21-6-2024
Friday 21 June, the day of the summer solstice. The day when summer begins in the Netherlands. The International Day of Yoga. On which a big yoga gathering will also be held in Times Square in New York, as well as in other places around the world. And at St Albert's, too. So far, we ourselves have not done any yoga here. But in honour of International Yoga Day, we were asked to adopt an asana and photograph ourselves in that pose for a video, like many other College employees. Of course we did that. Fortunately, we were provided with some very simple poses.
This Friday, the day started at eight in the morning, as usual. First with the college anthem and the national anthem, for which everyone stood in the correct pose.
During the college anthem, everyone stands with their hands folded, arms down. For the national anthem, the arms are held straight beside the body. Since both songs are played one after the other, the difference in posture was clearly visible. But to be clear: this happens every morning. As students and teachers, as well as non-teaching staff, walk around the campus on their way to their classrooms, they stand still on the spot and stop what they are doing. They wait for the songs to end, sometimes singing along. Only then do they walk on and continue their activities. At six in the evening, only the national anthem sounds, for which everyone again stops what they are doing. People sitting down, stand up.
The anthems were followed by the usual words of welcome and thanks, which usually take at least 20 minutes. A yoga teacher from the Isha Foundation (of the immense Shiva statue and its temple) was invited as a special guest. Under his guidance, we did some meditation.
St. Albert's has a sports campus elsewhere in the city. Its students were involved in organising this occasion. Also studying at the College are recruits from various army units: navy, army and air force. On ordinary days, they are indistinguishable from the other students. But today, it was obvious that they were there. There was clapping with military precision and on command at the appropriate times. These students also gave the yoga demonstration this morning
In the afternoon, we had another class. This time we saw the first BBA group (two more next week). In the early evening, we were picked up by Father Shaiju, We went to Willingdon Island. This is an artificial island, created when the British dredged Kochi's natural harbour to accommodate larger ships. Few people live on the island itself. Some foreign dockworkers have a room there, and the navy has a large base there. However, this base is closed off from the rest of the island. It's situated on the original island to which the rest of the reclaimed land was added to give Willingdon Island the shape it has today. This base is home to one of Kochi's oldest churches, built around 1700 by the Portuguese.
Originally, Willingdon Island held Kochi International Airport, before it was rebuilt on the mainland. There are also some luxury hotels and resorts on Willingdon Island. One of these hotels, the Taj Malabar, is where India's president and prime minister stay when they are in Kochi. Since the Fathers Shaiju and Meltas Cacko Kollassery, from Stella Mari's church on the island, got a little uncomfortable with the idea of eating there, we drove to another hotel, the Caisino. All in all, we had a very enjoyable evening, with serious conversations, but also lots of laughter.
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