A week after our Artisans And Ashrams group graduated and our adventures ended, Caroline and I are still in Nepal extending and assimilating what we learned with our fellow Dragons. We are eating dal bhat as well as global foods. I am wearing my......Read More
Each of us on this trip almost didn’t come. It was a detour from our normal flow. But we plunged in anyway and every day has held unexpected great adventures like a first run on a complex and fascinating river. We’ve used the metaphor of......Read More
I love Nepal as much for the incredible ice melting grins and faces lined with life spirit as for it’s top of the world mountains. Cameras don’t do justice. A joke, a toothy ear to ear grin or just deep lines of life like rings on an......Read More
Often times Nepal is just plain beautiful. No words. Except maybe a gasp and ‘very good’ – Ektam Ramro....Read More
I’m so appreciative of my fellow Dragons on this trip! As years pass, I’m generally more aware of the fascinating & unique fruit of which each human being seems to consist once they are peeled to whats deeper and beneath. It’s......Read More
We can barely believe that our time at the ashram has already nearly come to an end. We have meditated, chanted and practiced yoga. We have learned about subjects as diverse as philosophy, organic farming and Nepali dancing. We have avidly discussed......Read More
Just inside the western rim of Kathmandu Valley we’ve joined a Ashram perhaps confirming my parents worst fears short or me joining the circus. We learned to spool pashmina, were schooled in chipati-making by young experts, ate in silence,......Read More
A highlight of our homestay time is the opportunity to live and study with a Newari master artisan. Punya-ji comes from a long line of metalworkers and jewelry makers his workshop and business provide a rhythm of family life, with his wife Reena......Read More
My host “older brother” was born in this house (pictured) like his father was. He played marbles on the ground, joined his father to make offerings to the Buddha statue behind him, and ran around with his friends to temples everywhere in......Read More
The whole group has settled into their homestays and dived straight in to their independent study projects with master artisans. Some students are learning the meditative art of paubha painting, others are crafting jewelry from silver and precious......Read More
Independent Study Project (ISP)...Read More
Sometimes the universe aligns and we don’t know why. Divine intervention? Karma? Dharma? Unbelievable accident? Whatever the cosmology, whether plausible or not, it really does happen occasionally. In this picture I am standing next to my......Read More
Our first few days in Nepal have been packed full of amazing learning experiences. We learned about Buddhism from a Tibetan khenpo in Boudha and about Hinduism from Gorakhnath Babas in Pashupati. We have explored the markets in Ason and the back......Read More
Sometimes the word brush is inadequate to the task of recreating a master scene so rich, so unusual, and so detailed that witnesses require all senses to comprehend let alone to convey to others. Today was such a day. We began with life maps, Nepali......Read More
Orientation ends amidst oil lamp light and Bodhnath Stupa. We are fully in it now! Ommmmmmm…...Read More
Whoa here I am in Nepal 31 years after my last visit! For reals. At first I was excited about rediscovering a country and people I loved that first time. How would I see it differently so many years later? Then as we drove at night from......Read More
