Photos from my First 2 week in India and Nepal

A Food Co-op Coming to the East Bay

It's almost here! I food co-op! What does that mean? Super cheap healthy food in exchange for 2 1/2 hours of work a month. I'd join but it wouldn't make sense considering my living/eating situation but everyone else should! Check out their website:

http://www.berkeleycog.org/

Stevia is Revolutionary!

While in India I was introduced to a plant with very sweet leaves called Stevia. Apparently it is used as a sweetener and has no adverse affects like diabetes, obesity or high blood pressure. In fact it can be eaten by anyone with a sweet tooth AND it has healing properties! Why don't we know more about this miracle plant? Because the FDA banned it, apparenetly after being pressured by the sweetener industry. They had patents on their sweeteners but since stevia is natural, no one can patent it and they (the sweetener industry) would lose lots of money. Unfortunatly millions of Americans are ruining their health with sugar and asparthem when they could be eating stevia. VIVA STEVIA!

FYI you can buy it in a concentrated form at any health food store. I bought some today. For more info check out:
http://www.steviainfo.com/

Friends of Oakland

Check out my new blog: http://friendsofoakland.blogspot.com/ . It's dedicated to the history, culture and current events of Oakland and is primarily for UC Berkeley students who are members of the listserve friends_of_oakland@yahoogroups.com. You can join too! Our aim is to support organizations that empower residents of "the Town" to evolve their lives and communities by offering our time, resources and energy.

Malcolm X and Love

Prophet? Guru? Inspirational leader? What ever you wanna call him, just remember to call him a man of love.

April 1964
Letter from Mecca:
Never have I witnessed such sincere hospitality and overwhelming spirit of true brotherhood as is practiced by people of all colors and races here in this Ancient Holy Land, the home of Abraham, Muhammad and all the other Prophets of the Holy Scriptures. For the past week, I have been utterly speechless and spellbound by the graciousness I see displayed all around me by people of all colors.

I have been blessed to visit the Holy City of Mecca. I have made my seven circuits around the Ka'ba, led by a young Mutawaf named Muhammad. I drank water from the well of the Zam Zam. I ran seven times back and forth between the hills of Mt. Al-Safa and Al-Marwah. I have prayed in the ancient city of Mina, and I have prayed on Mt. Arafat.

There were tens of thousands of pilgrims, from all over the world. They were of all colors, from blue-eyed blonds to black-skinned Africans. But we were all participating in the same ritual, displaying a spirit of unity and brotherhood that my experiences in America had led me to believe never could exist between the white and non-white.

America needs to understand Islam, because this is the one religion that erases from its society the race problem. Throughout my travels in the Muslim world, I have met, talked to, and even eaten with people who in America would have been considered 'white'--but the 'white' attitude was removed from their minds by the religion of Islam. I have never before seen sincere and true brotherhood practiced by all colors together, irrespective of their color.

You may be shocked by these words coming from me. But on this pilgrimage, what I have seen, and experienced, has forced me to re-arrange much of my thought-patterns previously held, and to toss aside some of my previous conclusions. This was not too difficult for me. Despite my firm convictions, I have always been a man who tries to face facts, and to accept the reality of life as new experience and new knowledge unfolds it. I have always kept an open mind, which is necessary to the flexibility that must go hand in hand with every form of intelligent search for truth.

During the past eleven days here in the Muslim world, I have eaten from the same plate, drunk from the same glass, and slept in the same bed (or on the same rug)--while praying to the same God--with fellow Muslims, whose eyes were the bluest of blue, whose hair was the blondest of blond, and whose skin was the whitest of white. And in the words and in the actions in the deeds of the 'white' Muslims, I felt the same sincerity that I felt among the black African Muslims of Nigeria, Sudan, and Ghana.

We were truly all the same (brothers)--because their belief in one God had removed the white from their minds, the white from their behavior, and the white from their attitude.

I could see from this, that perhaps if white Americans could accept the Oneness of God, then perhaps, too, they could accept in reality the Oneness of Man--and cease to measure, and hinder, and harm others in terms of their 'differences' in color.

With racism plaguing America like an incurable cancer, the so-called 'Christian' white American heart should be more receptive to a proven solution to such a destructive problem. Perhaps it could be in time to save America from imminent disaster--the same destruction brought upon Germany by racism that eventually destroyed the Germans themselves.

Each hour here in the Holy Land enables me to have greater spiritual insights into what is happening in America between black and white. The American Negro never can be blamed for his racial animosities--he is only reacting to four hundred years of the conscious racism of the American whites. But as racism leads America up the suicide path, I do believe, from the experiences that I have had with them, that the whites of the younger generation, in the colleges and universities, will see the handwriting on the walls and many of them will turn to the spiritual path of truth--the only way left to America to ward off the disaster that racism inevitably must lead to.

Never have I been so highly honored. Never have I been made to feel more humble and unworthy. Who would believe the blessings that have been heaped upon an American Negro? A few nights ago, a man who would be called in America a 'white' man, a United Nations diplomat, an ambassador, a companion of kings, gave me his hotel suite, his bed. ... Never would I have even thought of dreaming that I would ever be a recipient of such honors--honors that in America would be bestowed upon a King--not a Negro.

All praise is due to Allah, the Lord of all the Worlds.

Sincerely,

El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz
(Malcolm X)

Sam Cooke Said it Best...What a Wonderful World This Would Be

Don't know much about history
Don't know much biology
Don't know much about a science book
Don't know much about the French I took

But I do know that I love you
And I know that if you love me too
What a wonderful world this would be

Don't know much about geography
Don't know much trigonometry
Don't know much about algebra
Don't know what a slide rule is for.

But I do know that one and one is two,
And if this one could be with you,
What a wonderful world this would be.

Now i don't claim to be an "A" student,
But I'm trying to be.
So maybe by being an "A" student
I can win your love for me.

Don't know much about history
Don't know much biology
Don't know much about a science book
Don't know much about the French I took.

But I do know that I love you,
And I know that if you love me too,
What a wonderful world this would be.

Latatatatatatahuwaah (history)
Oehwoewoe (biology)
Latatatatatatahuwaah (science book)
Oehwoewoe (French I took)

But I do know that I love you,
And I know that if you love me too,
What a wonderful world this would be.

Vandana Shiva is AMAZING

I had the great fortune of meeting Vandana Shiva while in India. Her writings are all over the web but here is an exerpt from her interview in Yes! magazine. http://www.yesmagazine.org/article.asp?ID=570

Sarah: Let me wrap up with a personal question. Every time I’ve heard you speak or met you, you’ve had so much energy, not only intellectual energy, but personal or spiritual energy. I’m just wondering, what keeps you so alive?

Vandana: Well, it’s always a mystery, because you don’t know why you get depleted or recharged. But, this much I know. I do not allow myself to be overcome by hopelessness, no matter how tough the situation. I believe that if you just do your little bit without thinking of the bigness of what you stand against, if you turn to the enlargement of your own capacities, just that in itself creates new potential.

And I’ve learned from the Bhagavad Gita and other teachings of our culture to detach myself from the results of what I do, because those are not in my hands. The context is not in your control, but your commitment is yours to make, and you can make the deepest commitment with a total detachment about where it will take you. You want it to lead to a better world, and you shape your actions and take full responsibility for them, but then you have detachment. And that combination of deep passion and deep detachment allows me always to take on the next challenge because I don’t cripple myself, I don’t tie myself in knots. I function like a free being. I think getting that freedom is a social duty because I think we owe it to each other not to burden each other with prescription and demands. I think what we owe each other is a celebration of life and to replace fear and hopelessness with fearlessness and joy.