Today is the Skanda Shashti and this evening we have our annual Muruga homa and abhishekam.

Meanwhile the Ganapati Kulam report on their activities today. Palaniswami has been busy getting ready for his trip with Bodhinatha to India. Kumarswami has been working on our monthly monastery newsletter and other publishing projects for Hinduism Today future issues. Arumugaswami has been working across the river on the Kalepa land (see below) with Sadhaka Satyanatha. Sivakatirswami has been working on the production end of the January issue of the next issue of Hinduism Today, getting it off to the printer and doing daily TAKA. Senthilnathaswami has been working on various video’s, shooting Bodhinatha’s Publisher’s desk for YouTube, porting some of Bodhinatha presentations from Keynote to a movie format by syncing audio tracks.

On the land across from Iraivan that we call “Himalayan Acres” or in Hawaiian, “Kalepa” the monks have entered into a collaborative agreement with a professional nurseryman, Scott Young, who will use some of the land to nurture his own collection of specimen trees, while training the monks and caring for more trees that will belong to the monastery.

This phase, Acharya Arumugaswami and Sadhaka Satyanatha have been working shoulder to shoulder with Scott, soaking up all his expertise along with Jonathan Anderson who also helps us on Kalepa projects. Together with Scott and his workers, the team are planting over 350 trees over a period of about 8 days.

This area is protected by a wind break of iron wood trees we planted years ago. It has been mowed and prepared for tree planting.

The auger on our case tractor is gigantic. Nearly 3 feet wide it makes a massive hole, perfect for planting large trees.

There is Jonathan Anderson standing by.

That is a row of areca palms, highly prized by landscapers.

Jonathan signals the tractor operator that the auger, after digging the hole, is up, clear and ready to move to the next spot.

A picture perfect hole for a specimen tree.

We have hauled over 200 trees so far from Scott’s nursery to our land.

These are various species of palms that are prized by land developers and landscaping professionals. After a home or building project is complete, these trees are planted, some of them nearly full grown, to provide instant landscaping.

More trees arriving. These have been raised so far in large plastic bags. Now they will get to spread their roots into Mother Earth without constriction.

This is yet another increment in the monastery’s effort to build up its agricultural endowment in order to sustaining this important property immediately across from Iraivan temple and also to just be an example of Earth-Friendliness. Gurudeva said everyone should plant 12 trees a year, if possible.

After a few years, this palm will have a good solid trunk and be ready for sale.

Weed mat is placed between rows.

Those who follow global weather may know that St. Lucia experienced a hurricane while Toshadevi and her two children were returning home. Fortunately, Dad (Fremont) is OK back home. Vanore sent these photos during their stop over in New York.

Vanore is twenty-one and his sister Lily is 13, but very tall for her age.

Vanore sitting by the river.

Mother and daughter by Wailua River

Master Course student Vanore Lawrence

Lily is adds two more arms to help our outdoor statue of the Six-Faced Murugan with his lilas.

With our brahmacharinis, Shama and Lila.