Recent visits and old-timers on Bali
It was with happy anticipation that I waited for Cole (aka Krishna Bharti) and Sara (aka Matwali) to arrive at our house. We had reconnected by e-mail about a year ago after a long gap since Rajneeshpuram where Cole used to be one of ‘the boys’ at RBG, handling heavy equipment. Many of you will remember him as the darshan photographer in Pune 1, for all time present behind his camera lens and always with a ready smile on his lips. He also shot thousands of photos of Osho and our community for the Rajneesh Times and the many books we published.
Photography remained his main focus for many years as he worked in the USA and in Switzerland as a corporate photographer and in advertising. Sara, who was born in Switzerland, lived and worked for many years at the ‘Zorba the Buddha’ disco in Basel, which became the famous ‘Babalabar’.
When they are not traveling – which they do periodically throughout the year (US-Europe-Australia) – they have been based in Denver, Colorado. However, they are about to make the Fremantle/Perth area in Western Australia their home for at least half the year, as much of Cole’s transformational work with people (Miracle of Love) will be taking place there; plus, it is a convenient hub to travel in Asia. Which means, we will get to see each other hopefully more often! cole@miracle.org
For Anutosh, Bali is becoming almost a second home. Born in Singapore, she arrived in Pune in 1978 very pregnant and is one of the few women who gave birth in Pune. And she stayed around too and was even featured in that famous STERN article from the seventies, nursing her baby boy. Typically, nudity works for the media at all times. I always look forward to meeting her because she is such an exuberant bubbly friend! She offers Family Constellation workshops and when we met she was exhilarated because the very recent event was “a beautiful group with twenty participants and many beautiful men that brought so much fullness to the group! Usually it is mostly women participants. It is difficult to work with this process if there are fewer people; this group was perfect.”
When she is not traveling, she lives in Seattle where she also works as a massage practitioner, offers doula services and postpartum care.
Meanwhile she is eyeing Bali as the perfect place for a residential death and dying group and has some ideas about whom to invite but doesn’t want to go public with it yet. She said, “Ah! Life…so amazing! And Yes, Death too!” anutoshf@gmail.com
There are quite a few sannyasins living here permanently on the isle but none of them is very visible! We are all connected and know about each other’s lives but don’t hang out on a regular basis. It is a quite unusual sannyasin community spread throughout the southern part of Bali. One of the few I get to see regularly is Dayanand, who you remember from Mumbai (maybe, those were very early days), Pune 1 and 2, Geetam, the Multiversity where he was a body worker, and a fabulous carpenter too.
He lives in the hills north of Denpasar in Nyuhkuning, a small hamlet near the famous artist’s village Ubud. I know, you have probably all seen the movie ‘Eat, Pray, Love’ by now and think you know something about the isle, but what they showed is not the Bali as we know it! Dayanand is married to Neneng, one of Indonesia’s top amateur golfers and he is an expert in sourcing teak furniture and stone carvings. He also produces exquisite silver jewelry, and his company Ebone Design specializes in piercing jewelry made out of silver, carved stone and wood. The photo shows him and Neneng at a Balinese wedding we were invited to recently. ebone@dps.centrin.net.id – ebonedesigns.com
Comments are closed.