the Lamp of Hope School - आशा दीप विद्याश्रम

This non-profit school for underprivileged children in Varanasi (run in the same building that we used have our Hindi language classes in) is run by some good friends from our years in Varanasi. The excellent work that the school does is quite encouraging. If you want to know more about their work and perhaps support them, they now have a very good website which you can find by clicking here.


To read page one of this brochure click on the image below

A Prayer

असतो मा साद् गमय।
तमसो मा ज्योतिर्गमय।
मृत्योर्मा अमृतम् गमय॥

Lead me from untruth into truth.
Lead me from darkness into light.
Lead me from death into everlasting life.

More Pictures

Sun through the palms

Sundown on the Arabian Sea

Arjun and his cousin looking out a window built into a ancient step well (a well which has steps going down into it - providing cool in the heat of Ahmedabad)

Elephants

Joel and Dana at the step well

Cows relaxing in the shade of an alley way

Driving by the spice market

At the Mosque in Ahmedabad, India
read #3 :-)

Muslim men doing their evening prayers

Dana and I visiting the Friday Mosque which has some amazing architecture

Beautifully carved stone lattice at the Mosque from the 1400s

3 big boys - Joel with our friends' kids Arjun and Benjamin

Dana holding Benjamin and his sister Charis

Men in skirts (Lungis are common wear for men in Varanasi - especially inside the house)

Our last evening in Varanasi - we had a few good friends over for a nice meal, some prayer for our journey, and to hang out one last time.

Arasi, Dana, Lijo, and Swami ji

Back in Romania - Pictures from the last 2 months

Hi All,

Sorry for the long delay in our postings. We've been super busy both since we've been here in Romania for the past week and a half, as well as in our last few months in India finishing up work with the School of Hindu Studies Office.

In December, we really began our transition out of Varanasi. The Christmas season was busy for us and we ended up spending Christmas together with friends in Delhi for a week. It was cool. After Christmas when we returned to Varanasi we had a few days - before new years eve, to pack up and move out of our house.
Our plan was to move in with some friends and their kids for the remaining two months we would be in India.
So that's what we did. It was so nice to be able to take time with them (Chuck and Stacie), play with their two children - Benjamin 2yrs old, and Charis - 4 months old. Dana especially enjoyed that. :-)

The beginning of January saw us finish up with our work in the School of Hindu Studies Office and hand over our responsibilities to our friends in the office. Dana's project of compiling the curriculum for the School of Hindu Studies almost completely finished after a year of work on it was a big accomplishment.

From the end of January, we left on a month long trip through India with our good friends, an American/Indian couple, Jeremy, his wife Arasi and their 2 and a half year old son Arjun.

We began with a trip to a conference in South India for rethinking Christian/Hindu interaction This conference was initiated by Christians concerned with culturally sensitive communication between the two faiths.
The conference was good for us and we left feeling refreshed and connected to people of like mind even as we were preparing to leave India indefinately.

Next, we spent about 3 weeks of down time with our friends at the beach and then at Arasi's family's place in Gujarat (where Gandi was from) for an extended farewell - a good way to end our 5 years in India.

Upon our return to Varanasi we finally said our goodbyes to friends, packed up - (not an easy task to sort our things we had acumulated these past two and a half years and figure out what to leave and what we to take) So after a week back at Chuck and Stacie's house we said goodbye to them and took the train to Delhi where we caught our flight to Romania.

The story of our flight - which was late and forced us to almost miss our connecting flight from Istanbul (even with an eight hour layover planned) was crazy, but we made it alright and so did our luggage. :-)

Now we've been here for a week and a half and are very busy trying to figure out how to deal with the papers to apply for Dana's visa to the States, our taxes, School, and all. But I won' t bore you with details.
At any rate, we are here in Romania for what looks like 5-6 months before we can finally travel to the states for those of Joel's family and friends who haven't met dana even yet after 3 years to finally do so. :-)

Well, here are some pictures from the past few months. Hope you enjoy them.

Shanti,
Joel and Dana

Seva Ashram - Delhi, India

Check out this website which belongs to the Seva Ashram - A centre for the Destitute, disabled kids, and the poor which opperates in New Delhi, India.


click on this link to check it out
Seva Ashram

Ashram Inauguration

Hi all,

We just wanted to share with you an exciting event - the inauguration of the new 'Mukteshwar Matth' which we were privileged to attend and participate in as official photographers. (photos below)
'Mukteshwar Matth', which means 'Lord of Salvation Matth', functions as a spiritual centre and is similar to a monastery. It has now officially been opened by our old language teacher - Swami Muktanand ji - who is one of the founders of the Ashram and is now residing there as a spiritual teacher.

Though the inauguration started at 4 am with an anointing service for Swami ji as the Acharya, or head of the Ashram, the main event started at 4 in the afternoon.
About 200 people showed up (far more than expected) and there was a lively worship time, singing bhajans (traditional devotional songs) and with a short teaching by Swami Dayanand Bharati (one of our School of Hindu Studies teachers) who came to Varanasi especially for this event. After the teaching food was served but half way through eating, the electricity shut off (which happens every day here in Varanasi, but the Ashram has no back up system (generator or batteries) so we lit candles.

Anyway, they say a picture speaks a thousand words so here are the pictures:

Kids playing in the alley way outside the Ashram

A view of the singing from an Archway

The Aangan - every old house is built around a central opening which allows air flow and heat to rise from the house

Prayer

Dana and her friend Shuchita

Lights out

To see our previous post on the Ashram, click here.

Dev Diwali Pictures

On the river on the night of Dev Deepavali

Lighting the Lamp - May the whole world be filled with the light of love in every heart.

Lighting lamps in a patern of a Swastika - a symbol of good fortune and well-being (not at all associated with Nazism)






Sunday November 5th was the festival Dev Deepavali which in Varanasi is the most beautiful night to be on the ghats (the steps on the banks of the river)
The ghats are the focus of this holy city, especially this night, because thousands of people light lamps and place them in rows all along the river.

Ten of us rented a small boat together and spent two hours on the river along with hundreds of others. It wasn't the most fantastic Dev Deepavali I've seen- two years ago, there were more lights out - but it was very cool anyway.
Above you can see some of the pictures we took along the way. One of them a picture of a friend lighting one light from another which we later floated on the river - each one with a prayer for the city and it's people.

Diwali Photos

Diwali!

We just wanted to share with you all some pics we took a few days ago on Diwali. Diwali is one of the numerous festivals/holidays celebrated in India, and one of the biggest. It is also called the Festival of Lights. On Diwali the return of the king Ram to his kingdom Ayodhya is celebrated. Ram, the rightful king of Ayodhya had been exiled from his kingdom for 14 years, most of which he spent in the jungle. His wife is kidnapped from him by an evil demon called Ravan. Ram succeeds in defeating the demon and taking back his wife, returning victorious to claim his throne. His reign is called the golden age. On the way back to Ayodhya, people from the kingdom kept lights on the roofs of their houses so that these would show Ram the way back home. This is what people celebrate and remember on Diwali.

For us, Diwali is a celebration of the Light of Life who came to establish his perfect kingdom in this world. It is like Christmas! So, on this day we get together and worship and light diyas (oil lamps) and share sweets with friends. And, we do what all the other people do in India: light fireworks!

It is hard to describe what craziness is going on during Diwali days - the whole sky is full of light (and smoke!) and the air filled with almost constant bangs! It can be quite scary actually. They put fireworks in the middle of the roads, set off rockets, so all pedestrians and vehicles have to stop and wait for them to pop before continuing on. Saturday night some kid set off a rocket which flew uncontrolled just feet above our heads - scary!
We really had fun though ;-)

To wrap it up here we'll post some pictures on the next entry (above).

Shanti, Shanti, Shanti, (Peace)
Dana & Joel

The Ashram Pictures

Joel, Dana and friends eating lunch with our old Hindi language Guru (teacher) Swami Muktanand one of the founders of Mukteshwar Ashram ('Lord of Salvation' Monastery - or spiritual community centre)

The Ashram, being a very old building near the river in Varanasi is currently under repairs.


A traditionally carved stone work lattice window at the Ashram

Back!

Hey all,

It's been more than a month since we last wrote, and so much has happened. Already, it's the ninth of October, crazy how time flies.
One month ago, on September 9th we finally said goodbye to Mama and Tata ('mom' and 'dad') and boarded our flight to India.
We arrived in New Delhi at around 2:30am and caught a taxi to our hotel where we were told, they didn't have any record of a room being reserved for us - even though Joel called them (from Romania!) the week before.
They did get a room for us though a short time later when some other guests were leaving to catch an early flight. Everything sorted out, we enjoyed our few days in Delhi (in Air Contitioning) before getting seats on the train for the overnight trip back to our home in Varanasi.
When we got back to our house though, it was a mess. Not only was everything super dusty, but all the clean sheets and clothes we had stored over the summer had mildewed because of the damp monsoon weather. We spent the next three or four days just cleaning our house and settling back into our place. It was nice to get back home in spite of the work and the heat though.

Since comming back to Varanasi we've been steadily getting back into the routine of things. We've started back in our office to work on our various projects - School of Hindu Studies curriculum, material for the web page, as well as some other studies. Joel also plans to start back into his music lessons.

On Saturday we had a party at our house to celebrate Joel's Birthday. We invited our closer friends, had a nice meal and watched 'The Skeleton Key' together. Good movie. Joel got some sweet books about the strange rise of 'modern India' which will be great reading...

Anyway, we don't want to bore you to death so we'll just end it here.
Hopefully we'll be posting more often than we have been. It's just been a bit crazy trying to get back into the swing of things.
Take care of yourselves.

Shanti (Peace),

J&D



ps. By the way, Joel cut his Hair! After Three Years!!!!