A special Vedic homa was performed this morning by Natyam Tyaganatha, our priest from the island country of Mauritius. It was a celebration of the 54th birthday of Sri Sri Sri Swami Pragynana Maharaj, who is spending three days here to have Gurudeva's darshan as he begins a world tour.

Swami Pragyanand lead us all in a sweet Sanskrit mantra and gave a most wonderful talk. A portion of this talk can be enjoyed at the end of today's Satguru Speaks audio clip. Very inspiring, and worth downloading the long file just this one day.

Swami honored our beloved Gurudeva, spoke of him as "the emperor of the galaxy of living Hindu saints." Quite a title that! Then Swami gave some good counsel to the pilgrims:

"Those who are living for others are living for life, and thus they are immortal. Others, living for themselves, are living for dying." Swami made us all laugh when he spoke of his birthday, which is today, he is 54, "my body, that is, not my soul." He said in India we celebrate birthdays with lights, with homes and yagnas, while, somehow in the West we make a cake, offer it to the birthday person and then blow out the candles, in a strange celebration of darkness.

He said, "Gurudeva is my protection, and I come here once each year to recharge my batteries. He protects me, and I feel, no matter where I go, that I am never alone. I know he will never abandon me and I have felt that from the very moment I met him in 1981."

To all the mathavasis yesterday during lunch Swami Pragyanand spoke of the milti-million dollar mission he has embarked upon, which is a spiritual center in his village in India coupled with an eye hospital and gurukulam and other facilities. Swami then turned to the young men who live in the monastery, smiled and told them:

"You brahmacharis here are so fortunate to serve at the feet of a true Satguru. I did not come to that point in my life until I was older, 21 or later. Here you are, living and moving so closely with Gurudeva, something so many would like to do but cannot. I am a bit jealous of you all. I hope you will take full advantage of being here. Serve well and make Gurudeva happy with your service."

In the mundane arena of nature, prakriti, the Big News of the day is the arrival of a shipment of sacred and medicinal plants from Bangalore, India. The sage of the shipment may never be told fully, but all will enjoy a brief summary, for it shows the obscuring power of ecclipses, and the sustaining power of persistence.

One of the joys of living on a tropical island is that everything grows well (ok, apples and peaches don't, but everything else, almost!) Gurudeva has had us collecting special plants for many years, and we have a fairly extensive list now, with a large focus on sacred and ayurvedically important trees.

So, we worked for several months with our wonderful temple carving site manager, Jiva Rajasankara, in Bangalore to bring 150 amalaka trees (reputed to have the highest vitamin C content of any fruit in the world, besides being a graceful landscaping tree) and 60 Ashoka trees to Kauai. Jiva did an enormous amount of work in India, making some other acquisitions from private collectors (Indian plumerias, bilvas, etc.) and about 17 days ago they left Indian during an ecclipse, headed for San Francisco (the airlines had refused to fly them to Hawaii). But Lufthansa erred, a sent them instead to Los Angeles, where we proceeded to spend days and days getting them through the agricultural inspection process. Kulapati Deva Rajan worked with Palaniswami for days, getting a broker, talking with the inspectors, trying to move the plants toward Kauai. Nothing. The inspectors seemed determined to show how little progress could be made.

We turned to Dr. Bill Ho in Honolulu, a long-time friend of the monastery. Bill had LA release them to him. But United lost the shipment, then found it, then lost it again. When Bill finally got his hands on it, the plants were beginning to be traumatized. Bill finally got them to Kauai today! The monks hurriedly potted them, watered them and we hope they do well. Jiva had wrapped the roots exceeding well, and only because of his care are they alive today.

Thanks, Jiva! Nandri, Deva! Mahalo nui, Dr. Ho! The monastery collection now has a fine collection of one of India's truly remarkable trees‹the amalaka, or amla tree, officially known for those who are into plants as Phylanthus emblica.