Tehmi and Plants and Animals

2005

On this day in 1961 I arrived in Pondicherry for the first time and was welcomed taken in by Dayabhai at the old Parc a Charbon guest house. On the morning of the 24th I had my first darshan of the Mother.

I have spent the last two hours with Tehmiben, reading Savitri and speaking of our lives in the Ashram. She told me all about her childhood in Bhopal, her father who was a fair tennis player and the chief surgeon of the area, in charge of a large hospital for many years, and of her mother who never left her children alone and would often tell them the same. She spoke of her years in school in Bombay and how three times a year she and her brother would travel by train with an auntie from Bombay to Bhopal to be with their parents who lived in a wing of the Nawab's old palace.Her mother was often invited by the Begum to visit her and their mother always brought them with her. They were strongly enjoined not to take any food that was offered (possibly because their mother was concerned about them being poisoned by the servants!) but they were allowed to eat the black cardamom seeds. Her mother never offended the Begum usually saying something to the effect that they never took food out of timing.

She spoke to me of Mother and how Mother wanted her to have a copy of Savitri (the same one I am reading from now and which she has used for more than 50 years) and how she told Mother that she already had a copy but Mother said: "No, no you take this one. You will find it useful."

We spoke of the genius of the species and shared experiences and reminiscences about animals and Tehmi related the story of Alexandra David Neel and the tiger who came up to her while she was meditating and I told her of my experience with the jaguars and the quail and fawn and how our beautiful sixteen year old cat (Kitty) died placing her head in my hands.

I have spent a long time in quiet today, listening to music and looking at Mother's eyes, praying for a total surrender and complete humility. The gratitude and consecration seem to be constant but one must be ever vigilant. The aspiration for surrender is increasing, daily I believe, in this atmosphere of the concentrated presence.

All the lotus seeds have been planted, labelled and organized and Kiran is writing a letter to Peter Slocum to thank him personally as well as ask some important questions such as time of transplanting, container size, depth of soil and water, etc. I have met dozens and dozens of Ashramites and visitors who have welcomed me with such love.

Tomorrow we will go to Savitri Bhavan in the afternoon where the foundation stone for the second wing will be laid by the children of Auroville as per Huta's wish. Dylan and Aaron will be among them. I will take H.P. Rama, Larry Jacobs, and Aruna in a taxi for the ceremony.

Today I met Arnab Chowdhury, had a lengthy talk with Bob Zwicker about the milk refrigeration room that is proposed to be put virtually against the Archives building, Lilo, Anjou and many others.