Principles

Hi,
Did you miss me? (Ha) How many of you bothered to go to the website and read the Monday message? I thought so. Well, I'm back on my computer, with all your names in a neat little row, so life can continue.
The weekend song was "You Are The Sunshine Of My Life" by Stevie Wonder. I haven't seen much mail, so I guess that one was a little difficult. Oh my. I guess it's going to be one of those weeks. "What you want, baby I got it. What you need....All I'm askin', is a little __"
Surely you remember this one. It's sung by the Queen of something. Everybody wants some. Rodney Dangerfield never got none..... You only get one day on this tune.
So, we just finished our first full day in Bali. Unbelievable. Most of the island is Hindu, and it's a very big part of daily life. Today was the beginning of the events leading up to the full moon and the new year. John (our host) lives right across the street from a temple. In fact, his compound is owned by the temple and he leases it from them. Anyway, all over the island, families and groups went to their temples and brought offerings. The offerings were then taken to other temples in other villages for blessing and they did this all day. We had a steady stream of worshipers passing by the house all day. There are traditional outfits that are worn, and various foods are prepared and eaten at the end. I got a real kick out of all the Gamelon groups that came through. Each village makes an offering, a large structure that's carried on the shoulders of many men, and a Gamelon group accompanies the offering, as well as the people from the village. The Gamelon groups consist of two large gongs, a few smaller gongs, cymbal players, drummers and sometimes flute players. I'll tell you more about this some other time.
We watched countless processions go past the house and down to the beach. There would be a ceremony on the beach, in front of the house and then they would go north to another, larger temple. In the afternoon we were dressed in traditional clothing and we walked up the beach for the final blessing ceremony. There were hundreds of people sitting on the beach, with all the offering structures at the foot of the temple. First there were prayers that were said, during which we took flower pedals of different colors and held in our hands. Then priests walked out into the crowd and sprinkled water on us. There were three into the hand, which we touch to the mouth, and then one over our heads. Then we took some rice and pressed it into our foreheads. The whole affair was to bless the past year and the coming one. After that, the offerings were eaten.
We met a woman from the U.S. that has been here four years. She came from another temple and helped us with some of the specifics. After the ceremony she and John's friend Linda took us to a hotel on the beach for a look around. We sat in a garden and talked for quite a while.
Later we went to dinner at a wonderful little restaurant in the neighborhood. This has been a very full day. We have no idea what's coming tomorrow. I do know that on Thursday we'll be taken into town for the big parade and then Friday will be the day of silence.
I'll be posting a bunch of pictures so you can see what we've been experiencing. Be sure to go to the Flickr site later this week. I have to upload when there's not much traffic.
It's time for Happy Tuesday.

Peace,
Danny

"The principles you live by create the world you live in;
if you change the principles you live by,
you will change your world."
~Blaine Lee

Gettin' Funky, Thai Style

www.flickr.com/photos/gratidudepics