Source HYDERABAD, INDIA, August 19, 2013 (Post Noon): The 11-day Ganesh Chaturthi festival will be commencing on September 9 and massive arrangements at pandals are already in full swing. Although majority of Deities are made with plaster of paris (POP), with every passing year, more and more organizers are trying to ‘go green’ by installing eco-friendly Ganeshas. In a bid…
Source Wanting to reform the world without discovering one’s true self is like trying to cover the world with wool to avoid the pain of walking on stones and thorns. It is much simpler to wear shoes.— Sri Ramana Maharishi (1879-1950), South Indian mystic
Source BALI, INDONESIA, August 18, 2013 (The Daily Mail): A mass cremation was held today in the Balinese town of Ubud in which more than 60 bodies were burned. The ceremony, well known as Ngaben, was shared by mourners who could not afford to perform the ritual by themselves. Ngaben, which means “turn to ash,” is considered to be the…
Source BALI, INDONESIA, August 15, 2013 (The Jakarta Post): Balinese Hindu devotees celebrated Pagerwesi on Wednesday by performing prayers in temples throughout the island. In some parts of the island, Pagerwesi is a minor religious holiday, not on par with Galungan and Kuningan, during which the Balinese Hindus celebrate the victory of virtues over vices. In Buleleng, the northern coastal…
Source “A successful man is one who can lay a firm foundation with the bricks that others throw at him.”— Swami Chinmayananda (1917-1993), Vedantist writer, lecturer and Hindu renaissance founder of Chinmaya Mission International
Source KATHMANDU, NEPAL, August 17, 2013 (Himalayan Times): The Ministry of Foreign Affairs today handed over rare historical artifacts that were stolen decades ago and recovered recently from the United States to the National Archives of Nepal. The six wooden covers of ancient Hindu religious books of Shiva Dharma, Bishnu Dharma and Bhagabata carved with colorful paintings of Hindu Gods…
Source PATHANAMTHITTA, KERALA, INDIA, August 18, 2013 (The Hindu): The Ayyappa temple at Sabarimala witnessed a heavy rush on Friday evening as hundreds of devotees from all over the State and neighboring Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh thronged the hillock to worship the Deity on the Malayalam New Year Day on Saturday. Head priest N. Damodaran Potti opened the…
Source In the four eternal Vedas; In the study and reading of scripts; In sacred ashes and in holy writs and muttering of prayers you will not find the Lord! Melt with the heart inside And proclaim the Truth. Then you will join the light life without servitude.— Sivavakkiyar, 10th-century Tamil devotional poet and mystic
Source DALLAS, TEXAS, August 9, 2013 (Dallas News): Frisco’s Asian Indian population is booming. Census numbers show that from 2000 to 2010, the Asian Indian population in Collin County more than tripled, growing from 9,673 to 33,502. The growth will soon be reflected in a new construction project on Independence Parkway in Frisco. After years of fundraising, the Karya Siddhi…
Source BERKELEY, CALIFORNIA, August 14, 2013 (New York Times): Growing up, Guneeta Singh Bhalla heard a terrifying story from her grandmother. In August 1947, as British India was being partitioned into independent India and Pakistan, her grandmother fled Lahore, in what was soon to become Pakistan, for Amritsar, in what was soon to become India. All around her was carnage.…