Author Archives: Ursula It has been said that you can not count the number of deities in the Hindu cosmology. And while, technically, they are all manifestations of One Supreme Being, it does make for a lot of festivals and religious observances. Of course, some gods – and festivals – are more important than others. Chhath Pūjā, also known as Dala […]  The writers at the Lonely Planet call it: “one of the world’s most spectacular coastal drives”. They are not wrong. Officially starting in Torquay, gateway to Victoria’s “Surf Coast”, and hugging the rugged coastline along the Southern Ocean for 243 kilometres (151 miles) to Allansford, just outside the Victorian regional centre of Warrnambool, The Great Ocean Road is worthy of its listing […]  February 14th was a special day this year: there was a full moon. Across Western countries, the fourteenth was Valentine’s Day, that most romantic celebration of love, or most cynical expression of consumerism, depending on your perspective. In North America, the full moon was the “Snow Moon”, named for the heavy snowfalls February usually brings. In Theravada Buddhist countries, the […]  Is there anything more magical than flight? … being transported through the air by an overweight contraption that somehow lifts itself (and you) into space? … watching graceful machines do impossible acrobatics high overhead? I love airplanes. I love their shiny, reflective surfaces; their lines and curves. While I know almost nothing about the actually mechanics of lift […]  What an amazing place Bagan must have been in its heyday! “Bagan is a gilded city alive with tinkling bells and the swishing sounds of monks’ robes” – attributed to Marco Polo‘s late-12th-century account. Probably founded in the mid-to-late 9th, the city was the political, economic and cultural capital of the Pagan Empire for 250 years, and would […] |
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