San Ramon Area of Refuge

[Guest guest]

I personally love Ammachi's stories. My email

Malayalee friend Ramesh Nair describes Ammachi's

speech as a local slang, or local dialect. Her

stories are down to earth, with very clear images

that anybody can understand plus humor.

 

I have never talked to Ammachi except to say a prayer

when she is giving me a hug. My friend Ishwari (more

about her below) tells me that I can write Ammachi a

letter and give it when I get darshan. The swamis

tell her later what it says. Ishwari says I should

write her about the thesis and I will.

 

Since I was working on my thesis all day on Ammachi's

last weekend in San Ramon I didn't go to retreat with Amma.

Thus, when I went to Devi Bhava, I was seated with the

"overflow" in the big shed where food is served. It is called

the Area of Refuge. We watched the puja and listened to

Amma's talk on closed circuit TV. We did the puja there

too.

 

The woman sitting next to me told me before puja

started that Amma cured her knee. The woman hurt her

knee when she was a ballet dancer. The knee had hurt

for years. One time she was sitting near Amma. The

woman's knee was hurting, as usual, so she was rubbing

it. Amma looked at her, looked at the knee and then

at her again and back to the knee again. The pain

went away and it has never hurt since.

 

That same woman told me about an Indian mother and her

small boy who had very thick glasses and sandal paste

across his forehead. She met them when she first met

Amma. The mother said that she brought the child to

see Amma all the time because Amma restored the boy's

sight. He had been blind. Amma blessed the boy's

eyes and gave them special sandal paste to put on his

forehead. Now he doesn't have perfect vision but he

can see well enough to manage.

 

My friend Ishwari Embrathiri told me that her doctor

wanted to operate on her ear. She had a stubborn old

infection that wasn't responding to antibiotics. She

asked Amma if she should do it because she was scared

of the operation. Amma said not to do it because they

often have trouble with that operation; it doesn't

heal properly and they often have to do it over again.

Ishwari asked her doctor about this since he hadn't

told her about these problems. He was a bit surprised

that her guru would know so much and admitted that

that was true; they often had to operate several

times. Ishwari told him that she didn't want the

operation in that case. When she saw Ammachi again,

her ear was still a problem. Amma said that, if the

doctor insisted, she should go ahead and have the

surgery, which she did. Her family all wanted to know

"How does Amma know all this?" Ishwari says "Amma

knows everything."

 

I was walking down the hill from the hall where Amma

was giving darshan. A young man was saying to his

lady friend, "It's good to see you here when Amma is

here because she's God." How many romantic movies

have you seen which have THAT line, eh?

 

No hug for me last night. I had # 1200. When I left

at midnight, Amma had reached 500. It's okay. I had

two hugs, a kiss and some great singing on Thursday

night. It's an honor to be anywhere nearby Ammachi,

even if along with 2000 others. Small crowd compared

to India. I saw an old friend there, someone with

whom I spent many happy hours in a Ganehsa temple in

San Francisco in the early 80's. She came with a new

room mate, who is an Amma devotee.

 

Ammachi wore a bright red sari heavily embroidered

with gold, especially the pallu. There were so many volunteers

helping nearby that no one could see Amma after darshan began except

on the video in the shed where dinner was being served.

 

Aikya