South American Ziraat Tour 2007

SOUTH AMERICAN ZIRAAT TOUR, 2007
Vakil Forest Shomer, Experienced Farmer-in-Ziraat

Invocación

Hacia el Uno
La perfección del Amor, la Armonía y la Belleza
El Ser Unico
Unido a todas las almas iluminadas que forman el cuerpo del Maestro (Mensaje)
el Espíritu Guía

I flew from Seattle, via Houston to Buenos Aires, Argentina, arriving on the first of February, and then took a regional flight into the interior mountains, the cordillera of Cordoba province.

flag of Argentina

MURSHID SAM DANCE AND WALK TRAINING
near Capilla del Monte, Argentina
February 2 to 6, 2007

I began at a camp for the Dances of Universal Peace where I presented Dances together with Ziraat and group Soulwork, for four days. The site was the remote, off-the-grid Yacu Yura intentional community in central Argentina.

There were previous acquaintances and many new friends, including some WWOOFers (Willing Workers On Organic Farms) among whom were Americans, one Austrian, one Irishman. There were eight countries represented on the land at the time, and several languages blending into a lingua franca for the event.

On my final day at Yacu Yura, perhaps the first occurrence of the Ziraat ritual in Argentina took place, with five initiations. Later, I offered a garden workshop with emphasis on seed-saving.

From Capilla I bused overnight and all day to coastal Chile. We passed Cerro Aconcagua, highest peak in the Western Hemisphere, on a brilliant day. A condor swooped past my front-seat bus window. Maravilloso!

In Viña del Mar, I was welcomed by Juan Marcos Aguirre, local Dance leader, and his family. We went to a crafts market where a quartet of young musicians were just starting a set of Andean music--the familiar mix of charango, quena, guitarra, bombo and sampones--as one may hear at many a North American festival--only far better.

On Friday evening, over 60 Chilenos gathered to meet and dance, at an organic homestead facing the Andes. I co-presented with Chilean members of Change the World, a Norway-based nonprofit, who took us on a Power-Point tour of ecovillages all over the world, and a sense of relationship was established between that movement and the spiritual element in these diverse communities.

Many of us camped overnight together and on Saturday, about 30 assembled to co-create the Ziraat lodge, dance, walk, meditate, share food, and develop a group consciousness. During the concluding ceremony, more than a dozen people chose initiation in Ziraat.

Juan Marcos together with Cecilia and their two daughters Malena and Antonia and I toured old Valparaiso on Sunday: ate fresh seafood, walked along the harborside, rode a funicular rail up the hills, and visited Pablo Neruda´s town house. As the bus arrived to take me further on that evening, a large festive crowd was assembled in the parque across the street for a celebration of the Chilean national dance, the cueca.

Then, an overnight coche cama (sleeper) bus south and eventually to Pucón, a very popular tourist town and jumping-off point for Andean parks in the bi-national Lakes District. Pucón is quite spectacular with smoking Volcán Villarrica towering over, all snowcapped. The "Sufi Caravan" (Dancing in the Heart of the World), co-led by Tasnim Hernandez, arrives in Pucón for a retreat this month (April).

Late in the evening, a long soak in one of the many local hotsprings, under the stars.

I climbed in El Cañi reserve, one of the largest and oldest private, nonprofit forest reserve sites in the region if not the Southern Hemisphere, which was co-founded many years ago by our Ziraat sister Amina Katherine Bragg! The ancient forest of beech trees was a profound place to visit, and I would have gone much further except for the steady rain that began as I reached the highland.

Then over the border by bus back into Argentina, past the immense Volcán Lanín through an Araucaria forest ('monkey-puzzle', like the tree in front of my house) to visit old friends Eduardo and Alejandra, who operate a native-plant nursery in scenic San Martin de los Andes, for two nights.

While I was there, the snow level dropped to 4,000 feet--lowest in midsummer in at least 20 years, and we went up to the ski resort and threw snowballs!

Next I rode a slow bus on a single-lane track through the Seven Lakes area: a brilliant day with freshly snow-covered slopes, scenic lakes, and an old growth pine forest. Arrived after some hours in San Carlos de Bariloche, on Lago Nahuel Huapi (reminiscent of Lake Chelan, in Washington State) with the full horizon of Andean peaks stretching away in the distance. Great chocolate here.

From Bariloche, I returned via Buenos Aires, overnight before flying to Colombia, where I began by rendezvous-ing with Dan Baker-Jud to attend Carnaval in Barranquilla.

Here Carnaval is a very big festival but perhaps less outrageous than in Rio, and attracts only small numbers of gringos and other foreigners. There were all-day colorful parades to attend, lots of music in the streets, and a relaxed atmosphere with the entire city taking a four-day holiday.

On Saturday, a large group assembled under a spreading mango tree in Cali, Colombia, for a day of Ziraat, Dances and Walks, group Soulwork and before we departed, two dozen new Ziraati had been initiated! Among this largest of all initiations since the beginning of Ziraat activity in the Ruhaniat, were one or more people to each of the six estaciones en Ziraat. Most notably, we now have our first Farmer-in-Ziraat on this continent, Dance leader Ana Maria Hoyos.

Upon arriving late that evening in Bogotá, Colombian Dance leader Sylvia Murillo blessedly brought me right to a small family-owned hotspring for a late evening soak.

The very next day, in the beautiful setting of Campo Alegre, a private school near Bogotá, once again a large group gathered and by day´s end, a Ziraat lodge with representation from the six stations of Workers on the Farm had formed, and again, over 20 new Ziraati took initiation. Alhamdulillah!

In all, our Ziraat community has grown by about 60 persons in three countries. It´s not my purpose to strive for large numbers in this activity. As Paul Reps once counselled: "Quality congeals in quantity." Rather, what we have here is a very high level of interest in Ziraat, good seed landing in fertile soil.

A team of translators has already made six or more of the core Ziraat teaching documents available in Spanish to these new groups; these Spanish language versions will be posted to the Files section of the Ziraat listserve homepage.

One last day: a walkabout of Old Bogotá, in company with two of the Sunday participants.

We visited the Botero Gallery (country's most famous living artist), ate at a quinoa-amaranth cafe, rode a gondola skyride up the mountain to Monserrate Church at 10,000 ft. overlooking the city, and passed the Presidential Palace where G.'W' Bush was soon to be a 7-hour guest on March 11 with 21,000 soldiers making his visit possible. Mine was a bit more modest!

Throughout the trip I found it easy to find good water and eat my kind of diet for the most part. Always a good place to sleep as well.

Gracias to my very capable translators: Jimmy Docker, Juan Marcos Aguirre, Jorge Calero, Sylvia Murillo. Our minds danced so gracefully together. My rusty español is much improved now, to the point of conducting initiation ritual, and much of the Dance instruction, sin inglés. It is enlightening to hear one's words rendered instantly and flawlessly into a second language. There is no doubt that attendees at each event received a perfectly clear version of the Ziraat teaching.

Thanks to all who helped fully match the $1,000 travel grant from the Ruhaniat Board that made this journey possible. Special thanks to Sabira Christina for sparking this travel by inviting me to teach in Brazil. While events conspired to keep me from reaching Bahia this time, Insh’allah this dream will be fulfilled early in 2008. Perhaps a few of you will be able to join me for the next journey and meet our familia espiritual in Ziraat!