The festival of the Earth

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Neringa
Posts: 590
Joined: Tue 02 04, 2003, 20:30
Location: Vilnius

The festival of the Earth

Post by Neringa »

Perkeliu is temos Naujienos/Zemes dienos, kadangi tekstas anglu kalba.

***


Taip idomiai gaunasi. Svente buvo tokia, kad praktiskai neimanoma jos zodziais apsakyti. Forume lietuvisko sventes aprasymo turbut ir nerasite.
Ta proga nutariau bent ideti mano laiska italui Lorenzo anglu kalba apie savo svarbiausius ispudzius sventeje:

***

... its just now when I can easily tell you about the festival since it was something overwhelming something undiscribable, something sacred. It took some time to conceive it. Thus only now I can put it into words. Especially after having heard impressions of other people.

So it was a festival where around 150 people participated. I have never seen so many shining people in one place, so contended, so peaceloving and open. It was one of the first big festivals of colleagues following the ideas revealed in books of Vladimir in Lithuania. And it was really the first big festival in nature, camping together.

The wheather was nice. Its just Friday afternoon, the first day, the rain poured heavily betweenwhiles. And I was a litte bit worried that our festival will not succeed as well as we wished. However, I was also asking myself why does it happen when such a bright and pure aspiration led as to this point, why God lets us soak in rain, there must be a reason.
Of course it was. Somehow this rain on Friday prevented some people to come, those who were unsatisfied with rain and "inconvenience", who were not so much determined to come. We wished that the festival was bright and elevated so the God granted the wish. It was to my great amazement that people woke up the next day (in the morning it was still cloudy a bit) with great smiles in faces, without a pretence to the wheather. So we were examined whether we are good enough to celebrate the day of Earth (in fact the day of Nature, and the rain is not excluded )). Furthermore, everybody had to go to sleep early, and it was a very nice deep sleep while the raindrops were druming our tents.

So we planned to plant a white rose in the place of festival. But due to the sandy soil we decided to leave it in a pot. So the festival began with bringing in the white rose with singing our beloved song "I had a White Rose..." (...I didnt know where to plant it, I planted it on the coast of the seas, on a high sandy hill, and the White Rose grew up, up to the very clouds, I climed up the branches of the White Rose, till I reached the garden of the Lord, I viewed the Son of the Lord, saddling up a white horse, the daughter of the Sun opened the gate, sprinkling the way with stars, I had the White Rose, and I reached the garden of the Lord). We also put 4 bowls: with water, fire, harvest (grain and honey-comb) and an empty bowl (which has to our great surprice become "an Alladin's lamp" )) ). We sang and danced in a circle. it was something like putting together in to one single entirety all our energies. It is always in the beginning of any event, that it takes some time until there is "a common sound". The action took place in a very beautiful glade. It is in the form of a circle, with a hill in the middle. On the middle of the hill before the festival we put a woodean sculpture "Tulip" and two woodean benches ("dragon", "snake") made by our colleague. When I watched once at the tulip, I felt so blessed, the mind stopped, its forms flowed and charmed. Interestingly, after the festival we realised that it is something like the symbol of continuation of family, harvest, harmony.

The program was followed very little, it was much left for spontaneous feeling what is right at the very moment, now and here. The next day started with sun greeting ritual "Agni kotra", with bathing in the lake (which was a natural individual activity). Then followed talks on different topics: family place-home-land, archaic symbols and traditions related to it, there meaning; birth of a child, experiences of women and men, midwifes in Lithuania; national Lithuanian bath (sauna) traditions, impact on health, inner harmony, use of herbs in bath, culture of bath. Alongside there was a place for a market. There were books, handworks, honey, audio records of "bards" and other things . There were two women who showed handcrafts: modeling from clay and binding of stripes(ribbons). In the evening we sang again, someone played the guitar, the drums, the flute. There was also one nice girl "bard" from Belorussia, she sang very beatifully. There was a group of people who showed Eastern type dance-katas, which is based on moving the energy. Afterwards we played national games in a circle. At night we stayed at a fireplace, continuing singing and playing melodies. There was enough space for everybody to choose the desired activity, to stay in the desired inner state. Sometimes I felt so filled up with all that nothing else there was that I could require, no action, just stay quiet.

The last day the wheather was nice again. We started the morning with new conversations, new games, motion. The market continued. In the end of the day we gathered into a circle around the Tulip on top of the hill. There were around 40 people left. And here we gave all our gratitute to our mother Earth. So the ritual - the meditation was on Sunday, even though we planned for Saturday. We layed on the ground and embraced the Earth together. I felt my heart so close to it, so simple natural and modest, we are so close to it. We step on the face of it every day, we sometimes touch it when we plant something, sometimes we lay down to relax. But it was never ever I could feel it so own. After we rose up sitting, and the song flowed spontaneously "Do you know that He is here, In you, in me, in us all, in a flower, in the grass, in a tree, in a bird, in the Sun, in the rain and in the rainbow; heis the Lord, he is the Joy, in you in me, in us all...". And while singing each word I saw lively the bird flying above, the Sun acoming from underneath the clouds, the rain was weeping so softly, the grass, the flowers were where we sit - around, and the trees were embracing the glade. And it was just the rainbow missing. I wondered - maybe its our aura, but after the festival, after we put the place to its previous order - we saw the rainbow appearing above... After the meditation a small child took the bowl with water and gave the people sitting in the circle to drink its water. So we drank the water one after another. We shared honey-comb and grain. We decided to plant the three roses in different ecovilages (one of them rests now in the ecovillage where people wish to create a fairy-tale land, another where a dolmen was found, and the third rests on a high hill in another ecovillage where I now rooted forever).

It was - in fact it still is - a big inspiration, so much energy. It was a consciuos space where I could see more than before. It was physically uneasy to hold up with it. Some things that I saw inside were not beautiful, but it is an inspiration to transform and to clean up the consiuosness. Now I feel I am another person. Thanks God we stepped into the future that we were waiting for since the nation of vedrus entered into the deep sleep. You are together, believe.
Remigijus
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Post by Remigijus »

:)
Mindaugas
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Joined: Fri 09 27, 2002, 23:01

Post by Mindaugas »

:V
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