Non-human species

Romulus Whitaker (‘Rom’), the world-renowned herpetologist, has had a long association with Auroville. He first visited around 1970 when ‘Cow John’ showed him around what was then the beginning of what he came to see as a fantastic experiment.

Once upon a time a very long time ago, deep in the woods at the bottom of a mountain — Mother’s Mountain, mata-giri—a six-page newsletter called Collaboration came into being.

Jyoti Naoki Eri was born in Kyoto, Japan, to accomplished artist parents. He trained as a sculptor in Japan through a traditional apprenticeship process.

In 2016 a German forester, Peter Wohlleben, published a book which describes how trees exchange resources with each other through fungi on their roots.

It’s easy to overlook the bark of a tree – especially here in Auroville, where trees are everywhere and we pass them daily, often without stopping to truly see.

It’s not easy to describe the emotion felt when stepping into a clearing in the forest, a magical place, perfect for hosting the portraits of 111 Aurovilians who have passed away in recent years.

Annapurna is Auroville’s largest farm. Comprising over 35 acres, it is a mixed farm with cattle, paddy and fruit trees, as well as a dairy and food processing unit.

From November 15th to December 4th, the Centre d’Art brought together two contemplative exhibitions: Pujasree Burman’s "Sacred Echoes" and Vasandan Virappan’s "The Symbol of Meditation."

On 6th January, 2012, Michael Bonke, along with Toine van Megen and Harald Kraft, made a presentation to the Auroville community about Auroville’s future energy and drinking water needs [published in AVToday # 271, February 2012].

An Auroville health scare started some weeks ago, when three aggressive dogs were reported in and around the Auroville grounds. The Auroville Dog Shelter was on call, and was able to collect and quarantine all three dogs.

Parvathi Nagarajan is a healer, herbalist, educator and community builder who spent 24 years running and supporting Pitchandikulam Forest projects in local communities.

BloomO! was launched during a warm and dynamically engaging event in Auroville as part of the Auroville week in February 2024, followed by a launch in Pondicherry.

In the heart of Auroville’s The Learning Community’s (TLC) base camp, where the gentle whispers of the wind were rustling along with the vibrant hum of creativity, a humble spectacle unfolded during the sacred week of Auroville’s Birthday.

Between 29th January and 10th February, in the Centre d’Art there was an exhibition of drawings by Ongkie Tan, titled ‘Inky Onky’. Ongkie Tan’s art is sharp, detailed, with a whirr of strokes, mostly in his trademark inky black and occasional subtle colours.

Silence Forest, an 11.2-acre green enclave neighbouring the Vérité community, is little known, even to many Aurovilians. In 2023, five research students from the University of Pondicherry, who were volunteering for the Auroville unit Yuvabe and were mentored by two professors, studied the flora and fauna of the forest and its ability to sequester carbon, conserve water, and increase resilience to adverse climate events.

Valeria has been teaching ikebana, the traditional Japanese Art of Flower Arrangement, in Auroville for over twenty years. Why did she, an Italian, study it for many years in Japan and then decide to teach it here?

In June, two members of the Funds and Assets Management Committee appointed by the Secretary of the Auroville Foundation (FO-FAMC) sent an email announcing that this FAMC will stop maintenance payments as well as the regular Forest budget to green workers from July onwards.

François Gautier came to India in 1969 at the age of 19, with the first Auroville caravan. Deeply impressed by Sri Aurobindo's writings, he chose to reside in the Sri Aurobindo Ashram for about seven years, after which he joined Auroville, where he has been living since.

Some years ago, when I lived in Hong Kong, I hosted my friend Alan Watson Featherstone when he gave a series of talks on “Restore the Earth’.

Natasha Storey is a long term Aurovilian who recently brought the Gene Keys and its Delta programme to Auroville.

One of Auroville’s success stories has been the greening and transformation of severely denuded and eroded land to what is now a diverse, rich and, in pockets, thriving woodlands.

Every so often a story comes along that captures the spirit of Auroville in a unique way, bringing to light aspects of its deeper purpose of transforming the world we live in to create a spiritualized life on our planet.

I do not want people to feel they have to read cover to cover, the purpose is to get a feel of it. At the end of the book are tiny mandalas, an endless world.

As a species, we tend to anthropomorphise everything. Kids’ books are full of stories of animals and plants wearing clothes, living in houses etc.

Integrated Animal Care Centre (IACC) was started in 2005. It is a legacy of Ann Plummer. She was known as “Animal Care Ann” as she used to give food and look after stray dogs and cats.

Auroville-raised Lili spent eight years studying art history, theatre and fine arts abroad, and is now perhaps the busiest youth in Auroville.

For the last two years, Aurovilian Nina Sengupta has been offering edible weed walks around Auroville. Every few weeks, participants venture out and discover parts of a hidden Auroville that are plainly in view.

Zohar (17), known to most as Zozo, might be Auroville’s youngest full time forester. He lives and works in Evergreen, where he grew up among the trees and animals.

Last month the dried plant collection of the Auroville Herbarium moved to a new dedicated building in the Botanical Gardens. Funded by SAIIER, inaugurated this March, slowed down a bit by corona, its establishment marks a new phase in the work of preserving and classifying our indigenous flora.

In order to best determine how the lake around Matrimandir should be constructed, a large test pond is being excavated, exposing layers of earth, gravel, sand and clay.

On World Ocean Day in June, a dolphin washed up on to Sri Ma beach. “It was a young dolphin that had not died a natural death, possibly related to pollution, or to swallowed plastic,” says Satya Agrawal, a teacher in NESS school, who was catalysed by this event to start collecting waste on the beach.

As Auroville battles encroachment, nearby deforestation, water depletion and chemical farming, the green skills developed by the pioneers who brought the barren plateau back to life become ever more important.

Human activity, especially over the last 300 years, has caused a measurable increase in the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, disrupting the climatic conditions of the Holocene epoch that has shaped every aspect of human civilisation.

Alan Watson Featherstone is a long-term member of the Findhorn community as well as a former Trustee of that community. He is also the Founder of Trees for Life, which has restored 10,000 acres of the Caledonian Forest in the Highlands of Scotland.

Like so many Auroville projects, Annapurna farm started with a simple keet-roofed hut, no money to speak of, not many expectations but with high aspirations.

The future is very unpredictable and will unfold in many unexpected ways and we have to be responsive and alive to that. The weather is becoming more erratic and resources like water and energy will become scarcer and more costly.

Christoph Pohl grew up in Germany. He studied media technology engineering and worked in video and film post production in Hamburg and Berlin before moving to Auroville in 2008.

In an article first published on Auronet, Rishi Walker identifies the causes and possible responses to the present urgent water situation in Auroville.

When Aurelec first started back in the early 1980s, it had no catering facility, only a small kerosene stove on which the cleaning lady brewed tea and coffee for the pioneer staff working there.