1. The present is our own
   Live, love and toil with a will…
   Place no faith in tomorrow
   For the clock then may be still….

2. Those who bring sunshine to the lives of others cannot keep it from themselves….

3. Smiles – miles away from stress
   Dreams – distances away from dangers

—Good things to think about, eh?

We find she always worked on keeping her thoughts and her mind in a good place. We miss our darling teacher and best friend.

Loving you,
Kamala, Anni and Link

Today is “Martyrs Day” in India, Jan 31, 2008 the day that Mahatma Gandhi was shot dead in 1948. His last words were, Hey Ram, or O Truth, depending on how one wants to translate that. Today is also the last day of Amma’s South India tour, and as I type, she is giving darshan in Thiruvananthapuram. I do not think anyone, including myself understands the sacrifice she is making there. She should be here tomorrow. I don’t know when we will get a chance to post this, we have ceased the cell phones and all the conveniences that come with them are also gone. What was Anni’s life sacrificed for? I still do not understand. Was it a sacrifice? It feels so to us. For us, she is purity and innocence, brightness, personified. Her presence in our lives kept us in that frame of being as well. Who and what Anni is, is so precious…Here is a verbatim letter that she wrote to Amma, the date of the translation into Malayalam is March 31, 2004, She had probably written it some days or weeks before, getting good
translation is very difficult. Anni would have been 15, almost 16 years old at the time of writing.

Dearest Amma,

If this world is really so unreal, then why are we so unable to understand that? Why is it that the unreal appears so real, and the real so distant? Is the physical world (as in tables, bodies, etc.) also unreal or is it just the social world (‘I’,’me’, ‘mine’, ‘you’, ‘yours’, etc)?

I imagine that if we know our oneness with everything then there would no longer be any purpose of human existence. Riight? And then, if there is no longer existence, what would become of this world? It must all be a mirage anyhow.

A mirage of what?

When all is you, and each and every soul thoroughly knows and experiences it’s oneness with you, then the world would dissolve…I guess. At least we’d see it very differently.

It is said that we are creations of God, and “God hath created us in his own image.” Then how did we become so far from you anyways?

Amma, please always keep me near to you, come inside me, always be with me, and let me serve you with everything I say, think and do.

— Annika

The following quote from Amma seems appropriate here and seems to encapsulate every point of Anni’s letter to Amma:

“In the beginning the Guru will tell the disciple, who is a practitioner, “The world is an illusion. Reject it and become established in the Self.” This is to speed up the sadhana. But at last he will understand that this whole world is part of God when he reaches Realization. Then there will not be anything to reject, only to love and serve all. This state is not hypothetical, but is derived from experience.”

OM, OM, OM
Kamala Aunty, Link and Anni

            We found some hilarious jokes in Anni’s diary which we wanted to share…On tours stops in India, and sometimes elsewhere, Amma occasionally will ask for a joke.  While we never had the chance to give Her any,  we wanted to be prepared. Trying to keep a ready repertoire of jokes on hand, was an ongoing effort on our part, and we made efforts to find good jokes, and prepare them in the event that we were ever called.

These two anecdotes, talk about situations with Brahmachari Gurudas, or Gurudas, as he is more commonly known.  Our family nickname for him (and we have nicknames for everybody) is Goo-dasy.  He is a hardworking brahmachari, who for the most part has been a real human being to us, acting as a family friend to the children,  sharing stories of Amma and spiritual concepts with us.  We came to know him in this regard through numerous small projects that we began to beautify the area around Amma’s room,  over the years, which often entailed his assistance in his more official capacity for securing bricks, cement, masons (he himself knows masonry also) etc. 

From a distance, it appears that he is always busy. It appears he has numerous ashram duties,  of various types of physical labor, from working with the laborers, hauling sand, cement,  cleaning the cow shed, being night duty guard attendant, dealing with the waste, setting up latrines,  the kitchen, etc., etc., really, his activities are so numerous it is hard to say what all he does.   He is always ready to lend a hand to anyone, for anything.   Along with Brahmachari John, he also attends to the funerals,   and disposal of ashes ceremonies, and was there with us when Anni’s ashes pot was thrown into the sea.  We used to take care of the darshan hut, and this story is from that time, one day when Anni and Link were working on it..  Anni entitled it:

 

“Repairing the Darshan Hut

One day, before Amma came back from some foreign tour, in 2003,  Gurudas decided that it was time to paint the Darshan hut roof. [this must mean the poles that hold up the thatch roof].  So accordingly, Lincoln and he brought in two tables (to tie together); so that one may reach the roof.  As we were tying them together, Gurudas looked at me and said:

“See, you’re not tying them tight enough.  When you tie, they should be so tight that your face turns purple, and an onlooker should be able to distinctly see the outline of every muscle in your face, and your veins should bulge and your eyes should bug out.”

After we were finished with the tedious task, he turned to me and said,

“You’ve still not tied it tight enough.”

“Yes, I did.”

“No, you didn’t.”

“Yes, I tell you, I did”

“Then will you get up and stand there?” he asked.

“Of course I will, “ I said, preparing to climb to the top.

“How do you know it won’t fall?”

“You two tied the other 3 legs.”

“Ay!” he said, “but we were all thinking the same thing!”

 

 

On tours, besides various duties, Gurudas also is the person who hands out tokens for darshan with Amma on the gents side.  In India, this can be a very powerful as well as dangerous position.  Once Amma starts darshan in the outside programs, where often 100,000 and more people are desperately wanting to get a token to see Her, and get in line, so as not to wait the whole night…the token man is in very hot demand. We have seen, with our own eyes,  from a helpless distance, Gurudas roughed up by a burly mob, the hair on his head in several peoples fists, his beard in the grip of other fists which rocked his head to and fro, demanding his personal attention.  It was after this that Gurudas began going on all the tours completely clean shaven.  Amma often jokes about this.  

It appears that Gurudas suffers an inner conflict.  There is his duty as Amma has told him – to give tokens out to the hundreds of thousands of people.  There is his duty as a spiritual son of Amma, to see that Amma’s form is kept well and safe.  When the darshans are very heavy, going 12 and more hours, sometimes 24 hours,  it is very hard to be kind or patient with hundreds of people who have just come,  and want to get darshan for a program which had begun the previous day!  Anni’s story exemplies this conflict in a way, well known on the Indian Tours.  She entitled it:

 

“Token Man

In Palakkad tour, [Northern Kerala] 2002, I was walking towards the Canteen and kitchen around 11:30 PM.  On my way, at least 3 people asked me where the ‘Token man’ was.

“I don’t know, maybe around Amma,” came the reply. (Tokens are only distributed until 12:00 AM) [time was fast running out for the token-less]

When I reached the kitchen, who should I see there, but Gurudas, the long lost ‘token man’ sitting in the far corner of the inaccessible store room, with a stack of tokens in his hand, looking around thoughtfully….”

 

That’s all for now.

Loving you,

Kamala Aunty, Anni and Link

            Tomorrow is the celebration of Amma’s official birthday here in Amritapuri.  The celebrations have started fully today, and there are tens of thousands of people in the ashram.  I haven’t gone down yet today…the crowds are thick…every time I look over at the bridge that we made after the Tsunami, to connect the island with the mainland, there is a thick human stream, like a river flowing in both directions, coming and going over it.  This year, I feel the greatest service I can do, is to stay out of the way.  We don’t have much heart for a party.

            We are very slow at going over Anni’s works.  We went though all her school notebooks a week or so ago…looking for her doodles, or any signs of self expression.  It is unfortunate that the schooling system here, even on the university level, really discourages self expression and genuine analysis.  I found comments from teachers on her exams chiding her for expressing her own opinions…if only they could realize how their own stilted thinking prevents India’s progress…. We are keeping aside all of her doodles.

            What amazes me is how many little sayings captured her attention.  She always wrote down little bits of wisdom that she found.  And rewrote them in later journals.  She was unconcerned about their source,  only in the way they struck her heart.  What amazes me also, is how they are mostly all about love.  I am ever in awe of her pure, sweet heart.

Here are 9 of her inspirational quips:

1. “When the power of love overcomes the love of power…then the world will know peace.”
2. He who has a thousand friends has not a friend to spare, while he who has an enemy shall meet him everywhere.
3. The best way to cheer yourself up, is to cheer somebody else up.
4. The hardest thing in life is to know which bridge to cross and which to burn.
5. Reality is wrong.  Dreams are for real.
6. The only abnormality is the incapacity to love.
7. A true friend is someone who reaches for your hand and touches your heart.
8. God is that which the blind can see, to whom the lame can walk, to whom the dumb can speak…
9. God is there in everyone’s eyes, they only don’t know it.  We should be able to see God there, in their eyes, even when they don’t know it, for She is ever-present.  Have faith in that.”

 

Wishing you love and peace,

Kamala Aunty, Anni and Link

ASPIRATIONS:
*To think positive
*To meet everyone with love and kindness
*Not to say bad about anyone
*Not to gossip (I rarely do anyways)
*Count 3 good things about everyone who is repelling to look at (gonna need help w/this one)
*To remember that God is in everyone (me too)
*Keep this goal in mind
*Not find fault in others
*Don’t blame others for your own faults

Having reviewed this, we again take heart to try to instill these concepts, oft discussed, into our psyches.
Loving you,
Kamala Aunty, Anni and Link

One night, that love came to me.
Clad in light with blue over her head
Sweetly smiling.
She caught me, the child that I was
And held me in her arms.
Such a gentle touch
And whether She spoke,
I do not know
She held me, hugged me,
Showered her love upon me
She then layed me on the bed,
Tucked the quilt around me,
And glided away in that brilliant orb
Of white light
My mother with the
Sweetest hands and Gentlest touch
How could you leave me here
Then go to the place where we both belong
A place beyond the stars…
I long to hold you
To touch you
To have you beside me, in doing everything,
Everywhere.
But then you left
After giving me just a taste of that love
Have you left me to struggle all by myself?
I want to be with you again
When will you come?

–Anni

More later,
Loving you,
Kamala Aunty