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PORT-OF-SPAIN, TRINIDAD, March 4, 2008: From 1838 to 1917, Indians were brought from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar as indentured laborers to the Caribbean islands. In addition to their work ethic, they brought with them the culture and religious practices of Hinduism with the Ramayana, Siva Puranas and the Bhagvad Gita among the several religious texts found in their “jhaji bundle”. Today’s 300,000 Hindus in Trinidad and Tobago will join the millions of Hindus worldwide worshipping Lord Siva on Siva’s Great Night, Sivaratri, on March 5.

Maha Sivaratri (Great Night of Shiva) is a major festival celebrated every year on the 13th night/14th day in the Krishna Paksha of the month Maagha in the Hindu Calendar. The most significant practices on this day are offerings to Lord Siva, fasting and all night long vigil. During Mahasivaratri, devotees meditate on Siva as the Absolute and on the deeper meanings of Sivalingam worship.

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LONDON, UK, February 20, 2008: An American team has found that being unable to control anger can make you four times more likely to have a slow recovery, according to a study published in the journal Brain Behavior and Immunity.

To see if anger would hold back wound healing, the team conducted a study with 98 participants who had agreed to receive standardized blister wounds, inflicted by a vacuum pump on their non-dominant forearm.

Anger control was assessed using a standard scale.

“not all participants responded in the same way to this standardized stressor. Those who had low anger control secreted more cortisol, associated with delayed healing,” says researcher Jean-Philippe Gouin. People with low control over the expression of their anger were 4.2 times more likely to take longer to heal, compared to those with higher levels of anger control.

The authors state that these stress-induced delays in healing could increase the susceptibility to infection at the wound site and result in longer hospital stays.

You can read the article http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?view=DETAILS&grid=&xml=/earth/2008/02/20/scianger120.xml .

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TAMIL NADU, INDIA, March 4, 2008: New books. Used books. All books are welcomed by two institutions in the deep south of India. When Hinduism Today editorial staff was traveling in Tamil Nadu in February, we were taken to several stellar schools and libraries. One school, the Chinmaya Vidalaya in Rajapalayam, India, has over 700 students on the campus (and a 750-year-old Baobab tree!)

The students sat on mats, all in uniform and more disciplined than you’re likely to see anywhere in the West these days. They listened to Satguru Bodhinatha Veylanswami give a talk under a giant tree. The principles shared their lack of text books, and appealed to us to have any and all texts sent to them.

Specifically, they need K to 12 texts on all subjects: biology, history, math, science, English, you name it. They can use one book, or up to 36 for a room. This is a dynamic educational institution, with negligible access to good learning tools. If you are interested in helping, or know someone who has access to books not being used, please contact: S.S. Ramachandra Raja at vgr_mci@sancharnet.in or mcirjpm@sancharnet.in

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A poor devotee points to the sky and says, God is up there. An average devotee says, God dwells in the heart as the Inner Master. The best devotee says, God alone is and everything I perceive is a form of God.
   Ramakrishna