winter is over. some updates:

1.
so the photos have either copied or moved to
somethingconstructive.net/mangolandia

2.
ama-zoni-a and i wrote a cookbook, recipes from brasil and philosophy from the ancients, at
somethingconstructive.net/jamanta

3.
i still love dolphins, went to marine reserve, and have still never seen any outside of sea world (tm).

4.
i spent all my free time in the last couple of months and much time i should have been studying (no guilt) or participating in temple life (i live in a temple; some guilt) working on it. you can read about it and even order a copy online at
somethingconstructive.net/jamanta

5.
my brother chanoor (does not drinks) got me a flute. a present from bombay when he went down last week to take a lesson from hariprasad(ji) chaurasia. he gave it to me today, me totally emocione, and its so perfect and beautiful. so now i have no excuses, a real flute thats better by much than i am and togetherly we shall learn.
ayurved classes finish friday. i have learned so much and nothing. ayurved is as deep as the pacific. i understand how to do and when to do some minor treatments and i will start whenever i can. my next step is shrouded in mystery, to me.

6.
today is 30 january 06. maybe exactly 58 years (missile time) after gandhi(ji)'s assassination. this morning in the middle of surgery (leech application) class we had a two minute break of silence and i sat under the pipal tree (ficus religiousa, banyan, buddha enlightenment tree) in the courtyard and tried to put somethings together.
mainly interweaving with memories of three years ago in new york city, took the day off of work (thanks jed) and meditated (before i knew i knew how) and went even to some sort of thing at the UN, for gandhiji and martin luther king. theres a sculpture there -- the picture might be in piscataway, new jersey -- of a revolver larger than a horse with the barrel twisted into a not. pretty powerful.

"
jan 30 - Gandhi's death versary. 2 minutes of silence in the courtyard; he is from sauroastrar [this peninsula, where jamnagar is]. He is out father. I feel like Gandhi is the 1st Gujarati to understand me, the only of my beloved relatives to fall under family, to understand my path and struggle alongside me.
there's a professor speaking and maybe his words are a final exam in Gujarati for me. i don't understand them; my mind is elsewhere. Maybe it's a final exam in focus.
I think of John Giuliano's fridge and photograph -- the front cover of a magazine showing the Pope's first foray out of the hospital, to visit and ask/give forgiveness toward the man who shot him. I think of Paresh talking about the temple at Ayodhya. Israeli students and Palestinian refugee counting their grievances. Can we replace the words? Can we dub over torture, over cries of agony with gestures of forgiveness? Can you see the short film, the cutting cinema of bosnian refugees, of rioters and broken buildings and mistaken amputations and mass graves with some soundtrack of forgiveness, some simple bhajan that understands what john understands and what gandhiji lived and died for?

In the pranami [the krishna sect in whose world hq temple i live] holy book we were reading the other day, they say 11 centuries after the koran will come a new time, a new man. or something significant. maybe it was jan 30 1948 and the savior was john wilks booth who killed gandhiji.
maybe He is ushering in an era of forgiveness. we must seek forgiveness within ourselves before we seek truth. it's the same of course, but aftert the most murderous century ever recorded has passed through us, has become part of us, maybe now is the time to forgive...
"

7.
much love my friends. sorry this blog has been such a disaster. caught in the middle of pubic and private, no doubt. from here on out im just going to be honest, not try to pretend to have any real knowldege -- ayurvedic or knot -- to share, and not be concerned with the Unknown who may read. those who know this is for them shall understand this is for them.

as for the rest, stool sex mushrooms vitriol. it's all here and none of its prurient. so there.

love
ankur