OK another early rise after a late night, but the vibrations of the tour just carry you along and strangely with little sleep, tiredness is not an issue. This morning we start with a lovely group meditation (yes before breakfast) by the pool overlooking a rice paddy. It’s postcard picturesque as we sit in stillness and togetherness.
Then it’s on the move, breakfast at the Gayatri Cafe, finish packing, load up and into taxi-cabs and off to the airport. It’s a temple celebration day, in recognition of Shri Saraswati, so we are conscious of travel time and we’re late getting away, but things flow beautifully at Denpasar airport and we’re through in a snitch, without having to part with any rupiah for extra baggage thanks to our Asian yogi brothers and sisters taking additional bags on our behalf.
It’s a short sojourn in the air between Denpasar and Surabaya (55 minutes) and we gain an hour with the time change, technically arriving at our destination 5 minutes before we departed. We’re joined by French couple who have been travellng throughout Asia over the last 2 1/2 months and are due to fly back in 48 hours to France. They live in South of France and are working in the field of ecological sustainability. Indre and Nico. Indre is from Lithuania and had her realisation 1 year ago. They were ‘coincidentally’ in Ubud and attended our first Music and Meditation program and then ‘coincidentally’ happened to be booked on the same domestic flight to Surabaya. They’re very open-hearted and Nico particularly is thriving on the first fruits of the collective sahaj experience, and having many ‘ahah’ moments.
The importance of being here is underscored when we realise that Surabaya currently has just 2 yogis, Ayu and Andy. Ayu has been with us since the beginning and we are met by Andy and his partner at the airport. They have been busy making arrangements in preparation for our arrival. Ayu is the sister of Bagus, who many Australians might remember thrilled us with his technical virtuosity on the piano in the rendition of ‘Summertime’ performed at Balmoral on Shri Mataji’s last visit to Australia.
We are housed in a veritable palace, a very spacious 2 double-storyed contemporary residence… more than enough room for us all, free- flowing spaces from one room to the next, with the patio area adjoining the main living space, and a pool that you can take two steps from the lounge suite and fall into… important for the continuation of our pool Olympics.
The venue for the inaugural music and meditation program in Surabaya is aptly named Halo. As with the other venues the room we were presenting in was part of a larger complex that housed restaurants, community halls and other facilities. Two adjoining rooms were used to make one long and fairly narrow hall. The stage was smallish and made for a more intimate atmosphere. Tonight we wore the white ‘Tour T- Shirts’ generously given by the Indonesian collective.
Each night is a totally different experience. Tonight Bagus was in the role of MC and translated the English explanations of the songs beautifully delivered by Ramaa, to the small crowd of attendees – 15 for this evening, supplemented by a strong contingent of 20 yogis and supporters including Bagus and Ayu’s parents, who loved the evening.
A sense of subtlety is essential in Indonesia, nothing overt or nothing that might be construed as trying to directly influence people’s spiritual disposition… so the best way in this instance was to raise the roof with Jogawa, and speak of the intrinsic energy that unites us all. After Jogawa participants were encouraged to feel this energy in their hearts and then above their heads.
Several versions of songlists were prepared (even during the interval) but these all got tossed aside as the evening unfolded to its own tune. Who would have thought that Manuk Dadali would break all the shackles and have all and sundry kicking up their heels! The national folk song we had been somewhat apprehensive about performing turned out to be the show-stopper, and continued for a good 15 minutes, including the musicians doing a convoy through the audience. Chris Szydlowski lead the way in unbridalled joyous dancing and we really felt a momentum shift.
Than it’s tucker time… tonight a lovely whole grilled fish and sharing the evenings experiences. Then it’s a cool dip (and a run for Mad-dog Matty Fogarty and his running sidekick Crazy-horse Craig Armstrong) and into Zzzz land for a few hours of deep sleep.
Kind Regards
Martin Purcell
It all sounds great fun and also groundbreaking stuff.
Love the photos and commentaries
Well done .