A splendid performance of Maestro Bismilla Khan. At young age he was already keen to caress the ears of the audience with the most melodious shennai ever.
Khan was perhaps single handedly responsible for making the shehnai a famous classical instrument. He brought the shehnai to the center stage of Indian music with his concert in the Calcutta All India Music Conference in 1937. He was credited with having almost monopoly over the instrument as he and the shehnai are almost synomyms.
Khan is one of the finest musicians in post-independent Indian Classical music and one of the best examples of hindu-muslim unity in India.
His concept of music was very beautiful and his vision, superb. He once said, “Even if the world ends, the music will still survive” and he often said, “Music has no caste”.
His shehnai was so close to him that after the demise of his wife he began to refer to it as his begum, or wife. After his death, his shehnai was buried with him.
Suggestion: try to use it almost everyday in the morning: a couple of teaspoons in a glass of semiwarm water. If you dont really like the salty flavour of the water you can always add a drop of pure spearmint or a real mint leaf. To start use it for a week and the week after dont use it. Already the second day in the morning your mouth will ask for it because a good salty wash-up refreshes and keeps the salivation at normal levels. In addition: gargling about twice during the process will make up a even perfect job for your speaking/communication and so on!
Every time you’ll enter a Lush shop yor senses will be completely wrapped by odours and it will give you the feeling to be in a forest or in a bakery: it depends if you are going for a piece of cake or a walk into the nature afterwords. It is an incredible experience to see these products; they are a little bit expensive because of their basic vegan philosophy. But a bath bomb can be purchused as it is one of the cheapest item. You can crash a small part of it even in a footsoak bucket together with salt. I went to browse their website: here’s their story…
A Bit of History
The LUSH creative team has been working together since the late seventies when we first started to hand-make our own cosmetics. In 1978 we sold our first product to the Body Shop and in 1988 we set up Cosmetics to Go in Poole, Dorset on the south coast of England, where we surprised the bathing public by inventing products such as bath bombs, shampoo bars and massage bars and built a hugely successful, catalog-based mail order cosmetics company the like of which had never been seen before.
Everyone Makes Mistakes.
In a series of unfortunate co-incidences, culminating in a disaster, Cosmetics to Go went under and we had to sell what was left of the company. In 1994 we picked ourselves up and started making cosmetics again. Our first shop was at 29 High Street, Poole, where it is to this day, and we opened our second in London’s King’s Road. We were mobbed! We grew from there.
Today, Tomorrow, Beyond!
Today we have 500+ shops around the world. We also operate web and telephone businesses in the UK, Canada, Australia, Italy, Japan, Sweden, Hong Kong, Switzerland, Hungary, Germany, Taiwan and the United States. We hand-make our cosmetics in our own factories in the UK, Italy, Canada, South America and Japan. Every product available in our shops or sent to you by mail is as fresh as it can possibly be because fresh products work better and use fewer preservatives. Our aim is to have the youngest, freshest products in the history of cosmetics.
Chinese are very much attracted by the long history of Italy (and of course of all of Europe), and especially by the peaceful and cozy daily lifestyle. In Italy a kind of deep freedom is really easy to be perceived from the attentive ones. Easy to travel around, openess and helpful people always at the corner, good weather, simple food make of Italy one of the best destination for the Chinese of the coast and of the mainland. See how much they enjoy it!
I am here with my beautiful smart new laptop with its pretty artistical and original functions. i am thrilled for this gift that probably Mata saraswati sent somehow. It is a touch screen working one, and not only. One can also paint with fingers on the screen, draw thick lines with fingertips!
See the fingertips of the picture? They have colours. I can program the laptop on the blu color of the palette for example and, just like the picture does show it, paint a sky with the forefinger on the screen. Then after digiting on the green square, make the grass with the medium finger and also a red flower with the little finger. It s going to be such a fantastic playuful adventure this new laptop!
I just ponder we can now use the fingers so much to extend our expressions and reach more channels of communication out. That was impossible before. Science is galloping to such an also artistical speed and we can send enormous amounts of joy and creativity out to the others!
You know the basic of ayurveda, the ancient science of the Veda? The highest of all the forms of divine manifestation. One of its basic principle is that we can detect feelings, perceptions of our inner biological system by increasing the sensitivity of our fingers. This is possible today. I heard for example that in a medical conference of our times a lady could detect an illness at the heart level to one of the chairman (who asked how the sensitivity of the fingers could work). She gave the exact answer and the man, a doctor himself, was mesmerized. The power of our fingertips has just started to be known in these last 30 years thanks to the active participation of the Indian born Doctor Nirmala Srivastava to various medical and scientifical conferences. She explained in details how we can know ourself, our health status, our catches and the ones of other people by relying on our fingertips. It ’s an incomparable sourse of knowledge with a great future ahead.
How to develop a good sensitivity of the fingertips? it seems not difficult. However it requires good understanding of our human nature and capacity to focus our attention at least on positive things if not practically on the top-of-the-head, the most significant area of the brain. Meditation seems to be the most important requirements to develop a sensitivity of this kind. Infact thru meditation we do not think, we empty our brain, we touch in silent the central point of our being, of our humanity which can be equal to divinity, somebody can say, at this level, why not? It is a space of purity and profound joy that takes room into ourself more and more, depending on the time we spent into meditation. Anyway it is generally suggested by doctors to meditate for a while either in the morning and evening, to start and complete a regular cycle of our normal biorythm.
Why and what do we learn about ourself by meditating? Good question! The answer can be another question: Do we know when we breath? Yes, everytime we do breath (when we do not breath we are gone). This is the place where the meditation work goes to affect. It does help us to understand the work of this part of the nervous system, the spontaneous part, the one which we do not have apparently any control on but that yes, we can achieve to realize and eventually to master. In order to become master in this Science of the Self Knowledge we can ask immediate support to another body part. Guess which one? The fingers, right. They are the mirror of our brain. There it is contained the nervous termination of each and every neuron of the brain.
What is the relationship between brain and fingers? They love each other so much that they are connected. We humans are very integrated personalities, at least we aspire to become that (this is why now it is Fingers Age and not Stone Age). Diverses areas such as emotions, satisfaction, eating functions, care, creativity, open mindness etc.etc. (they can be thousands, really! I read that for example forgiveness has been also considered as a human function to be developed in recent papers research) are located in the brain, we know that. These same areas can be localized on our fingertips and felt for diagnosticating the movements of that spontaneous, innate part of the central nervous system (it s called sympathetic nervous system SNS). An headache, a stomach problem, an eye disfunction…everything can be detected by our fingertips while we keep our attention on the top of the brain! It is an amazing discovery! Isnt it? New frontiers for the modern medicine too.
There are people who made of their fingers the origin of a brilliant version of life. There are people who use fingers to have fun, grow and enjoy themself. There are people who (like me) use a touch screen laptop to paint and embark in cool art works styles. All these people can achieve an oustandingly balanced and peaceful life bringing good changes and nurturing the human desire for a real transformation with knowing the power of their fingers. Now let me try this screen painting thing.
In 1992, Planet Drum, an album co-created and produced by Zakir and Mickey Hart, was awarded a Grammy for Best World Music Album, the Downbeat Critics Poll for Best World Beat Album, and the NARM Indie Best Seller Award for World Music Recording. The band Planet Drum, with Zakir as music director, toured nationally in 1996 and 1997. Zakir also continues to tour with the musicians from Shakti — John McLaughlin, Shankar and T.H. Vinayakram — in different collaborations and ensembles as well as leading various percussion ensembles of his own design. In Summer’99, Shakti re-grouped for an international tour.
Last saturday, the second appointment of this Spring 2008 with the Bhajan Sahaj group from Hong Kong was a releaser of joy, fun & relax. The response to the bhajan genre, Indian born music exalting the qualities of the divine, in the Chinese city was very positive and about 150 people gathered to enjoy the new sounds and melodies. From the audience, an Indian lady who has lived in HK for ten years now, quite expert of harmonium and tabla said she really loved the singing and was astonished, together with her daughter freelance-writer, to listen local people able to sing in marathi, hindi and sanscrit.
There have been two musical sessions and a middle break to present the scientifical benefits of sahaj meditaton supported by a power point documentation. [Nirmala magazine will be also glad to send via email this bilingual presentation (Chinese and English) if anybody were in need of].
And now Nirmala magazine would like to inaugurate a section dedicated especially to all the wonderful men of the creation! To the love they feel in the heart for mother earth, to the care they always have for their wife or girlfriend, for the devotion they understood for their mother. To all these men a musical opening, the outstanding qawaali from the majestic master Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, Afreen afreen, which tells the stupendous qualities of the woman.
husn-e-jaanaaN kii taariif mumkin nahiiN
It is not possible to praise the beauty of beloved.
I never saw anyone so beautiful
[her] body is like the images of Ajanta*
[her] body is like a spell on eyes
[her] body is like a song [and] perfumed
[her] body is like ecstatic music
[her] body is like sweet-smelling moon-light
[her] body is like a blooming garden [her] body is like the first ray of the Sun
[her] body is like carved statue, eye-catching and arresting
like sandalwood
like marble.
Note: Caves in India containing beautiful murals.
chehraa ek phuul kii tarah shaadaab hai
chehraa uskaa hai yaa ko’ii mahtaab hai
chehraa jaise Ghazal, chehraa jaan-e-Ghazal
chehraa jaise kalii, chehraa jaise kaNval
chehraa jaise tasavvur kii tasviir bhii
chehraa ek Khvaab bhii chehraa tabiir bhii
[Her] face is like a fresh flower.
Is it her face or moon?
[her] face is like a Ghazal, [her] face is like heart of Ghazal
[her] face is like a bud, [her] face is like lotus
[her] face is like manifestation of imagination
[her] face is like a dream, and its interpretation too.
chehraa ko’ii alif lailavii daastaaN
chehraa ek pal yaqiiN, chehraa ek pal gumaaN
chehraa jaise ke chehraa ko’ii bhii nahiiN
maah-ruuh maah-ruuh
maah-jabiiN maah-jabiiN
[Her] face is like the tales of Alif Laila (note: Arabian nights).
One moment real, another moment imagination
[her] face is like no other face
[her] forehead is moonlike
so is her body.
aaNkheN dekhii to maiN dekhtaa rah gayaa
jaam do aur donon hii do aatishah
aankheN yaa maikade ke ye do baab haiN
aankheN inko kahuuN yaa kahuuN Khvaab haiN
aankheN niichii hu’iiN to hayaa ban gayiiN
aankheN uuNchii hu’iiN to du’aa ban gayiiN
aankheN jhuk kar uThiiN to adaa ban gayiiN
aankheN jin meN haiN qaid aasmaan-o-zamiiN
nargisii nargisii [like narcisus] surmayii surmayii [greysh]
I could not keep off my eyes after seeing her eyes
they are like two cups of wine and that too, burning
are these eyes or two doors of wine-house
her downward glance is abashness
her upward glance is prayer
when eyes look up after downward glance, is like a style
eyes, in which arrested are the sky and the earth
like Narcissus
[and] greyish
zulf-e-jaanaN kii bhii lambii hai daastaaN
zulf ke mere dil par hai parchaiiyaaN
zulf jaise ke ummRii hu’ii ho ghaTaa
zulf jaise ke ho ko’ii kaalii balaa
zulf uljhe to duniyaa pareshaan ho
zulf suljhe to yeh zeest asaan ho
zulf bikhre siyaah raat chhaane lage
zulf lahraaye to raat gaane lage
zulf zanjiir hai phir bhii kitnii hasiiN
reshmii reshmii [like silk] ambariiN ambariin [perfumed]
The story of the tresses of beloved is also long
tresses are like shadows on my heart
tresses are like over-cast clouds
tresses like some black spectre
when tresses are entangled, so also is the world
when tresses are straight, then writing this song becomes easy
when tresses spread apart then black night downs
when tresses sway then the night sings
tresses are chains, but so beautiful
silken
[and] perfumed
Many people, myself included when a child, have experienced this wonderful treatment which can be given by the mother or an auntie. It is really effective for kids who use to be nervous and easily irritated because they have not discovered the cozy benefits of the child sahaja meditation. Massaging the head of a little one will surely calm him down and even better when the head is accomodated on the laps of a caring adult. My auntie was perfect in giving me massage all the time i felt the need and I would have slept right away after few minuts. Hence it is also a very good method during the bed time or for resting. It is suggestable not to massage longer on the top ofthe head but on lateral sides and especially in the backpart which is corresponding to the nabhi chakra: stomach, liver and thinking activities. All these functions slowly come to a more relaxed end helping the child to slip into a sleepy mood quite comfortably.
