The Anna Hazare phenomenon is sweeping the country as I write. On television I see faces of all classes together supporting his cause. I am trying to understand my own reasons that urge me to wish him success. …read on
If you care to look beyond the million gods you encounter in India, you would find a sturdy belief system that would be worthy of some fundamentalism. A ministry awaits a messiah who has the energy to found a new fanatical religious order based on it; and I would happily join it. For about a quarter century since I became aware of the concept of Pancha Maha Bhuta, [Bhuta is pronounced ‘bhootha’] I have wondered why we as a civilisation have not yanked it from behind and worshipped it instead of the gods in front.
I translate the Sanskrit phrase “Pancha Maha Bhuta” [PMB] as “Five Grand Spirits”. They are Space, Air, Fire, Water and Earth. “What of them?”, do you ask? Well, wait until you discover how ‘Indian Tradition’ [IT: a nomenclature I like, ahead of the narrow sounding ‘Hinduism’] sees these five spirits permeate every material reality that surrounds us. For several millennia people of this land have instinctively subscribed to the primacy of PMB. They explored the integrated system that the five Spirits amount to, examined it with rigour, discovered order in them, documented the knowledge, and then -and only then- perhaps to spread the idea in the streets, suffered to bring in the arts, temples, and gods. The short point is the Bhuta are the fundamental reality; the gods come later.
Let me begin to share my enthusiasm starting with this wondrous passage I found here. It is one of the verses by Vedaranya, a scholar and administrator of the Vijayanagar Empire
“Only one quality can be seen in space: it can reverberate sound, but we cannot touch it, taste it, smell it… Space can only cause an atmosphere for creating a vibration of sound; so, as nothing else is possible there, Sound alone is the quality of space.
But of air, there are two qualities: air can make sound, and also it can be felt. It can be touched. Sound is the quality of space; sound and touch are the qualities of air.
But fire has sound, touch and has form, as we can also see it.
And water: we can hear its sound, we can touch it, we can see it, we can taste it. But we cannot taste fire, taste air, taste space,
Earth has five qualities: it can create sound, it can be touched, it can be seen, it can be tasted, and it can be smelled. Smelling is the quality of only earth,
…so Earth has five qualities, Water has four, fire has three, air has two, and space has only one quality.”
Let me make a list out of the above:
Our ancient folks were active list makers. They went on to map our five senses to the PMB:
From a Tibetan source, I discover more equivalences:
So it goes. How does it all come together? I decided to make a set of tables out of what I was digging out of the Internet. I neither know Sanskrit, nor am a scholar or a philosopher; just an enthusiast for earth’s environment. My hope is to discover an argument that might give environment a primacy in our search for material prosperity.
On new year morning, I started work at 6 am to complete yet another swale. After warming up the excavator engine I quickly got into a steady rhythm, enjoying the nip in the air and the drift of mist across the far casuarina grove.
In a few minutes I became aware of being watched. And there, not twenty feet away, stood a fox staring at me, unfazed by the machine, its buzz or me seated in it. It had been around the whole time for sure, watching. We locked eyes and were in sync, his presence pervading me. We were in communion for several long seconds.
There he was, at ease amidst the brush, almost quizzical about my presence in what seemed his natural habitat. Whatever the omen of staring a fox in the eye, first thing in the morning, it felt good that pointReturn had come this far from the bald hard land that I had adopted in 2006.
That fox was the cue to review the year gone by and to plan the year ahead.
…
Let me begin by restating the pointReturn mission: it is to turn the barren 17 acres into a productive one leading to self sufficiency in food, water, energy and cash for 40 people.
2010’s most significant event has to do with people. pointReturn managed to attract two committed, spirited, young persons in January. Karpagam and Sriram have rapidly made pR their home, and advanced the vegetable and agricultural agenda by at least two years. Had I been working alone, I would have gone ahead with planting trees,yes and maintained them and then awaited the arrival of people such as them. I had imagined they would come when the project had settled rather more than it was at the end of 2009.
Their arrival this year has quickened the pace all around. Their blog conveys their excitement and commitment. Their coming on board has attracted widespread notice. In September, their friend Siddarth became a volunteer too, committing himself to at least an year.
His arrival grew the pace of activities a further notch. Increased activities required greater presence and thus, 2010 became the first year the campus has been manned full time. A work routine is also evolving. Everyday something happens that nudges the project further and makes it a more distinctive place.
Regrettably Raju who had been with me for three years, helping build the infrastructure left in August. The project had entered a new phase, calling for a different routine and that rendered him a misfit. The parting was amicable; he is now employed in the city, which enables him to return to his young family every night. I owe him much gratitude for his contributions in those early years, when it was a stark land with no facilities, let alone comforts.
As 2010 drew to a close, I had a happy development to savour. Karpagam and Sriram came over to meet me on Nov 29. They simply and directly said: “We have discussed between us over the last several months and decided this is where we want to be and live our life. So we formally give you our long term commitment to the project.” They complete an year here on Jan19, and I was eagerly awaiting the passing of that day so that I may pop the question myself, and here they were, clear and decisive. I was overwhelmed.
I now have people to discuss issues with, plan developments and share responsibilities. We complement each other: their first love is to grow vegetables and grains and mine is to enable such activities and to keep the course to make pR a larger thriving community some day. As 2011 dawns, I am far more assured than I was soon after adopting this land in 2006. We can now raise this orphaned child together.
…
2010 saw plentiful rains. In fact since August there has seldom been a fortnight that did not bring a shower. Happily, we were ready to welcome them into waterbodies: there is today a total capacity of about 2.3 million litres between ponds, swales and percolation pits. The work continues to create more.
Thus far we had been dependent on just the windmill. Though it has been a reliable darling we had a scare on one or two windless days. We have now put in a hand pump as a backup.
In March and April we saw the windmill lose suction on many days as the water table fell. The bore-hole it draws from is 200’ deep. The suction pipe was 140’ into it. We had it increased to 180’ this year. Between this move and the good rains we hope to be water secure in 2011.
Sunil is a young well-wisher of pointReturn, who works in the USA and has been following this project from its inception. He often mentions our work in his blog. He has been intrigued somewhat. In September, 2010 he posted some questions for us to answer in order to understand what it was all about. Questions were tailored and addressed to each of us. Recently we answered them.
Taken together, this exercise reads like a good conversation that will help readers understand the pointReturn experiment. I also believe it would be very useful for others who may one day visit us and work with us and those considering similar initiatives. When we are indeed ready to welcome volunteers we may use this material for their orientation.
With his permission I translate from Tamil, where necessary and re-present the whole content. What follows appeared in two blog posts. First on Sep.02, 2010, Surveyson, [our friend’s preferred online name] explained his motive, framed the questions and asked his readers to also post theirs. On October 27, 2010, our responses appeared.
Surveysan’s preface:
I had reported that Karpagam and Sriram have started to work full time at pointReturn. Refreshing your memory about this project, [between 2000 and 2006] D V Sridharan [’DV”] went around the country digging out little known success stories and introduced then to us through goodnewsindia.com He wrote at length on his heroes and explained their work well. Go to that website and read for yourself.
In 2006, he began a new initiative, called pointReturn. Buying 17 acres of barren land in the village of Jamin Endathur, he has sought to turn it green, by means of extensive rain water harvesting, tree planting and stewarding the return of nature. Working alone and spending his own money, he dug a pond, installed a windpump and experimented with new techniques for restoration. He was looking for volunteers to join him.
I said to myself: “Bah, who’s going to give him his life and join him to work in the wilderness”. Boy, was I in for a surprise! Karpagam and Sriram did exactly that. What surprised me was that both are well educated and with good careers; how did they decide to leave their comfort zone and step out to work under the harsh sun in the interest of common good.
I too consider myself a man with public concerns: every now and then I bemoan India’s public ills and then quickly turn to chase the next dollar. Many self-centred people like me however, harbour tiny dreams of making a difference by acts of sacrifice. But where do we start? How do we walk away from good careers and money? How do we say, ‘enough’ to money? I was confused. To work for public good, needn’t we at least set aside two or three hours per week? What use is our education? An education paid for by the society at large? What do we do in return for the comforts received. Yes, yes I used to be confused. Then I would douse these questions and move on to the next chore at hand.
So I was curious how Karpagam and Sriram [-and Siddarth, who has come on board since Sep,2010] came around their confusion and made the jump. I decided to ask them a few questions in the hope their answers will clarify me. What follows are my questions [-and your questions as well if you sent them in]. When their answers come it, I shall list the Q-s and A-s in some order.
There are many lessons one learns in an undertaking such as pointReturn. Those from Nature come in accompanied by compelling evidence and demonstrations. These are exciting to learn. Those of a personal nature however, seem harder to accept . I will quickly deal with the latter first. …read on
Bill Mollison, 80 years old, toddled up to the
blackboard and wrote “You are so lucky. Three teachers!”. Then swinging around, he stood, cuddly as a lad, cocking an eyebrow up and smiling the friendliest conspiratorial smile you ever saw. That kick started the Permaculture Design Course [PDC] in Melbourne, Australia on September 22, 2008. …read on
For just over a month now, hardly anything has happened at pointReturn - except, most gratifyingly, the 300 odd plants in the ground have continued their growth and the windmill has continued to water them. With that comfort, I spent the time of inaction to observe a few oddities. …read on
An invitation from Samanvaya has to be taken seriously, for Ram, his wife Rama and colleague Priya who run it are serious, commited people. The invitation was to a weekend retreat to discuss Gandhi’s view of Self-Rule, which he called Swaraj. Everyone has heard the word Swaraj and understands it differently. I too had my own understanding of it. What might have made Samanvaya convene a weekend retreat focused on it, in Gandhigram, near Madurai? I decided to attend, and returned with practical ideas to experiment with at pointReturn. …read on
On July 31, 2006, the 17 acre main body of the pointReturn site was formally registered. It took until the December 21, 2006 to buy an additional 0.91 cents on which to lay an all weather access road. But that didn’t quite start off the project. I had to wait until April, 2007 for the fields to be harvested of a standing peanut crop, before the road could be laid. Still, there are significant achievements on view. How that happened is a story of disappointments that led to workarounds and it could be of some value to other beginners. Throughout this article, there are […more] markers that will lead you to detailed stories on the topic. …read on
The new windmill has been trying its best to be of service. There were a few anxious days when a part had to be replaced, the piping and pump to be changed and ways of managing it, to be understood. It pumps water now, but with some notable caveats. After digesting the unpleasant messages it delivered, I have learnt to see the pointReturn challenge very differently. Not only is the task greater, but solutions are more involved. The new windmill has already proved itself a wise and eloquent teacher. …read on
point Return is powered by wordPress using a theme designed by In My Pad
