…left his body on 24th February 2016
Satyam Puratana, known in the media world by his legal name Peter Lustig, was born 1937 in Breslau, then Germany, now Poland. As a small boy he witnessed falling bombs and firestorms in Breslau, pictures which haunted him his entire life. With the help of a gipsy woman the 7-year old travelled alone the exhausting trail westwards, to safety.
Puratana had always been a survivor, clinging to life and living to the fullest. He enjoyed smoking Gitanes cigarettes – and when he turned 42 he was diagnosed with a lethal form of lung cancer. By then Pu, as we all called him and as he also called himself (he loved Winnie-the-Pooh’s philosophy) had met Osho and taken sannyas in Berlin together with his wife Atmo Anasha and their four-year old son Sunder Momme, now Deva Pavi. Despite his illness – magic happened. Under surgery Puratana almost passed away; he had contracted a bacterial infection which wiped out the cancer cells and so saved his life – but he lost half of one of his lungs. When a hole in his windpipe did not heal the doctors had given up on him, but Pu managed to close the ‘non-closeable’ hole over the next couple of months with a mix of pure willpower, meditation and visualisation.
Puratana, Anasha and Pavi moved into the Hannover Commune in 1984. By then the couple was already well-known in the German children’s media. Puratana, originally a sound engineer for the US-radio AFN in Berlin – turning the knobs when Kennedy said that he was a Berliner – had started presenting a children’s show on science for the TV Station ZDF called ‘Pusteblume’, later ‘Löwenzahn’. The show became so popular that ‘Peter Lustig’ with his typical shrug – living for the show in a cute construction trailer with an Osho picture on the wall – could no longer live a quiet life in Germany. There were intervals where he escaped to Tuscany, the States and India, but Pu just loved his work too much to emigrate for good. He spent some months on the Ranch, doing groups and being quite a ladies’ man. Those were the days… When Anasha and Pu split up they remained close friends and moved to Mallorca where they lived in close vicinity to each other. Back then there was a lively sannyas community in Mallorca’s north.
Puratana believed that the cancer could return any day and decided to live every day as if it was his last. He was an avid risk-taker despite being slightly impaired by having lost half a lung and with Hep C, which he had contracted in hospital through blood transfusions. Still he rode his Harley Davidson and even bought himself an antique fishing yacht. His friends were shocked when Puratana decided to sail the ‘north route’ around the island of Ibiza in lousy weather, fighting house high waves! Again he survived! It took his third wife Astrid to tame him a little bit….
Puratana, besides his TV work, had published several books and audio plays. He only stopped shooting in 2005 when he became more frail. That’s when he moved back to Berlin and split his time between the German capital and Husum, a town at the North Sea, because the sea breeze allowed him to breathe more freely.
He was also a gifted illustrator and inventor of unusual little useless, but entertaining thingies, like talking guitars with names.
Peter Lustig received several awards, among them the German Federal Cross of Merit (Bundesverdienstkreuz) – and love in abundance. Not bad for the small survivor from Breslau!
Swami Satyam Puratana lived his life to the fullest in the Here and Now. He left his body peacefully after a short coma due to a severe heart attack in the presence of his caring wife of many years, Astrid, in Husum. Osho was always in his heart.
Text and images credit to Anasha
Obits in the German media: Focus – Spiegel – Süddeutsche
Tributes
Dear Pu, thank you for your love and support during our stay in the Osho Commune in Hannover. Have a good journey!
Nijesh
Hi Puratana, we just met shortly, enjoying a good time setting up the Hannover Disco. It’s a pity that I haven’t seen you again before your long travel. Sure we meet again somewhere, sometime. Love.
Subhadro
Dear friends, I have spent many hours in front of the TV watching and listening to this extraordinary, beautiful man who radiated compassion and joy of life. Did that even when I was way over 40 😉 He was a man who one wanted to spend time with.
Raji Susanne Atorf
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