Featured Dance:
The Ocean Refuses No River
by Lila Flood
An ancient Sanskrit scriptural & traditional yogic
interpretation of this phrase is: the dissolution of ego (river) into pure awareness (ocean).
We open our hearts to all people and all parts of ourselves in the all-encompassing Love of God, who is Love, Lover, and Beloved.
The ocean refuses no river, no river
The ocean refuses no river, no river
Ishq Allah Mahbood Lillah, illa’llah
Ishq Allah Mahbood Lillah, illa’llah
Movements
|
The ocean refuses |
Holding hands, grapevine right crossing
Left foot in front first |
|
no river |
One step in Left-Right, swinging held hands upward |
|
no river |
One step out Left-Right, swinging held hands back |
|
|
[repeat] |
|
Ishq Allah Mahbood Lillah |
Walk Left, holding hands |
|
Illa’llah |
Spin Left |
|
Ishq Allah Mahbood Lillah |
Walk Right, holding hands |
|
Illa’llah |
Spin Right |
Patrick addresses conference in Malaysia
One of our regular dancers, Patrick Harrigan, recently visited Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia to give the closing keynote speech at the
First International Murugan Bhakti Conference before an audience of over 600 delegates.
Patrick is well known in South India, Sri Lanka and among Tamil people worldwide as an advocate and practitioner of
Murugan bhakti, or devotion to Murugan or Skanda, the South Indian deity of poetry, wisdom, war and romance.
Speaking without notes, Patrick addressed the conference for 45 minutes in Tamil language, explaining how he first came in 1971 to India and Sri Lanka where he met his teacher German Swami Gauribala, and between 1972 and 2007 walked twenty times the
forty-day Kataragama foot pilgrimage to the jungle shrine
Kataragama venerated by Sri Lanka’s Hindus, Buddhists, Sufis, and indigenous peoples.
“Most of the delegates had never heard a Westerner speak in Tamil language,” says Patrick. “Some were in tears, I was told, to hear a Westerner speak in Tamil about a subject dear to their hearts.”
The next conference will take place in Switzerland in 2014, and South Africa will host one in 2016. Patrick has already been invited to address both conferences.
