Sunset Kirtan

Sunset Kirtan

Yesterday, I attended an incredible kirtan (call and response singing, known here as baijan.) I’d gone swimming in a fancy swimming pool at a hotel a few kilometers from town and had a thali for lunch. I was really tired and sun-drenched.

I went to Sri Shiva Shakti at 5 pm (I go every day at 10 am and 5 pm for her darshan.) She is a very sweet and powerful teacher. I walked past the heart shaped flower offering by her chair, placed a few roses, and sat in the front row for the first time. After sitting and meditating for some time, I felt renewed and rebalanced from all the Shiva energy of Arunachala, the mountain. Her specialty is balance of Shiva and Shakti (masculine and feminine) energy.

I walked in the direction of Bharat’s, which is somewhere on the edge of the town, and got a ride from a woman who was headed there, too, on the back of her bicycle. Many people here rent bicycles, mopeds, or motorcycles and I’m becoming an expert at being a passenger.

So we arrive at kirtan, and it’s been going for a while. Everyone is on the roof, and there are six or seven musicians with guitars, drums, and shaky shaky things. We’re chanting and the music gets really good and we’re clapping and it gets even better and we get up to whirl and dance and the sun is setting and Arunachala is in the background and I’m swinging around and around with my arms clasped with a Dutch woman and then an Israeli woman, and the rose falls out of my hair, and then the music stops and we are completely silent and still.

Afterward, most of us head to Satiya’s cafe for dosas and then to another rooftop for Papaji’s video satsang, which was really funny. Papaji was making fun of a one of his devotees and then another one was laughing hysterically at his problems and then suddenly became very serious, and just sat there while Papaji moved on to the next person without saying anything, and it was so funny I couldn’t stop laughing for a long time.

Then I went home, lit some incense, and finished my Turkish hazelnut chocolate bar, which sent my frontal lobe into spasms.

About Administrator

Alicia Dattner is a comedian and speaker who jousts with such topics of love, time-management, money, environmentalism, politics, spirituality, and creativity. Her first solo show, The Punchline, recently won Best of the Fringe in the San Francisco Fringe Festival 2008. Her second show, Eat Pray Laugh won Best Storyteller at the NY United Solo Festival. Her company, Making Light, is dedicated to bringing humor and lightness into spirituality, relationship, and every day life.

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