In Visakhapatnam, some members picked us up from the airport in a bus. Soon the luggage was in the bus and we drove through the city to the WTT retreat center. It almost felt like coming home – it was my 25th trip to WTT meetings in Visakhapatnam (and my 30th trip to India).
This year there were some changes. Guru Prasad, the son of Master KPK, informed us that we would be staying at the retreat center and that meals would be served on the third floor of Radhamadhavam, place of the WTT-temple. This meant that we were right next to the temple on the first floor, where the meditations and meetings took place, and we were able to spend more time together as a group.
There was a warm and familiar atmosphere, and the meals, prepared by his wife Gayatri and her sister Purnima, as well as other helpers, were very good.
Early in the morning on the first of January, there was the traditional meeting at the Master EK statue on the beach road, with morning prayers, a water ritual and breakfast together with members of the Indian brotherhood.
Afterwards, we drove to Andari Talli Nitya Annadanam (video clip), an innovative project for the large-scale preparation and distribution of food to the needy in Visakhapatnam. Every day, volunteers prepare free meals and distribute them at several hotspots. This center now also houses the book warehouse and shipping center.
In the afternoon started the seminar with videos of Master Kumar’s 2015 seminar on “The Energy of Synthesis” in Cordoba, Spain – profound teachings. During the seminar we also had talks of Guru Prasad on aspects of the wisdom teachings – one very interesting talk was about the importance of right pronunciation of mantrams.
On 2 January the group went to Ramadri, an environmental development project of WTT at the coast road about 18 km away from Visakhapatnam. The women empowerment projects had been shifted from there to the new center of Master EK Samskriti Sadan in Vizag but other projects are going on in Ramadri. We had a walk around the compound and visited various little shrined and the cow protection project.
At dusk, we sat in the little amphitheater overlooking the place for evening prayer. Later, we returned to the retreat center.
