"Thank You India...Thank You Terror"-Alanis Morissette

The night before Thanksgiving day in the US this year...just a few days ago really Mumbai in India underwent a 'terror attack'. On Thanksgiving day fellow blogger Elspeth Duncan put up this post about how she was talking with a friend in the car on the way to an event and they decided to honour the North American festival in a sense by saying thank yous to each other...then right after they said their thank yous...well guess what?...Alanis Morisette's Thank You came on the radio!

That got me to thinking bout how often when were are chatting or reading or saying something the word is then said right after on TV...what's up with that? coincidence or some kinda of network or fabric in the universe that hooks us all up in some way...transcending space and time and all of that! And Elspeth's post came up just after I had done two posts one, about how things seem to be just coming together in some way like I guess it is what can be called networking but I just kept meeting this person or doing this thing that leads to this thing and I visualized it like water droplets coming together. And another one bout the power of visualization and how I had visualised or perhaps even in a sense had a premonition of a tree!

Then within all of that I read Elspeth's blog and looked at the words she pasted for Alanis Morissette's lyrics for the song-Thank You. And just makes you wonder...can all these things further be linked to the fact that just the night before India had the terror attacks...pure coincidence? A terrorist fascinated with her music? Or the same thinking that India representing a land of peace especially to so many Americans nowadays with the New Age religion etc and being the land of Ahimsa-Non-Violence and Mahatma Gandhi and all was it the terrorist sick way of contrasting peace versus terror...putting them side by side on America's Thanksgiving? And in doing so they coincidentally expressed with actions what Alanis expressed in song? You know Thank You India-as it has given us the Mahatma and Ahimsa and Satyagraha...Non-violence and the practice of using non-violent resistance started by the Mahatma to resolve political issues versus Thank You Terror-as in being the total opposite in this is the use of violent acts against civilians to resolve political issues and God knows how resolution is sought by this anyway. But I guess in song it is Alanis Morissette's way of embracing the opposites...the yin and the yang and thanking them all for it is all that propels her and the universe itself to unfold as it should?

I still can't Thank Terror cause of the hurt it causes but perhaps those souls involved it was their purpose on earth to take part in the dance so that the universe could unfold...perhaps such acts are what propels us forward for it makes us wake up as a world and look, listen, feel and causes us then to be the change we want to see...so perhaps what we do now post terror will decide how things will continue to unfold...? And I leave you with that Alanis song that leaves us with much more to think about too...

Visualizing The Tree of Peace...

I thought I had blogged this on one of my blogs but based on interactions I had in response to comments made about my last post on my Meady's Musings blog I realized I just never got about to doing it. One of the things too is I think this post is applicable to both my Meady's Musings blog and the Universal Collective Prayer one so I'm going to do a dual entry and post it on both. So here is what I want to say...

Last month as part of the Diwali celebrations in work we had a photography competition I was a major driver of the competition and I was a major player in setting up the structure of the competition, developed judging templates, sat as a judge and also had the immense pleasure of presenting the awards too! :)One of the guys on our organizing committee was at loggerheads with me of a severe kind cause he didn't and still does not believe that if one wanted to show the concept of peace or what we called the 'human value of peace' for the competition they could take a serene scenery or a picture of a tree say to show it!I don't know why he couldn't see it but I don't want to go into all of it...I took the higher road I think and felt he should still be a judge cause it was good to have opposing ideas on such a panel. But I stood my ground as also being a judge. He however took that idea to the judging matrix and so as far as I'm concerned all such entries had a major handicap in that judge's eye. Luckily there were three judges and so an almost perfect picture of a water pond/dam in our refinery area surrounded by beautiful Samaan trees was able to cop third prize representing 'Peace'. Had it just been two judges or a third judge who felt differently it may have came first.

The Third Prize winner is at the bottom of the picture:


Now when I was visualizing how the structure of the contest would flow I kept seeing this tree in my head when I thought of peace...I didn't have the picture locked down to location but I had a general idea of it's shape, size and type although in the visualization I never knew what type of tree it was I cleared saw it...and I sometimes visualized me or just an arbitrary human (no identifying features at time) sitting in Yogi position under the tree and usually dressed in white or sometimes just under the tree not necessarily in any Yogi pose. Weeks past and then I had to go to Tobago for the weekend with some friends (it's when I had the Gran Couva chocolate) and that Friday although I was off from work and in Tobago was when the entries for the competition was closing. And so I kept being excited to get back into to work to see how the entries would end up! :) Although I also relished the time for relaxation and the company of friends. And guess what...as I walked into the yard of the home I would be staying in for the weekend...I saw the tree! The said tree...very similar in shape and size...it is only then it occurred to me on the prompting of a friend that the tree was what we call an Almond tree in Trinidad...although it's not the actual almonds that people eats as nuts I think...although the fruit is huge and green and shaped like a big Almond i.e. almond shaped. I don't know much about the details of the fruit of the tree and how it is treated to be honest...but there was the tree! And in saying that it reminds me of something I read when I was 14 or so by J. Krishnamurti bout how man names trees and label things and in doing so gets so caught up in that, we miss the beauty of the thing. So let's not get into the name of the tree and I was glad that in my visualization I never named the tree type as in label it and I myself although come to think of it knew it was 'an Almond tree' never clicked into that until the friend named it...I was just caught up in the tree for being all that it is!

So there was girl and her tree...All weekend long as we sat in the porch looking out...I kept thinking there was the tree! And just as I had visualized it...if someone had told me that could happen or it happened to them I'd think them crazy...even now people can say it is just coincidence and who knows perhaps it is? But it had a huge impact on me! So imagine I did end up spending many hours just lounging with friends looking at this tree! :)Perfect bliss...Satchitananda...Perfect Peace...Harmony...a thing of beauty is a joy forever...and so much more...just me and my tree!

And here is looking at your tree!Pics taken by me and one of friends think was Ian Graham not sure who snapped what...And if it was Ian he knew nothing bout the visualization story as I didn't share that story with him so going to flag him in this writing to let him know now...:

Smile! It's All Coming Together...

I had been meaning to share with my readers something that happened to me last week as it happened but in all my excitement as a part-time, at night after my full time job blogger...well I...I fell asleep! I was excited bout the whole thing and then got all so worked up checking out the film, the related sites and processing all of it in my head and this and that...and so I expended so much of my remaining of the day's energy I just fell asleep...didn't even have dinner...and then the next few days the excitement wasn't there...this was last week Tues 18 Nov I only know the exact day cause I had saved the link to the film on a word document under the title smile not to lose it and the document was created on that day. The thing is then as the days rolled on even more things unfolded but I was just too tired to blog it! But perhaps it was the universe's way to allow more to unfold before I got up to blog about it! Who knows...q'est que c'est...who knows what it is...? However as I didn't blog it right away another event occurred that could be seen as totally random and meaningless or as very serendipitous etc. Although I yet don't know what is the greater plan or meaning...so now here's the story...

Fellow blogger Elspeth Duncan who many times inspires me to go off on something in my own way after she has posted it...had posted up this link to a film that was sent to her by a friend. She had said the film was just bout 19 mins long I think it was and how her readers should view it...it seems the title of the film is Validation cause I can see it being the title although Im not 100% sure now if the title appeared anywhere. As a result she had titled her blog that too. However on watching the film I more thought of it as Smile! I'd call it Smile! if I had to name it...SMILE!...and though in many ways the film can be seen as corny it really was a lovely film! And it made me think too how true it is for all of us in life really? And how many of us are somewhere along that journey the man was on in the film...and at what point are we? I guess we can all ask ourselves these questions...our stories might not be exactly the same and of course the film strips it down to the very basic and generic core which is what makes it a bit corny but of course also simple. I mean maybe we again find love or a smile from another person but we do in the end...or maybe many of us are grumpy cause of the same thing that happened to that man in the film or the girl...but it's so cool that when he got his smile on again even after her refusal he inspires again and what was meant to be then unfolded on its on in its own time...that little film has a multitude of little lessons if you go into it...it's very lovely and powerful! Of course me going on about it so abstractly might have lost you but you just have to watch the film which I'm going to link below.

However before I do that I want to let you know the serendipitous or synchronous things that happened to me after checking out this film. I realized that the film's origin is on this site Spirtual Cinema Circle and it was so lovely to find that! If you check it out you will see why...then I realize one of the founders of it, Stephen Simon had his hands in some way involved in some of my really fav films like What Dreams May Come and, Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure. Of course I also find Deepak Chopra reviewing the site positively but he is all over the place in spiritual media stuff so perhaps not such a coincidence but still since I'm a member of the Intent community as well so even that was already another synchronicity perhaps? Then I realize that there is another online community affiliated with this cinema site called Gaia. I was too sleepy and information overloaded to join which is by the way one of my Intents on Intent...to not suffer from information overload! So I must have fell asleep but then a few days later on Intent a guy joins on first as a community member blogger but then quickly moves to the Intent Voice side of the page...I find his stuff interesting...but guess what?! It's only a while after and as more information about him comes up I realize that he, Brian Johnson is actually the founder of a company called Zaadz which he has now sold and is which is now Gaia! So what you think? Coincidence? Or Serendipitous? Or Synchronous? Or just plain and simply nothingnous? :) I don't know...Je ne sais pas...Hum na jaane...But in my mind the whole thing keeps being visualized as a set of water droplets or like moving celluloid type beads sort of just merging together till they form bigger and bigger droplets...and it reminds me of the Big Blue Marble song that I dedicated to Mallika Chopra and the Intent community in the past and was also reminded of by Elspeth..."closer...getting closer" Whatever it means or not interesting isn't it? N'est pas? Non?

I've tried to find a pic that best illustrates my visualization cause a good visual might also be how water droplets on a well polished car start sliding into each other...or if you excuse my engineering terms here, like how water in emulsions separate from the oil say and coalesce together...like attracting like I guess and being repelled from the unlike? Dunno? Plus I'm not for segregation...Anyway I can't find any of my own pics that would best show it so I've burrowed this pic...it doesn't say it is copyrighted and it's from this link http://www.scalestotails.net/images/WaterDroplets.JPG also I'm not using this pic to for any profit so hope it is OK.

WaterDroplets.
JPG (JPEG Image, 640x426 pixels)

And finally you can go off and enjoy the lovely little film and let me know what you think if you like...
Smile!

Closer...getting closer...

Here I Go Raw Again!- or as I learnt the last time around Semi-Raw might be a better term for it!

Photo by Tyron Waterman 2006

This is just to let all my readers know that since my last days raw...I had gone on a very, very meandering path again and things had just gotten too out of hand yet again! The chocolates, the ice cream...mmmmm...just all the decadent treats were really more than a girl should eat! So I figured I had to come back again to the beginning and start all over again so 'Here we are, here we are, here we are again! :) I think from my last adventure raw and me calling it then 70% raw what I can say is I've learnt that the more smart sounding word to define my current eating approach might be semi-raw. So Hoorah! Hoorah!...Hoorah! Hoorah! Hoorah! Here I go again...semi-raw! It took a lot to get back to this day as I kept putting it off about a week now...so it really is with a Hippy Hippy Hooray! that I say from now until Christmas Day I will be semi-raw again!:) YAY!

Gran Couva Cocoa Makes the Finest Chocolate!

I know I've been neglectful to whoever out there in the great big blogosphere that might be following this blog...but guess as the overused phrase goes aka cliche- Life Happens! So yes I have had that chocolate some time now and I've just been too neglectful of readers to let them know and I do humbly apologise to ya- Oh Great Ones! But yep on Sunday 19 Oct I had my first bite of Gran Couva 2007 limited edition. I got it as a present the night before in Tobago as part of my friends and they of House Building fame 5th wedding anniversary celebrations! After dinner the female of the pair gave all other females in the party a bar each of Gran Couva. They also had a sampling of different champagne and a make shift speech by the Best Man of 5 years ago fame! But Teetotaler that I am I didn't sample the liquid stuff! But then to my surprise...

My friend, who was suppose to bring me a bar and never did respond when I inquired if she had remembered to get it or it had delivered on time, brought something out. It was the chocolate! I then realised she had been keeping it as a surprise of sorts and she had just decided to get lots and give each female guest one...I guess cause more gals are into chocolates than guys? Or at least in that group of people perhaps? None the less I got my bar! :) The funny message that came after we all got the chocs though was that my friend had not refrigerated it. So it had traveled from London to TT in all the variations of temperature. I can't say I got the logic of going through the trouble of getting so many vintage bars of chocolate and then leaving them out of the fridge in the tropical heat but I think my friend's room was air conditioned on and off. She went on to say that of course she has just had them lying around in her suitcase the whole time so they may very well be just one melted one blob by now...But then one of the girls said it's dark chocolate and so no it would not have melted?! Now I didn't believe the girl who said it would not have melted cause I've had another girl bring me Cadbury's Bournville already (a dark chocolate when it had temporarily become unavailable here in TT) and that blob thing...happened big time! Now I'm not going into all of this to knock my friend who was nice enough to get me the chocolate in all the hassle of travel and other plans and it may have cost her bout 3.5pds sterling too I think! I'm going into all of this so that you will get this bout this chocolate!

Lo and behold the girl who said bout the dark chocolate was right well at least for dark chocolate of this percentage and quality! The chocolate had not melted a bit! It even had all the writing engraved on it intact! WOW! And it tasted like the finest quality cocoa in the world from Gran Couva in Trinidad of course!:) It tasted not sweet but yet not bitter...it has to be the finest dark chocolate I've ever eaten! HOORAY! It truly is just like Hong Wing Coffee then! Made in TT and the Best! (of my first blog ever fame!)Well at least the cocoa that is! As in the cocoa is from TT but the chocolate made in Europe. But I'll have to tell you the cocoa taste was so full in it...it had to be the cocoa that made this chocolate what it is! Below are some more shots of the finest which was from a 2007 collection of bars. And you know what? Inspired by my first blog ever I think I'm going to start A Best Chocolate in the World poll!

On Dying Young and What Doctors are Meant For?

Today I found out that one of niece's friends, a twelve year old girl, died from leukaemia. My niece told us when she got home from school today. I was actually at home cause I'm on a week's vacation to see about some other affairs. My mum couldn't believe it and I who myself never even met the girl but heard of her and knew when my niece used to be on the phone with her and when she entered her life also felt sad...It made me look up leukaemia on the web and I learnt that in the UK in the 50s to the 60s about there most kids used to die from leukaemia a few wks after it was diagnosed. However in the present day only 20% of the kids die thanks to advances in medicine.
Apparently this child died on Friday but my niece only found out today, Monday when she went out to school. My niece wasn't very close to her and she was a new friend. Cause my niece has only now started high school and she did not go to the same elementary school as this child. However my niece was introduced to this girl by her mother who met the girl at a pre-school she sometimes teaches at and cause she found out her daughter and the girl were going to attend the same high school in the new school year she felt it might be a good new friend. In Trinidad children write an entrance exam to get into high school and get into to different ones based on their marks and choices. Both my niece and this girl had chosen the same school as their first choice and had gotten into the school. So over the months leading up to starting at their new school the girls used to exchange texts messages and phone calls. My niece was invited to a party the girl had just before school started I think it may have been for her birthday but my niece did not end up attending.
In September both my niece and the girl started their new school but were not in the same class cause usually they have three classes entering and they are arranged either randomly or by alphabetical order. So my niece and her were in the same year but not the actual class. However I now learn from my niece that the girl has been out of school since early October or late September. My niece last spoke to her on the phone mid October. When I researched leukaemia it made me wonder...that's exactly the same time it took for kids to die back in the 50s and 60s in the UK. Was it that this child was in the unfortunate 20% or was it that in Trinidad health care was back in time compared to in the UK? I am comparing with the UK case studies as they happen to come up in my search....with a documentary done on the kids on BBC. In running a spell check on this blog I realise I may have gotten the UK info cause I spell like the Brits and the Americans and Brits spell the disease differently-leukemia versus leukaemia. I guess I won’t know why this particular child died and it is not worth finding out as it will not prove anything and only bring more grief to the family. However it does make me wonder about the health care set up for this in Trinidad as a whole…
But it also made me wonder about many more things…can any amount of health care or doctors decide when we are going to die? Are doctors merely just gatekeepers who can help us enter this world and leave? What are their roles really? Perhaps they are just meant to care for the bodies when they enter this world and when they leave making the transition as peaceful and painless as possible? And of course I guess make our time on the earth as healthy as possible too. But for sure they can’t really stop death can they? Nor can they cause death? But I don’t know…and really doesn’t it seem too when you think of it from the spiritual side it makes sense that we only enter and leave this earth when it is exactly the right time? So what is this thing call dying…is the soul really in control as to when it can enter and leave this earthly plane? I really don’t know…but for sure some people forget and think doctors and medicine can do more that they possibly can…
My niece has been known to exaggerate and dramatise stories but I don’t know cause she does seem to be troubled by this on a subtle or subconscious level at least. So I take it she is being honest about this…she says to me that her friend had asked her that if she died that she should come to her funeral…very sad sounding conversation for 12 year olds…but cause I believe this is true I am driving my niece and her mother to the funeral tomorrow. I’m not attending myself as she will go with her mother…I’m just the transport. The school is officially taking students but the priority was for students in her class itself and there is no more space on the bus. My niece has experienced death in the form of relatives before of which I think she took the death of my grandfather, her great-grandfather the worst…but just makes me wonder…death…dying…dying young…makes you sometimes wonder what’s all this about?…and the sadness of the parents who have to grieve such a death…