Day 3: Creativity in Our Community

Written By: Namita Bhavanam

After a good night’s rest, we woke up ready to conquer the day. I went to the mandir a little earlier to be ready to bathe Baba. Being able to do Baba’s bath again after a long time felt so fulfilling, and I was able to feel a strong connection being in such vicinity of his form. There is a certain serenity in the simple pouring of water during this time. Looking into Baba’s eyes every time I am up there doing abhishekam or drying, it feels so personal and powerful. We had lemongrass tea this morning and it was YUM! From working on the packaging designs for these Haritachala products to actually tasting them during this camp, the design team felt very happy to see the products come to life and try the deliciousness that they offer

For example, we had the new and revamped malt drink the morning before for the first time and it was so great being able to taste the improvements while also knowing about the ingredients and benefits by heart. We had dosa and upma for breakfast and then had our first activity for the day: learning Madhyan Arati from Ammamma! She so patiently taught us, line by line, and word by word. Ammamma taught us all the pronunciations, and she explained the meanings as we progressed through the lyrics. It was beautiful to see the amount of attentiveness she had to each lyric and how she taught us with so much care, making sure not one person was confused before moving on. The experience was so surreal. Spending this time with Ammamma felt like a gift that kept on giving throughout the entire camp, as we learned each part of the arati and finally completed it during the final days of the camp.

After this, we learned how to make garlands! This has been a life skill that I have been wanting to learn since forever so that I can help make them for Baba and Guruji tatayya for satsangs and other occasions. Pushpa aunty and Vasu aunty started off our garland sessions with the tying version, which took multiple tries but was so much fun to learn. Once I understood the technique, I was able to make a garland for the Baba photo in Babuji Hall. 

After garland making, we had sambar and cabbage curry for lunch. During the afternoon break, we spent some time with Pravallika and updated her on the day so far! She was severely sick since the previous day so she was taking some well needed rest. Today was our first day of officially starting to paint the bakery walls! Yesterday, we worked on piecing together our design printouts and taped them on one wall along with the tracing paper. Today, we traced the borders and started painting the vines for the first big wall. Some girls worked on tracing and painting while others worked on taping the papers up on the next wall. This project gave us the opportunity to practice teamwork and collaboration. Also, we had to plan and figure out the most efficient way to delegate tasks so that we are taking advantage of the number of people we had! 

Seeing how hot it was in this room, especially while we were elevated on the ladders, the uncles brought in another cooler so that we would feel more comfortable. After another painting day, we ended up with not one but two coolers! The love and care the volunteers gave us was shining through every little day-to-day action. Later on in the camp we learned that one of the coolers they had kept in the bakery for us was their personal room cooler! They sacrificed their own comfort to ensure ours, which is just one small example of the unconditional love we experienced.

After a couple of productive hours of painting, we had our very first photography session with Dev uncle. This first session was to get acquainted with him, learn about his experience with photography and Guruji tatayya, and understand the goals of our lessons. He showed us the pictures he took when the Haritachala mandir’s Baba statue was brought to Tiru on April 14th, 2012. He also showed us the photos he took for the mandir’s inauguration. Not only were the photos beautifully taken, but they captured the raw emotions of these moments that were so important in Haritachala’s timeline. As he clicked through the photos, it felt like we were there in person watching these moments with our own eyes.

For dinner, we had palak paneer with roti and then ended the day with our daily gratitude circle! Like always, we had lots of things to be grateful for that we carried with us as we continued onto the following days of camp.