June 17, 2004From Toronto back to New England, and the ISAH Conference, conceived of and organized by Dr. Amala Guha with the intention of furthering the cause of Ayurveda in the West. The conference was, by general consensus, a success; and it was a pleasure to meet with various colleagues, including Dr. Vasant Lad, at the Interlaken Inn in the gorgeous northeastern corner of Connecticut. After an overnight at the Kripalu Center in Lenox, Massachusetts, where I am scheduled to teach during 2005, I was driven by Mark down to the Wassaic train station, to catch a train for New York City. Mark, who lived for several years in Japan, offered me the happy news that there is a good chance that Masanobu Fukuoka is still alive. While in India I was gifted a copy of Fukuoka-sama's The One-Straw Revolution, a book that seeks to revolutionize farming by simplifying it to the extreme. A thought-provoking read, should you be able to locate a copy.

While in NYC I spoke at the Sivananda Yoga Vedanta Center, the Exhale! Spa, and the Patanjali Yoga Shala. I was thankfully not invited to address the students at Hot Nude Yoga in Chelsea, which (I am told) has but two rules: no kissing, and no touching your penis. Two of my four nights in the City I spent with Stephan of Soundwalk - www.soundwalk.com
and was pleased to learn that final touches on my own Soundwalk opus, recorded in and for the City of Benaras, are nearing completion. As soon as it emerges I will announce its advent; watch this space!

When not teaching or consulting I visited the Ganesha Temple (as also those of Shridi Sai & Raghavendra Swami) in Queens, and took in a performance of Aida (the Elton John/Tim Rice Broadway show, not the opera). Aida offered excellent work by the Princess & by Aida, and also offered the amusement of ex-Monkee Mickey Dolenz on stage as the villain. Nilufer & Kaika Clubwala, who accompanied me to Aida, celebrated their 20th wedding anniversary that midnight over dessert - all best wishes to them both for another 20! Pleasing dinners at the Candle Café, excellent chocolate from Payard & Teuscher; and a delightful brunch at Sarabeth's with Samantha Colt ensured that I did not go hungry while in the City. Sarabeth's is always full, and as I was stuck in traffic Samantha (sister of Dr. Claudia Welch) obtained a table for us by procuring one for herself and then suggesting that we pretend mutual surprise on spying one another there. We pulled off our drama so impressively that the man at the next table couldn't restrain himself from asking if we were related - to which I replied, "Not by blood." Afterwards I dragged Sam to the Museum of Natural Science where we took in the new Meteorite Hall (including one of 37 tons!), & went gaga over the minerals and gems. Never a dull moment in the Big Apple!

Time, and building heights, prevented me from watching the June 8 transit of Venus across the disc of the sun; I contented myself with the thought of its recurrence almost precisely eight years hence. What the event did for me was to return me to Point Venus, where I stay when I visit Tahiti; for I learned in the prelude to this transit that the point owes its name to Captain Cook, who stopped over there on June 3, 1769 to observe a Venus transit. His observation, commemorated in a monument & plaque, permitted for the first time a (relatively) accurate calculation of the distance from the sun to the various planets. How richly Point Venus deserves its name!

June 11 I returned to Texas; June 13 Lynda from Florida & daughter Molly arrived, to visit with my mother, feed the donkey, and shell some of last year's pecans. We also made the obligatory visit to the Alamo, and had tea (and mango & cinnamon ice cream) at the Menger Hotel.

June 16, after depositing L & M at the airport for their flight back, I took my usual late night park promenade, during which I came near to entangling myself in a giant if delicate spider web being created by an industrious spider on the side of one of the still-burning path lamps. At least four feet across, the web seemed ambitious for such a small arthropod; but clearly that arachnid had (like the ant of the song trying to move the rubber tree plant) high hopes. Good hunting, little spider!

June 2, 2004 After canoeing on the Connecticut & climbing Mt. Wantastiquet, I took in Troy before departing Brattleboro for Toronto. On the downside the filmmakers, motivated surely by the limited attention spans of the American public, simplified (butchered) the story (e.g., Agamemnon & Menelaus die while in Troy; Homer's decade-long siege appeared to last all of about a week on screen); the positives included a creditable performance by Brad Pitt, an excellent one by Eric Bana, and Peter O'Toole as King Priam in a splendid scene pleading with Achilles to return his son's body to him. The filmmakers elected to make the Greeks seem more barbarian than the Trojans, who came off as noble, if seemingly unable to choose rightly at any crucial moment, taking in the horse being simply the last of a long list of mistakes. A good example in action of the fine Sanskrit phrase vinashakale viparitabuddhi: when the time for your destruction arrives, your discernment will warp.

While in Toronto, in between lectures, dinners, and visits with eminent astrologer-philosopher Mantriji, I took in three other films, two in the cinema hall and one on video, of which Shrek 2 was hilarious (though I continue to hope that contemporary filmmakers will soon tire of flatulence jokes). The other two were more serious, Cabeza de Vaca being a Spanish film that tells the story of the Spanish explorer of that name who spent eight years among the natives of the Gulf Coast, surviving multiple privations that produced in him some manner of internal transformation that gave him the gift of healing. He and his men then became renowned among the local tribes as they moved among them, ministering to the sick and wounded. The screenplay seemed rather loosely based on the actual story, but it was far better than the complete silence about this side of Cabeza de Vaca in the school history textbooks of my youth. Apparently Cabeza de Vaca (who's name means "cow's head") wrote a long letter to the King of Spain after returning to Spanish territory, requesting his sovereign to respect the natives, and to refrain from enslaving them. Cabeza de Vaca's pleas may have fallen on deaf ears then, but it is heartening to see his story emerge now.

The other film - Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... and Spring - tells (in Korean) the story of an old monk who lives in a remote hermitage along with a small boy whom he has somehow become obliged to rear. The boy goes bad, and the old monk is forced to resort to radical measures to save him. An outstanding film in every way: story, images, photography, acting. May we have more like it!

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