​My mother took me to her elementary school in our first days at her village, Kase, in Aomori Prefecture in Northern Japan.  I have heard about this school from her all my life, and this was the first moment I could see the school for myself.  Alas, the elementary school in my mother's village, once a thriving place of learning, playing, growing, is now an abandoned building.  Why?  This could be due to younger families in the village, having migrated to bigger cities.  The elementary school age population has reduced so much that keeping the school open was not sustainable.  The young children in Kase now have to commute to the next town, Kanagi to study.
My mother's school building radiated with so many stories to tell.  All the children who spent their precious young days in the building with their teachers, the administrators, the cooks and cleaners, each have their own piece of the story.  
The children's handprints on a wooden pillar at the entrance of the school made a remarkable impression from a past, to an unknown future.  I felt a sad lament arise from the abandoned building,  like the school ground was longing for the children's footprint again.  Children bring vitality and youthful energy to a village.  Wouldn't it be wonderful if the school building woke up to the sound of children's laughter again?
I learned that the scene of abandoned schools in small villages is not too uncommon in Japan now.  I started to day dream about a reverse migration back to villages, a kind of eco-village living of a different kind.  
While I stayed in Kase, my mother's village, I read the Mother's little booklet on Japan.  The booklet was given to me by dear friend Marti, while I was teaching a month-long course on Ecovillage Design Education in Auroville, India in 2019.  This was the right moment for me to connect with the Mother's message about Japan.  Although the booklet was written nearly a 100 years ago, its message is timeless when it spoke about the children and the soul of the country.

knowledge ... A country where such are the children and so they are treated is a country still ascending the steps of progress and of mastery.'

The Mother was born Mirra Alfassa in Paris on 21 February 1878. A pupil at the Academie Julian, she became an accomplished artist, and also excelled as a pianist and writer. Interested in occultism, she visited Tlemcen, Algeria, in 1905 and l906 to study with the adept Max Theon and his wife. Her primary interest, however, was spiritual development. In Paris she founded a group of spiritual seekers and gave talks to various groups.
In 1914 the Mother voyaged to Pondicherry to meet Sri Aurobindo, whom she at once recognised as the one who for many years had inwardly guided her spiritual development. After a stay of eleven months she was obliged to return to France due to the outbreak of the First World War. A year later she went to Japan for a period of four years.
In April 1920 the Mother rejoined Sri Aurobindo in Pondicherry. When the Sri Aurobindo Ashram was formed in November 1926, Sri Aurobindo entrusted its full material and spiritual charge to the Mother. Under her guidance, which continued for nearly fifty years, the Ashram grew into a large, many-faceted spiritual community. In 1952 she established Sri Aurobindo International Centre of Education, and in 1968 an international township, Auroville.
The Mother left her body on 17 November 1973.   (https://www.sriaurobindoashram.org/mother/)
https://www.sriaurobindoashram.org/mother/
https://motherandsriaurobindo.in/The-Mother/​

Here is a gallery of images from the booklet 'The Mother on Japan.'
​

Shigako Kidachi was born on a warm sunny day in July 1942 in Kase, Aomori.  She was the second child to Ichi and Tamigoro.  Her older brother, Tomoji was born five years before her.  When she was born, her family did not have a stable home of their own.  She remembers moving homes with her parents and grandparents.  The family finally arrived at a spacious building they could call home.  The building was already quite old when the family moved in.  A younger brother, and two sisters were born after my mother.  Altogether they made their home a lively space of three generations living and growing together.

I had been to our ancestral home in Kase once before when I was eight years old.  We were living in Northern Iran at the time.  Those were the pre-revolution days.  The Iranian economy was strong enough for my mother and me to travel to Japan and back without breaking the back of our home-economy.  
I remember dancing for my great grandma, bonding with my two aunts, and charming my grandparents, in our ancestral home, at the age of eight-yeas-old.
My life-path was such that it took me 46 years to return to my ancestral home again, just after the Covid lockdown and social restrictions.  In our ancestral home, my mother spoke in Tsugaru, her native tongue.  There is something about being at 'home' that puts you at ease.   I felt like I was getting to know her, in her natural element for the first time.  A deeper connection with my ancestral lineage was awakening in me.  Suddenly a depth of my own roots, the ancestral influence in my life was being revealed to me.  For the first time in my 54 years of life, I was feeling the connection to my Tsugaru heritage.  My heart was crying.  I cried for realising what was amiss in my life ~ for the disconnection with my ancestors in this mysterious land of Tsugaru people.  And I cried for the sudden love I felt while slowly arriving at my ancestral home.  I heard my ancestors whisper in my heart.  'Welcome' they said. 'Welcome to our home, to your home.'

As a vegetarian eater, arriving at a place where I would feel 'I want to try everything on the menu' is very rare.  Restaurant Momo in Nagano Prefecture, was that rare gem of a place for me.  The whole place vibrated with care.  Food quality was superb.  The atmosphere was relaxed and creative ~ exactly my sort of place.  Instantly I felt a kinship.  
I filled my rucksack with home-made snacks for my journey back to Scotland.  I was facing a rough journey back with the possibility of two nights of sleeping in airports.  Good quality food, made with care, makes all the difference in the quality of your journey.  I felt well resourced and nourished by the food and vibrations of this place.  My deep gratitude to the people who have created Momo and are maintaining it from day to day.

It was Fatima-san's birthday.  Her wish for this day was to spend a part of it with friends in the Sacred Mountain and do the OM Chanting Ceremony.  And so, it came to be.
I met new beaming faces, already at the little mountain cabin as we arrived.  
-'My name's Gayatri Devi Dasi' said the beautiful woman in fuchsia pink.
-'I'm Surya Dev Das' said the tall gentleman.
-'I'm Yoginam Pub Das' beamed the kind young man.
I felt intrigued.  The Indian names I recognised, but the combination of Indian name spoken in context of Japanese language was new for me.  I felt a new adventure was waiting for me.
The wood cabin room is spacious.  The floor is covered with tatami mats.  I find tatami-mats very comforting and supportive to sit on, although having a cushion always helps.  Soon enough, we were sitting in a circle.  Gayatri-san started to explain OM Chanting in great detail; its story, how its done, its benefits, etc.  I felt very grateful for the length she went into to explain what OM chanting is, how it is done, why we do it, and how it benefits the individuals and the world.  I was convinced that I wanted to participate.  She demonstrated how the OM sound rises from the belly and traverses the whole body, rather than being just a nasal pronouncement.  The OM sound, rising from her felt so much rounder and bigger than her petit body, camouflaged in beautiful colours of dark pink and navy blue.

One thing that touched me in particular about the effects of OM Chanting was the purity it radiates to about 2 km radius around the place it has been chanted.  Secretly I thought to myself, this would be so helpful for my friends and folks in Iran and the Fertile Crescent.  We are so much in need of both physical and spiritual cleansing.  Could the OM Chanting really purify you?

Soon the room filled with our voices.  We sat in two concentric circles facing each other.  The voice came from the depth of our bellies and bones.  It reverberated through the body.  The M sound made me quiver.  At first I could not hold a stable M sound ... it just slipped away from me, and I could not chase it.  But I came back to it again, and again, and again.  With each repetition of the OM chanting the sound grew deeper in me.  Until, one moment, with wonder, I felt I could hold the whole OM sound steady and transcendent.  As I reached this level of steadiness images started to dance inside me.  I felt the forest around me, full of medicine and mystery.  I felt my ancestral roots in Japan.  A deep sense of gratitude bubbled up in me for this moment, for being in the forest with these friends, chanting OM and tapping into the well of mysteries of creation.  I became aware of the other streams of my ancestry, of my deep roots in Iran and the Fertile Crescent.  A deep wish bubbled up in me to connect, and bridge, and make known the magic of OM Chanting across my many worlds.  So many worlds exist in me, but I am only one woman.  So many worlds exist in our planet, and we are truly one world.

The OM Chanting was Fatima Suomi-san's birthday gift.  What a rich gift to give away!  I had asked Fatima-san what she wanted for her birthday.  She smiled and said 'harmony and peace in the world.'  Could this be possible, the cynic in me had its own opinion.  
After the OM Chanting Ceremony we sat in a circle again to share our experiences.  I heard each person express his and her personal journey with the sound of OM.  I felt something in me had grown, like I had become larger, rounder, more contained.   Each one had a unique encounter, and we all had something shared and in common.  A sense of roundness, like an encompassing skin surrounded our individual and common experience.  
​We went for a walk in the forest afterwards.  My senses were sharp and clear.  I smelled the tantalising Sansho tree ( a sharp pepper tree).  I could feel the heart of others around me.  I moved with gratitude and love as my eyes met the eyes of others in the forest.  I joined Fatima-san in her earnest wish for harmony and love in our world.  

https://bhaktimarga.jp/
https://bhaktimarga.co.uk

​On my last day in Japan, I was blessed by my visit to see Fatima-san (Suomi) and Yaqin-san (Yuya) in Nagano Prefecture.  They have kindly took me to the Hijiri Shrine, a Shinto shrine nestled in a radiant forest.
We walked the path through the thick bodies of trees to reach the shrine which was, just at that moment, illuminated by sun.  A small space in the shrine was created for humans to pay their respects to nature.  Behind the shrine a small pond contained the spring water coming from the mountain, which is always fresh and cold.  Tiny little fish flirt in the water of the pond.  Next to it, a sign carved in stone, announces that the pond, is a seed pond.  I don't know how this small body of cold water could be a seed pond, ecologically thinking, but something in my heart jumps up and down in delight.  Here, on my last day in Japan, I offer the intention of my journey - to sprout seeds of life, to the pond.

​I wrote a story in preparation for my journey to Japan, and to offer a workshop on Personal Seeds of Renewal for the Earth.  I followed a process I learned from Allan Kaplan from the Proteus Initiative.  After observing my present circumstances from various perspectives, I allowed my imagination to 'see' into the potential of my journey.  The story surprised me.  It also delighted me.  What follows is the myth of my Japan Journey.

​There is a woman who loves seeds, and she collected them whenever she could.  Seeds of all kinds : flowers and grass, grains and vegetables, trees and bushes.  She just loves plants, insects, worms ... anything that belonged to the category of life.  She had a big sac, in which she placed her seeds mindfully.  But her sac had a hole in it.  Just like Kokopelli who travelled from place to place, with his seed sac, and a hole in it.   Kokopelli, the seed collector, left a trace of life wherever he'd been.
She is particularly keen on human seeds - the potential of each person to blossom.  She also noticed that many people have forgotten their seeds, their gifts and essence of life.  So she decided to help those people to reclaim their seeds, and plant them for the sake of life.
She climbed up to the top of a tall tree.  From that height she chirped a bird song.  She sang for the people who could hear her to gather around the tree.  When she looked down, many people were gathered in expectant anticipation.  So she climbed down and sat with them.  They started a great conversation.  So many soulful stories were exchanged in their circle.  She helped each person to sprout their seeds, their potential to blossom.  And those who gathered around the Tree of Life went to awaken the seeds and potentials of others.  A ripple effect reverberated through the land.  The people who sprouted their seeds were no longer victims of circumstance, but agents for life.  They distinguished between love and domination.  With their power to discern, they made a difference  in the unfoldment of evolution on their land.
She perched up on her tree once again.  Looking at the landscape of her life, she could see undulating patches of time.  The patch of time she had spent in Japan were among the most colourful and abundant times of her life, such that from that patch of time, seeds of life kept forming and being released to regenerate life well into the future.  She felt the heart of Gaia beating with her gentle, soft, caring rhythm in the heart of everyone she knew.  She saw all this from her vantage perch on the Tree of Life.
​

I met Fatima-san (Suomi Sekiya) in Findhorn about 5 years ago.  She joined our 1001 Angels mosaic creations on our first day of the project, and her last day of a two-week stay in Findhorn.  By some good fortune our paths just crossed.  I was immediately curious about her, since she had so uniquely expressed two cultures I also felt a part of, namely a Sufi tradition in Japan.  I felt we have so much to explore together, but at that time we had very little time to invest in our explorations.  When the opportunity presented itself to visit her in Nagano prefecture, I approached her.  I was delighted to know that she could take a day off her work, which happened to be her birthday, to be with me and her partner Yaqin Nirdosh (Yuya Sato), and the Sacred Mountain of Hijiriyama, which she is a guardian of.  Both her name and her partner's name, Yaqin evoke deep feelings for me, as they are from my native tongue, Farsi.  Yaqin means certainty, Fatima, purity.  So together they speak of Pure Certainty to my soul.

Meeting Fatima and Yaqin at the Hijiriyama, which literally means Sacred Mountain, felt like a chord of destiny's been tugged.  I also found out they are both web-creators.  Since I've been looking for web-masters for Trees for Hope, I asked them if they could make our website, which they delightfully said yes!  My heart did a little dance at the top of the hill where we were standing to admire the view of the expansive North and South Japan Alps Mountains in Nagano.

Later on her birthday she took me to a remarkable restaurant called Momo, which means peach.  There she gave me her meishi, business card.  On it she lists a few things she offers the world as a way of her unique expression.  They include : Herbalist, Psychic Healer, Holistic Therapist.  As well she lists Meditation and Prayer, Deep Ecology, Permaculture, Co-Creation with Nature.  

Yaqin offers on his meishi (business card) : Meditation and Co-Creation Space.  His business name is Nirvana Lab.  I feel like I have just connected with two dear kindred spirits, on my last day in Japan!

http://nirvana-lab.com
http://devafatima.com
http://libernaturae.com
http://nuuralanuur.com

The time to take off for my journey to my mother's land finally arrived, about a week after summer solstice.  A dear friend, William Thomas has sent me a short clip of his Solstice Agnihotra Ritual atop a hill in Yorkshire.  
My husband, Alan dropped me off at Inverness Airport really early in the morning.  He was still recovering from his own travels to Ireland, where he was a speaker at a rewilding festival.  With me preparing for a long journey away from home, and Alan arriving from a stressful Airport Trauma in Dublin, there was much tension in the air.  But Alan delivered me very sweetly to the airport, as this is his way, accompanying me all the way to the final security checking point, beyond which he could not go.  We kissed and parted ways.  I knew he was with me on this journey, even though I was travelling alone.
Getting through security is an ordeal.  I queued up in the long line of people to board the plane.  I felt disturbed by the airport checks, and distressed by the prospects of my long journey ahead.  
Standing in the long queue, I looked at the app on my phone, and saw that I am yet to listen to William's gift ~ his Solstice Agnihotra video.  With the ear-buds in place, I pressed play.  Instantly I was transported to the hill-top, in the early morning of Summer Solstice.  As I listened to the song of the birds, the gentle vibrations of fire, the offering of ghee, the deep and calming chants of agnihotra, I felt the universe paused to listen with me.  
I released my stress to the fire.  Breathing in, and breathing out the rhythms of agnihotra calmed my pace.  When I finally stepped into the aircraft, I felt light.  Flying on wings of fire and a prayer in my heart, was the sounding note to start the flight towards my mother's country.
Thank you William for the purity of your Summer Solstice Fire.  The note you sounded cleared the path of my heart to start a long journey of discovery to Japan.  I am sharing your video here in the hope that it will reach those who read my blogs with their own long and challenging journeys, as an aid from beyond.  

I have chosen to invest a good deal of my time to up-cycle the tetra-pacs we use in our household.  I learned this beautiful weave from a tutorial on YouTube, which has helped me to make all shapes and forms of boxes, bags, storage units.  They are utilitarian, and in my eyes, quite pleasing too.  Is this art, or is it not art?  
For me the creation of these tetra-pac boxes is a transformation of a waste material to a useful product.  I enjoy the process of making them.  There is some creativity involved, although it is more a matter of design and calculation.  I would consider these woven baskets works of craft ~ leaning towards art.  The art being the spirit of transformation, and limiting my wasteful disposal.  What do you think?

* Why do we need to learn and communicate in the language of our bodies?
​
In our post covid era we are in need of ways and means to care for our health and happiness in diverse and informed ways.  My intention by providing classes and workshops in massage is to strengthen the field and network of practitioners who are fluent in the language of our bodies.
My own experience with Esalen massage and Scaravelli inspired yoga has helped me be in touch with moments of somatic enlightenment, moments when I felt as light as a bird in flight, as spacious as a healthy forest, as delightful as a wild coast full of mystery and mischief.  These treasured embodied moments increased for me as I put my attention on my practice and learned to let go of outdated habits and behaviours.  I want to share the sense of joy, wholeness, and soft-breath I have been experiencing in my body with a wider network of friends.  I want to guide more people to the treasures in our bodies that speak a language of connectivity, intelligence, lightness.
Our natural state of being is wholeness.  Yet we learn to live with pain.  Pain is a feedback mechanism pointing to where we have fallen out of wholeness.  When I learned how to listen to the pain in my body, I could then help my body to return to its natural state of alignment with my spine and become fluid.

*Classes and Workshops
I am offering classes in the Language of Our Bodies for a limited number of people.  We will start our practice in the art of touch and massage.  We will engage in yoga movements and increase our awareness of our own bodies.  We will learn how to approach the bodies of other people needing help to release tension and pain.

*When?
Starting in January until August, most Saturdays from 10.00 ~ 1.00.  

*What is the exchange?
I offer this programme in exchange for either cash (suggested £60 per session) or work (3 hours), or a mixture of the two.

*Commitments
I ask the participants to consider these commitments :
Regular practice in between classes
Regular study of the anatomy
Caring for your health and wellbeing with regular yoga or dance

*For one or two people
The classes could work very well for couples or two good friends as you will be learning together and practicing on each other as well as on more people afield.  It also works well when you join on your own.

*Responsibility for everyone’s safety 
When joining the classes please take responsibility to for your own wellbeing and others by ensuring that you won’t pass on any nasty virus during our sessions.
​
*Get in touch
To join the classes, contact Pupak on:
hoopoesong@protonmail.com

What is clean energy?  Doesn't burning wood logs add to our green house gases? A few good questions were raised from my last blog.  I thought to address them here.
To discern clean energy from polluting ones, we need to distinguish three types of carbon.

1. ​ancient carbon in fossilised plants and animals stored deep within the earth millions of years ago.
2. carbon in the atmosphere, combined with other gases, CO2 being one combination.
3. carbon stored in plants and organic matter, such as tree trunks, even our own bones, in soil, and in sea creatures.

Our green-house gas crisis, and 350 part-per-million optimal count for CO2, reaching now critical count of 410 ppm is due to releasing fossilised carbon that should have remained below ground.  Our current global crisis has been building up from the first extraction of fossil fuels and accelerated with a fury as we increased our oil consumption like addicts.
The carbon stored in wood, and other organic matter, belongs to the cycling and recycling of carbon that goes back to the atmosphere and the total mass of matter above ground.  Burning wood logs is comparable to us eating food, and exhaling CO2 when we breathe out.   Nature had struck a balance to maintain all the elements in life-supporting ways.  We have destroyed this balance by our greedy extractions of earth resources.
In this context burning wood is clean energy because the carbon it releases goes back to the natural recycling of the earth matter.  Indeed it is one of the cleanest sources of energy as well as sunlight and wind.  The problem comes into the picture when we extract more than our share, and set out to destroy forests for our greed.  But if you are someone who has enabled more than two million trees being planted (Alan, through the charity he founded, Trees for Life), burning a tree or two a year, from a sustainably managed woodland, to heat your home will not deficit our planet. 
Coming to think of it, if we each had a part to restore a part of our eco-systems, we could all be living on clean energy, physically and metaphysically.  

Sources : 350.org
                Trees for Life

We received nearly 4 cubic meters of seasoned wood from Hinterland, a managed woodland in Findhorn.  This is our yearly supply of wood to heat our home for the whole year.   Alan (my husband) spent all day chopping and stacking the wood.  Thank God for our neighbours who came to help.  
We consider burning seasoned wood clean energy, as opposed to fossil fuels.  The reason for it is that wood stores the carbon that is in the atmosphere already.  By burning the wood the carbon is released back to the atmosphere to be recycled by living organisms such as plants and soil.  Burning fossil fuels, however releases the carbon that has been stored in the depth of the earth, or the sea, millions of years ago.  Releasing the fossilised carbon is one of our major sources of global warming.  We need to stop burning fossil fuels ~ and we knew this for at least 5 decades.
Chopping wood and living on clean energy ~ feeling grateful to the trees today.