Letters from Shanti Ashram, India

62. Translation Blessings & Thoughts on America - Sept 2000

Blessings for Translator’s Group

August 22, 2000

Dear Parents,

Namaskars! All is OK here. This will be a quick letter, I hope!

I got a really happy-news letter from SH. It seems that they formed a group of all the translators and two people handed over a letter to Sathya Sai Baba. They also got their own scarf, a pink one with silver lettering, with 'Premsai' on one side and 'Sai Seva' on the other. (Premsai is the name of the Internet site with all the discourses.)

It seems that the very first afternoon after the scarves were distributed, one of the members got a good seat in front. When Swami came in, He was staring at the scarf and reading it. He came up to her saying, 'Sai Seva', 'Prem Sai.' Then He asked, 'Premsai, what is it?'

The lady said, "We're a small group, Swami." (She forgot the translator part, but you know how it is when Swami is right there talking to you!) Then He asked, "What country?" and she answered, "We are from many countries, Swami." Then He circled His hand and made some vibhuti and gave it to her.

SH sent me a bit of the Vibhuti. (It had to be distributed amongst the 14 translators!) I was happy to gulp down the white vibhuti, smelling just like Swami creates it, the tell-tale wonderful Sai-smell! Some Grace, eh!

Enclosed are notes from Vara Lakshmi Vratam. Both Padmamma and SH wrote me news of it. It was a big event, the first time Swami ever celebrated it, which is wondrous in itself. More big events leading up to 75th year, I guess!

Vara=boons, Vratam=any ritualistic vow or puja. This puja is very popular amongst married ladies, and is done with big pomp and show, the main results desired is to secure long life without becoming a widow first.

It seems that it is a big ‘do’ with Swami's whole family. Every year they would invite all their personal friends, including many VIP residents of Prasanthi Nilayam, to their village homes, and give away the usual choli-pieces, fruits etc. Once Venkamma took me around on one Vara Lakshmi Puja Day. We had to visit around five or six of the relative's houses, and I lugged around a bag of all the gifts given away to us.

Anyway, this year Swami had 108 VIP's including all non-widows in Swami's family who were present (they must have made up at least 30 ladies!), and everyone did the traditional puja with all paraphernalia, in the Sai Kuwait Hall itself.

The discourse was nice - I am sure ladies all over the world are making their men-folk study it well! It's good - let them learn to treat the ladies of the world better.

I am going on with discourses from Sai Towers also.

It is strange that immediately after I wrote you about the construction of the Big Tower one month ago, they took down the ground level iron scaffolding and went away, only leaving piles and piles of sand bags lying around! Only the four base pillars, only two or three feet above the ground, remain. Maybe they are waiting for the cement to get hard enough to start building the tower. No workers or noise since then, hooray!

I am taking part less and less with things outside - like I don't exchange news with anyone, just do my work and return. I am feeling really introvert lately. Jnaneswari went on some day-trip yesterday, to a distant city, and was gone 5 AM till 10 PM, but I didn't even know about it till late that morning! Not much news is reaching my ears lately, thank Swami. Bliss is ignorance.

There were two more big meetings (only with top Ashram officials) and I could hear the arguing from my room, going on hours and hours, but happily don't know what they were saying. Just the shouting voices of Uncle, Anjaneyulu and RS Raju, the other Visakhapatnam big-wig. Jnaneswari also had to sit through these meetings. All plans for the improvement of the Ashram, only Swami knows what's in store next.