Saturday morning after breakfast, last exchanges and saying good-bye to one and all, we boarded the buses which transported us back to San Francisco or San Jose. And the team of organizers started closing the site of the group living and packing….
It was quite hot when we came down from the mountains to the central Californian area. Our bus driver drove with high speed, he seemed to be in a hurry to come home… The bus stopped at the Courtyard Hotel in San Jose North. While the others checked in, I waited in the lobby together with three friends to be picked up.
Some hours later Murali came with his neighbor Gurjinder and they drove us to Morgan Hill. For two nights, we stayed in the house of Gurjinder and his wife Kusum, a very amiable couple from Punjab in Northern India. They live in a beautiful huge villa, newly constructed and well decorated inside and outside with Indian art. He is an IT specialist, she a dentist. She helped in Anu’s and Murali’s house in the kitchen, where the Master and his travel group stayed and where many of the Indian brotherhood came for the prayers. A small footpath through the garden connected the two houses.
Gurjinder and Kusum gave us a warm welcome. It touched me very much that they gave their own bedroom to accommodate Rosy and Mathilda. And I slept in the room of their daughter, who was rehoused to her twin brother (both approx. mid-20s) – one would hardly such hearty hospitality in Europe.
Sunday morning after meditation there was a Pada Puja, a traditional worship of the Teacher and his wife by members of the Indian brotherhood of California in the house of Anu and Murali.
Later, the Master and his companions made an excursion, while I sat down to write the minutes of the General Assembly. Afterwards, Mathilda and I walked through the gardens of the two houses and enjoyed the flowers and the smell of the eucalyptus trees. And we had interesting exchanges with the parents of Murali. Although in the 80s, they are very spirited.
Next morning when we wanted to prepare for departure, Gurjinder was showing the rooms of his house to the Master, just looking into the room where I had spread my belongings for packing… Shortly afterwards, a driver from Lyft came to give us a ride to San Francisco airport.
Mathilda’s flight was in the early afternoon, mine was in the evening, and finally delayed for 2.5 hours. I spend the day in the airport, reading, writing, watching some expositions of the SFO Museum in the airport. While I was out on a terrace at the Gates, I saw the Swiss airplane coming in with much delay from Zurich. It was nearly 10 pm when the plane took off again for the flight back.
In the plane, I sat in a row together with a mother and her daughter, about 8 years old. They were from LA but of Italian ancestry and on their way to Italy. The lively daughter gave me a welcome chewing gum and recommended me to watch the “Captain Marvel” movie about a superwoman, which she had already seen, and so I did.
Flying through the time zones, looking down once while passing from Greenland over fields of icebergs and then again just before the Hebrides, I tried to consciously realize what was just happening. Yes, the melting icebergs around Greenland have something to do with my flying above them; but the unfolding network of light and spiritual awakening and of an attitude of service witnessed during the group living is a strong promise for better relations between humans, nature and the globe.
When my wife picked me up at the train station and I finally was back home, I felt profoundly grateful for the safe ending of the journey and filled with an abundance of impressions.
