frames to the second story of the Mini Mela and completed the roof installation. Now the main array is the gets full attention. With the day's help of so many monks, the panel grounding wires were mostly installed, and the SK estimated one or two weeks of work was done on this single day. Another group of monks spent the morning planting trees, joining the solar project in the afternoon, while another small group helped with the Media Studio renovation project. It was a productive and enjoyable day for everyone. Jai Bodhinatha!

It has been called the ugliest flower in the world. It is neither dainty nor symetrical, two touchstones for beauty. But it is wild and anguished, and there is beauty in that. It is the rare tropical Anthurium marie, the black-leafed giant anthurium that is having a beautiful day in Siva's Sacred Garden.