hare krishna is for lovers

When Laura and I decided our next location was going to be the EcoYoga Park, just outside of Buenos Aires, we looked forward to a couple weeks of meditation, yoga and healthy eating. Little did we know that it was run by strict Hare Krishnas. Or that we would meet some of the most wonderful, crazy characters I had yet to know...

We were greeted warmly by the director, Thakur, a skinny, joyful man with high energy and big teeth. He was always a gracious host, serving us second and third helpings of squash every night in the dinningroom drapped in orange cloths and spotted black with flies.

The Park has a garden filled with vegetables and herbs that contributes to about 80% of the park's delicious vegetarian cooking. We do a lot of weeding and harvesting (both for our kitchen and to sell in town), preparing seedbeds and watering plants. Our jefe Maria is a sassy little 5 foot nothin Bolivian who loves the drama. You barely notice the hole in her mouth where teeth used to be with her vibrant smile and hearty laugh, too big to come out of such a little thing.
I also got a chance to work outside the garden on a mosaic border for a beautiful white dome-shaped temple placed in the middle of the park. This trulli looks like something you would need a magic carpet to get to and serves as our yoga and meditation shelter.
My most memorable day of work however, would be working on the sustainable adobe hut. The outside needed its final layer of -nothing other than- cow dung. Yup, whole lotta poop. Splattering feces on walls seemed like something people do only in insane asylyms, but I was eager to lend a hand.
Luciano, one of the newest members to the Hare Krishna community (and the sexiest), used his bare hands to mix the poopers. (I was still attracted)
At only 18 years old and totally untouchable, all the girls couldn't help but want to touch him.

The Hare Krishnas are totally celebate though. Celebatism as well as vegetarianism, mediation, and chanting are the main focuses of their religion. They don't use garlic or onion in the kitcken because it apparently stimulates the pleasure chakras. and when I spilled something in my room and tried to grab the kitchen mop, one of the Madres told me I couldnt bring that mop into the bedrooms because it has 'different energies'. The men have completely shaved heads, except for a little tuft of pony-tail sticking out of the back of their head and wear safron saris and the women, or the 'madres' wear long, beautiful braids and dress in white saris.

At first I didn't understand the religion because it seems to try and avoid earthly pleasures at every expense (the men even sleep on the floor rather than a bed). I couldnt understand because as far as I am concerned, I am trying to seek out as much pleasure in this life as possible.

However, after witnessing a big festival where a guru from Germany and 200 Hare Krishnas came from all over Argentina to celebrate a wedding and a nameing ceremony, I began to see the joy their religion gives them. They receive their pleasures purely from within and the energy of their God, Krishna. It is a lifestyle that is too strict for me, but I have taken a lot away from them.
For instance, I have decided to become vegetarian. And it was hard at first because meat is effing delcious. Are you kidding me? I love my burgers. But I just started to meditate on all the reasons why I'm doing it before deciding what to eat and its only gotten easier. My body feels alive and full of energy and my concious is a little clearer with mama nature. I'll spare ya'll the rant though. Just don't talk about McChickens or I might start to tweak...

With all this spirituality goin on, we were still able to find us some craziness with the wonderful group of volunteers gathered. First of all there was Renee, a fiesty bald black woman who serves as a never ending form of entertainment. She is full of self-declared "crazy", and we all agree. I have literally peed my pants and shed tears listening to her stories and contagious laughter. Aunty Nee Nee, as we call her out of pure love, serves as quite the contradiction as she is a professional psychotherapist and newly atuned Reiki master on a spiritual journey that started in India; yet also shares maybe a little too much about her sexual deviant episodes and general "freaky-deaky-ness". Ying and mothalovin Yang, right there.
Her classic, " I don't trust myself with a gun- I'm too crazy!!" managed to work with just about anything and we continuously entered such things as "I dont trust myself with a horse/towel/ slave- I'm too crazy!!"

Jonathon, an ex-Cali frat boy we called JT Boomtang, served as her partner in crime, always pointing out just how crazy what she just said was. Half Jewish, half Mexican, all beard, he was a wonderful combination of soul and sexual energy, providing us with some hilarious original songs such as "sexual yoga" and an ode to the most beautiful of the madres at the Park, Govinda. He shed his astronomy knowledge on me, teaching me about Stardust Valley and the Solar Plexius. (Damn my gullibility)
An English bloke from England, George, and his girlfriend Suzanne, are also lovely people. George served as head of the sing-a-longs at our late night 'dark house' parties where we snuck in vino a couple times after the Hare Krishnas went to bed. He was probably the most hilarious man I have ever met with a genius wit- turning every situation hilarious with his constant, insane mind flow. Infamous for his drunken night of quoting "You're so fucking beautiful you don't even know it" repeatedly while trying to make out with everyone, I have a special place in my heart for George. Suzanne is his polar opposite, and probalby his sanity, and the sweetest thing you'd ever meet. With giant feet, she is my sole mate.
Then there was Martin. Bless him. Also from England, Martin was the most chilled out person I've ever met. Dude has taken his fair share of drogas and is basically perma-stoned, with a voice just above a whisper in a monotone voice, occassionaly busting out a good-hearted "BOOMTANG!" to express the joy that resides permanantely in his soul. He always wants to "take it to the next level" and "fly high above the mountains".
Poor guy has a flesh-eating bacteria in his right arm that he refers to lovingly as 'the Beast' and views it as the closest he will get to experiencing a child growing in his womb. He is the gentlest soul I have ever met and I would love to be able to transport myself to a couch with him and his two cats, jermimah and tiddlewinks, whenever I feel a moment of distress.
Then there was Katherine, my soul sister, from England. At only 20 years old, girlfriend is such a wise soul and source of inspiration, helping me to cleanse the body of impurities through fasting, resparking my desire to learn the guitar, how to crochet and to embrace the individualism of my off-tune singing voice.
I am so thankful for each and everyone of these people and the forming of this strange family. They have forever left a mark on my life and I can only hope that our paths will cross again one day.

During the Boomtang Revolution of course.