Just got back from a week in Delhi visiting our project there. The project is in its fourth year and offers English classes to some of the poorer communities in the East of the city. This year Amida chaplain, Sahishnu has two volunteers with her. Kaspalita and I travelled out on Monday a week ago. We spent most of our time visiting the different classes, held in different Buddhist temples around the area. Some were for children, some for young women, and others for mixed adults. They tended to be very interactive with lots of word games and singing. On Sunday the visit culminated with a school admission ceremony for ten people in Shanti Nagar, a district just over the border in Uttar Pradesh. This group has been meeting with Sahishnu for a couple years to practice Buddhism and its members have become particularly interested in our form of Pureland and wanted to become part of our group. You can see photos of our visit on my facebook site
Among those joining the school was Shiv Kumar Gautam
who has been a very active supporter of the project in his local community. At the ceremony he also received the Buddhist name Suvidya. The community from Shanti Nagar presented us with a lovely picture of the Buddha teaching the five ascetics. In this picture you see Kaspar and I seated with Suvidya in his home.