Journey To The Burn 08/19/08

From our new Krishna Camp/Burning Man blog Seeking Spiritual Adventure

Reporting live from Salem, Ohio

We (a holy triumvirate featuring Soma, Rasikananda, and myself Chris) have finished the first and least enjoyable part of the yatra: packing a huge Dodge Sprinter van with a even bigger Rath cart attached to the back of it. One step at a time.

After the impending oatmeal, we will finally begin. The West is the best they say...we will follow the advice. A 3-4 day journey out to Black Rock Desert, with possible stops in between in Iowa and Utah.

Stay tuned here for updates throughout the journey and Krsna willing live from Burning Man itself. Here are some pics of our packing...

Daydream Nation

Whoohoo! 100th post! I'd like to thank the paws paws, Madhava Ghosh, and all the weeds I've uprooted! Here's to a 100 more!

This is from a new blog being done in conjunction with the wild and ecstatic journeys of Krishna Camp called Seeking Spiritual Adventure.

" Falling out of sleep, I hit the floor
Put on some rock tee and I'm out with the door
From Bowery to Broome to Greene, I'm a walking lizard
Last night's dream was a talking baby lizard

All comin' from hu-man imagination
Day dreaming days in a daydream nation"-Sonic Youth

The theme of the 2008 Burning Man is "The American Dream", an exploration into the conscious and subconscious expressions of the rootless and seemingly boundless diaspora that is life in this modern day Empire of Planet Earth.

As the members of Krishna Camp, we return once again to the Black Rock Desert as a vital member of the past, present, and future, and as the title of this blog describes, we are there not only seeking spiritual adventure, but more importantly, distributing it without cause and without discretion as to body type, caste, or creed.

What is the point? A sizable chunk of American youth have now specialized in living their life, inside their cushion-cage, in personification of this question, but despite all apocalyptic platitudes about the "end of culture", for many of us, the natural desire of our souls pushes through.

For the many-colored living entities that will assemble at Burning Man, that push to a higher plane of realization, of enjoyment, of compassion, of peace, of self-confidence, etc will swirl in the air like the ever-present playa dust.

Our founder and guiding light, Srila Prabhupada has said "Our contact with matter is just like a dream. Actually we are not fallen. Therefore, because we are not fallen, at any moment we can revive our Krishna consciousness, and we break the dream."

It doesn't take much thought and vision from a material perspective to shatter the house of cards that is the "freedom" of our current state of affairs. So the souls in Krishna Camp want to push further, to really bring the rising sun to the desert, to revive the real, blissful, loving consciousness of Krishna at any and every moment. It's our duty of tradition, passed down and down and down and who are we to get in the way.

The adventure at Burning Man will be about intimacy, recreating the connections of the heart and soul which have been replaced these days by wireless radiation. We want to bring people home, back to themselves and back to Krsna.

In the fever that is Burning Man we want to snap back to attention the daydreamers of this nation to their real birthright. Our greatest weapon is the Holy Name of Krsna, our greatest tools are our humility and sincerity, and our greatest hope is the example of all those who have gone before us. Please bless us and join us.

Jesus Saves, but Yzerman scores on the rebound

Being a former hockey goon and born resident of Hockeytown (Detroit, Michigan), I was tickled and pumped up to hear Madhava Ghosh's recent account of the exploits of the Palace Guards, the former New Vrindaban roller hockey team.

I am so pumped-up about it that I told Ghosh if I don't get a chance to play in a new version of the Palace Guards, I will have to take birth again until that desire that fulfilled.

Out of his causeless compassion, during his weekly stop at the Moundsville flea market this past Sunday, Ghosh picked up two pairs of roller blades and three sticks for the team. The skates are a little bog, but they fit, and amazingly I didn't fall flat on my face or arse in moving about a bit on them. Thats a good sign.

The sticks were right-handed, which oddly enough doesn't work for me, despite the fact I am right-handed. Using a hockey stick is the only thing I do left-handed. Karma is strange.

Here's some pics of the happy occasion that pushed the reunion of the Palace Guards one step closer to reality.

Adi-Guru finds out that I'm a different person on the ice

Blades of steel

The human brick wall

Are Your Thoughts Your Own?

aneka-citta-vibhrāntā
moha-jāla-samāvṛtāḥ
prasaktāḥ kāma-bhogeṣu
patanti narake 'śucau

Thus perplexed by various anxieties and bound by a network of illusions, they become too strongly attached to sense enjoyment and fall down into hell.

Check out this link to a lengthy but very interesting piece on the mass media's influence on our thought processes and decision-making. You may call it conspiracy, but the effects are real and the causes are devious.

Tofu In The Rye

It's a great American image. The beef-chewing, muscle-clad, super hyped-up (and super-rich) professional sports athlete. No hippy pixie dust here, no sirree bob!

But as we look around, and we see its the 21st Century, a strange world upside-down, always evolving, sometimes even in positive directions, the above image shows its mutations, its permutations. Underneath the headlines of steroids and dogfights and big bags of cash is another way these athletes exist, as real role models and examples in the fight to bring awareness of of the benefits of the vegetarian and vegan lifestyles to the masses.

Click here to read more.