Auroville (Tamil Nadu), January 23
Survey incognito
After a trip to Madras to get the bike, camera and a new mp3 player, I arrive at the affects the community of Auroville to which I must make a topic for Liberation. This is the first time I bump for Liberation, is not that I magnifier. Before leaving Paris, I looked for some info on the Net. Auroville is a utopian city is seeking an example for the world to achieve unity among men, can hardly be more laudable. However, opinions on blogs and forums were very divided. Some spoke of a strange atmosphere, with a personality cult around the Mother, the founder of the ashram. The author of a book on utopian communities, released in late 2007 (the name escapes me) said failing to get a clear idea about the project. The head of the Travel section of Libération that has commissioned the paper, wanted to make a video report there twenty years and permission was denied. Finally, a regular meeting of Auroville in India told me that it was better than I hide my identity as a journalist if I wanted to work alone. In short, there is a kind of cult perfume in the air, suddenly I found myself embarked on a secret mission. As a cover, I am preparing to explain that I need to feed my news blog.
Auroville, January 30
Utopia
One week I'm here and I am getting tired of playing the spy. I do not feel very credible during the tour, as I realize interview before my interview group of tourists a little surprised so diligently. That said, this does not stop me being a smart ass.
But one morning, when our guide asked us to deliver "the color of the sky is in our heart," I'm a little ashamed when he is responding "blue charged with expectations. " These salaams be justified in China or in Turkmenistan, the gold Aurovilliens seem full of goodwill. They came to realize their dream of a better society.
I present to you the thing in two words (if you want to know more, the article is at the end of the blog). Imagine a forest dotted with communities and individual houses, with its center a giant golden golf ball where people come to pray in silence before a huge crystal traversed by a ray of sun falling from the ceiling in a vertical, a dozen meters higher. Basically, Auroville is a spiritual project, which I also have not grasped the full scope. Basically, it is the result of research of the Indian philosopher Sri Aurobindo on the "integral yoga, which combines spirit and matter in order to reconcile man with the" Divine "that he carries within him. Ultimately, this should allow humans to influence its own evolution to take a nature "supramental" or even access to immortality, it m'al'air go far enough. For more details, I refer you to the complete works in 24 volumes of Sri Aurobindo, available at his ashram in Pondicherry. Well, you will also find some explanations on the site www.auroville.org.
Display devotional
His companion, a French woman named Mira Alfassa but everyone here respectfully calls "Mother", relied on this work to lay the foundation of Auroville. All Aurovilliens adhere probably not 100% at the thought of Sri Aurobindo, but most of them are well studied and all seem to be less invested in a spiritual quest. His portrait, and still more that of the Mother, whose name keeps coming up in conversations, on throne all public buildings. I just know that it is common in India and to honor the great gurus, I have a little trouble with this display of devotion.
Vocation laboratory
Nevertheless I am impressed by the projects here. Aurovilliens take some organic farms, where they try not to go against nature. They plow at least, do not prune their plants and of course they add fertilizer or compost. The schools are experimenting with systems offering greater libertté children that interest me personally, because I hold a discreet but persistent resentment of the Jesuits that framed my adolescence. An architect is overseeing a research center, working on the implementation cost of the latest innovations in sustainable architecture. He developed techniques for molding bricks, wastewater treatment and exploitation of solar energy, all these methods are also exported to developing countries.
Auroville The canteen is the symbol of the vocation of the project laboratory, with its brick structure and a gigantic solar concentrator, which produces enough steam to prepare every day nearly a thousand meals.
I'll spare you the effort of reforestation programs in the direction of the disabled, the co-development projects surrounding villages ... Plus all the workshops and new-age care medicine that I detail in the article. In Auroville, people try to live better and this is palpable everywhere. Public places do not offer alcohol and are non-smokers, including outdoors. I go to a party also pretty amazing, where two hundred young people danced all night by drinking only organic fruit juice.
Punk is dead
With their desperate quest for spirituality and good health, I find very touching Aurovilliens. But I must confess that at the same time, just this evening, I tear out my hair soon before this comes to an acoustic guitar bleating his love of his neighbor, the slammer shaved with a tuft on the neck, which marks his disgust drug and wickedness, and this pair of Brazilian percussionist who plays a song of his own titled "Mother Earth". A little more and will disembark with Patrick Bouchitey his guitar and his cassock for us to announce the return of Jesus. At the hostel where I boarded, I met a bunch of nice young people, very open to Eastern philosophies. But it did not seem to bother them to have crossed half the earth to be in a neat little bubble all Western countries in the middle of the craziest ever. Cons for me, I struggle. It does not take me more than a few days before having a passion to do something stupid. I tell myself that there must be some punks in the local youth who feel the same urges. But gosh, these old libertarian Aurovilliens have foreseen everything, including a "youthcamp" where youth can break loose, but still within the city so that it stays under control.
Auroville, February 4
Transparency
I finally spill the beans. Everything went very well, the press officer gave me a press kit and accreditation to enable me to make my photos quietly. I ask my questions more clearly to people and they take more time to answer me, so far without hiding their criticism. I took the opportunity to spit nice piece to students who share my dorm at the hostel because I had pushed up their zeal to tell tall tales too ... I put serious pressure to my inquiry, probably a bit too much, because I collect a ton of info that I will not. Result, I do not take advantage of workshops offered. Damn, I willingly tried capoeira, contact dance, riding without remorse or tai chi, and above all I would have started meditation.
I hang even when a yoga class, but really is too static and painful for me. I'm using my time for Watsu, a woman I handled with extreme softness in a pool. I also the surprise, opening her eyes between two dips, falling on my cousin Marion who came from Toulouse to learn this technique.
0 comments:
Post a Comment