Monthly Archives: September 2011

From a beautiful photo essay in The Atlantic:

“Hindus around the world — from South Asia to Britain and beyond — observe many colorful holidays throughout the year. Recent festivals include the Ganesh Chaturthi, celebrating the birth of the elephant-headed deity, and Janamashtami, the birth anniversary of the god Krishna. The range of experiences at these celebrations runs from joyfully loud and spectacular to solemn and contemplative. Each devotee celebrates in a distinct, personal way even while joining the larger community. Hinduism is the world’s third-largest religion; the majority of its one billion adherents are concentrated in India, but sizable communities exist all over the globe. I hope you enjoy these vivid, intriguing glimpses of Hindu festivals photographed over the past few months. [39 photos]”

Happy first day of Navaratri!

My friend Robert Moses, the brains and genius behind Namarupa magazine, was driving in his home state of New Hampshire, and saw this gentleman walking down the road. He got out of his car, and made this little film on his iphone, so it is a little hard to hear, but completely excellent:

I spent an inordinate amount of time yesterday trying to track down, on youtube, a video of Iggy Pop doing one of his amazing mid-song backbends. All I could find was Mick Rock’s iconic photo:

The closest I could come to finding a video was a clip from the Dinah Shore Show, featuring David Bowie on keyboards. However, just when Iggy goes into the backbend, they cut to Bowie. The song was Funtime, not my favorite Iggy song, but if you have a spare 3 minutes…

Lou Reed offered to write Iggy to ask him where I could find the video, which would make a much more interesting story, but this less interesting one will have to do.

More relevant, perhaps, to spiritual discipline and music: Lou composed some beautiful music for his Tai Chi Master, Master Ren, which is well worth checking out. Here is the link to some short clips.

Iggy – breath through your nose! And careful of your knees!

“Try not. Do! Or do not. There is no try.” –Yoda, Master Jedi

Guruji could not have said it any better himself. Actually, I think I might have heard him say it in almost that order once or twice…

Thank you, Cristiana!

In 1977, Mr. Iyengar was 59 years old. Very inspiring!