Auroville's monthly news magazine since 1988
Mar 2016 (115 months ago) Download PDF (free download)
Impressions from the event — Story by Deepti Tewari
On the evening of 29th February, Deepti Tiwari gave a much appreciated talk, the fourth and last in a series, organised by Cinema Paradiso, on the theme of consciousness which have been given by different Aurovilians. Here are some selections from a much longer talk.
A considered editorial — Story by Alan
“This evening the Divine Presence, concrete and material, was there present amongst you. I had a form of living gold, bigger than the universe, and I was facing a huge and massive golden door which separated the world from the Divine. As I looked at the door, I knew and willed, in a single movement of consciousness, that “the time has come”, and lifting with both hands a mighty golden hammer I struck one blow, one single blow on the door and the door was shattered to pieces. Then the supramental Light and Force and Consciousness rushed down upon earth in an uninterrupted flow.” — The Mother, 29 February 1956
A Q&A with Balu and Meenakshi — In dialogue with Lesley
Auroville recently hosted a two-day festival to celebrate Tamil heritage and culture, a first of this scale and vision. The brainchild of Balu from Mohanam Cultural Centre, and Meenakshi from Auroville’s Tamil Heritage Centre and Ilaignarkal School, the festival brought together artisans, performers, farmers, VIPs and visitors for festivities on Auroville land.
A Q&A with — In dialogue with Inge van Alphen
The Ministry of Social Justice & Empowerment oversees the interest of the Scheduled Castes, and intervenes in critical sectors through various schemes. One such scheme is the Schedules Castes Sub-Plan (SCSP) that ensures the flow of targeted financial and physical benefits from all the general sectors of development for the benefit of Scheduled Castes.
A Q&A with Vivek — In dialogue with Shradha
From November to March it’s always busy in Auroville, with the community hosting performances, workshops and exhibitions and welcoming the outside world. This year, adding to all the other activities, were farming and agriculture-related programmes. These included ‘From the soil to the plate’ (at Buddha Garden), Permaculture courses, Sunday Farm Walks, Krishna’s Circle Garden Project (at Solitude Farm), Joy of Learning sessions on Farming (an Auroville Campus Initiative), the Auroville Farm Festival 2016, the Pongal fest display by Meenakshi and her friends, an Annapurna Farm visit (with over 100 participants) and the revival of the Saturday Markets – to name but a few.
A Q&A with Akash Heimlich, Monica Tobar and Riccardo — In dialogue with Shradha
The Auroville Urban Farming project was started by Riccardo, a long term volunteer studying Food Security in Auroville, with the aid of Luigi in late 2014. Since then the team has grown, and today includes Giacomo, Mira, Ion, Valentina and Redvan, youth at Les Maison des Jeunes (along with Jaiakash, the gardener) and Martin from Auroville Consulting.
Impressions from the event
On February 7th, the ‘Landing Auroville Celebration’ held at the Unity Pavillion was an encouraging success. Organised by the joint land fundraising teams of Acres for Auroville, GreenAcres and LFAU, the event’s central message was the sacredness of the land, and the need for an intense collective effort to acquire land in Auroville’s Master Plan area now.
Food is very much in the news these days. Recently, the Joy of Learning team presented two sessions on farming in Auroville, where the issue of Aurovilians’ food tastes, and how this impacts the farmers by determining what and how much organic food they grow, was an important topic.
Reflection — Reported by David Hutchinson
David Hutchinson has been deeply involved with the Integral Yoga for 35 years. He has been a member of the Sri Aurobindo Association in the U.S., co-editor of the magazine Collaboration, organizer of AUM conferences, and moderator of several online lists on yoga. Recently he made a brief visit to Auroville for the first time in twenty years. Here is an edited version of his reflections.
Reported by Gaelle
When I first arrived three months ago, I imagined I was going to learn about new governance and economic structures, a new way of making decisions and managing money. What I discovered was different.
A Q&A with Min, Mike and Lalit — In dialogue with Alan
The Joy of Learning is an experiment in collective learning which addresses a wide range of themes associated with life in Auroville. It tries to (re)familiarise the residents with important issues in a stimulating and respectful learning environment, and is supported with funding from Stichting de Zaaier.
Auroville’s 28th birthday Auroville’s birthday, on February 28, was celebrated with the traditional dawn bonfire...
Auroville Marathon The ninth Auroville Marathon, held on February 14th, drew over 3,000 participants from across the country...
Bamboo Centre intensive course The Bamboo Center organised a three-week intensive hands-on training course for bamboo crafters...
Upcycling exhibition at Udavi Artists Ok and Orly and Mark from the Upcycling Studio exhibited ‘upcycled products’, or products made from waste, at Udavi School...
Expressive arts therapy A symposium on expressive arts thereapy took place at the Pavilion of Tibetan Culture and the Sankalpa Art Center on February 19-21...
Honouring
On the evening of February 29th, Roy (Alistair Wicks) of New Creation passed away in his UK home in the presence of his daughter and son, due to kidney failure. He was 92 years old. In 1989, Roy, a retired British police sergeant and school welfare officer, visited Auroville after the demise of his wife and was approached by André Tardeil, who at the time was setting up extended training at New Creation for village youth and needed someone to coordinate the educational efforts there. Half a year later Roy returned and started funding and establishing New Creation Bilingual School, which is now the well running CBSE-accredited Aikiyam School. Throughout the years, Roy’s house in New Creation became an organised and educative boarding for pupils of the school who had no relatives to take care of them. ‘Roy’s Boarding’ has been a caring home from where many youngsters from the village have been guided into the world with love, an institution which survives today as ‘Malarchi’, efficiently run by two of Roy’s pupils who grew up in this home. In 2001, suffering from a serious knee infection, Roy left for the UK, and was not able to return. He has been always in contact, via email and skype, with ‘his children’, whom he dearly missed and vice versa. Roy, thanks to his enormous work, will be remembered with love and gratitude by numerous youth from the village who thanks to him have found a solid place in society.
On the afternoon of Tuesday, February 16th, Mani (P. Munian) who lived in the Pump House near Bharat Nivas left his body at Trichy Hospital due to kidney failure. He was 58 years old. Mani was known as a friendly, goodhearted person who began his Auroville life at Forecomers in the early eighties, as a foreman of the workers there. In 1988 he joined Auroville and moved to the Pump House a year later. For many years he was involved in the Land Service. Mani’s remains were cremated on February 17th, in Pondicherry.
