Wednesday 7 April 2010

Thursday, April 1st, 2010

“From Idea to Function”

Durban, South Africa

There is this Afrikaner monk by the name of Laghu Hari who I have the pleasure of working with on the production, “The Three Lives of Bharat.” He came to Durban from Cape Town about three weeks ago. He’s a very talented man and has used his gift of puppet- making to contribute to the play. Massive size marionettes and puppets of a deer and a tiger and an additional wild boar costume from Jwala Mukhi, an equally talented and young mother from Florida, all add a certain richness to the story on stage.

It brought me to wonder that the skill of this master puppet-maker is at the world’s disposal and yet has not had the chance to search a desirable fruition. I guess we could see that the opportunity is at hand. Like myself, Laghu has a passion to exhibit this higher conscious culture and using it in full force. Right now the world appears to be hungry for cultural display in the form of art, drama, dances, music. The subject matter can be rather flat when not garnished with the depth of a spiritual component.

That is what is special about all the Vedic stories and their messages that keep it set apart from standard mundane material. I stand in wonder once again what wealth there is in all the deep content of the Puranic tales. I think it’s a ripe mango ready to be picked and some of us just need to point out that there is such a tree.

Laghu and I have done some talking and we envision that perhaps collaboration is a possibility. In any event we have come to be beyond the dream stage and are working together on this weekend’s festival.

I appeal to blessings from all that this weekend goes well with the performance. Let’s see what the future holds.

5 KM

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