A Fleeting Glimpse of Sky Walkers

04 Nov 2011 Leave a comment

by Eva the Dragon in Food for the Mind - Books Tags: , , , , , ,

Sky Walkers in the Late Morning. Her head, eyes, nose and mouth are easy to see on her long tall body.There were 4 of them but 2 disappeared before I get my camera. It was so bright I could only point and click.

The body is your only home in the universe.

It is your house of belonging here in the world.  It is a very sacred temple.  To spend time in silence before the mystery of your body brings you toward wisdom and holiness.

Your body is in essence a crowd of different members who work in harmony to make your belonging in the world possible.  We should avoid the false dualism that separates the soul from the body.  The soul is not simply within the body hidden somewhere within its recess.  The truth is rather the converse.  Your body is in the soul, and the soul suffuses you completely.

Therefore all around you there is a secret and beautiful soul-light.

John O’Donohue

from Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom pg 48-49

When Snakes Could Fly

03 Nov 2011 2 Comments

by Eva the Dragon in Food for the Mind - Books, Stories from Far Away Lands - Travel Tags: , , , , , ,

Eve's Bible the Book

“I didn’t understand your Sphinx reference,” said Mojo  referring to Who was the Sphinx? .

Walker’s Encyclopedia’s cover  reminded me of who could rectify my error.   I turn to a real expert, Dr. Sarah Forth author of “Eve’s Bible: A Woman’s Guide to the Old Testament.”   She is a theologian whose specialty is the Old Testament.  (note: I added the images for the post.  If they are a bit incorrect blame me, not her.)

In her chapter When Snakes Could Fly, she writes “theacentric” (goddess-centered) civilizations throughout the Eastern Europe, the Near East and India portrayed the goddesses as snake and with snakes as well as bird women.”  These were more than mere fertility figures but “Goddesses of regeneration who were responsible for the entire cycle of life.”

Sumer’s religion “more than forty-five hundred years ago is among the oldest we know much about,” she writes.   But it was Egypt, “the Land Beyond the Rivers” that more directly influenced Israelite beliefs.”

Egypt had a PRE-history, before the dynastic pharaohs.  During this period, Wadjet represented by the cobra was the patron goddess of Buto an important “city” during the Neolithic period.  Her sister Nekhbet was a vulture.

Together they were called the Two Ladies.

Lower and Upper Egypt were combined and the two started to merge into one.

The Narmer Palette is thought to represent the unification of Upper and Lower Egypt.  Notice the intertwined serpent heads of the lions.  Wadjet was also associated with Bastet represented by a cat/lion.

3100BC Narmer Palette thought to depict unification of Upper and Lower Egypt

“Egyptian Snake Goddess Uatchet (I think Wadjet is the more common spelling) was both a woman and a large winged serpent.”

Human Headed Winged Cobra from King Tut's Tomb

Uraeus, a spitting snake, denoted both a goddess and a serpent.  “The Uraeus adorned the headdress of pharaohs for thousands of years.”

Uraeus On King Tut's Death Mask approx 1333BC

Over millennia societies changed from earth based religions and “serpents were demoted to servants of the gods, or worse, their enemies,” says Dr. Forth.

Slowly Wadjet became Isis.  Isis merged with the Great Goddess Hathor and became Horus’ mother instead of his sister.

Isis

In Christianity the most famous serpent enemy was the one in the Garden of Eden who tempted Eve to eat from “the tree of knowledge of good and evil” that Yhwh (God) had made off limits.  Because of this snake incident, the entire human history was changed.

According to Dr. Forth this story “remains the best example of the Israelite campaign against the snake-goddess.  Yhwh (God) reacted by cursing the serpent.”

Because you did this/More cursed shall you be/

Then all cattle/and all the wild beasts

On your belly shall you crawl / And dirt shall you eat/

All the days of your life. (Gen 3:14 JPS)

Dr. Forth writes “Assigning the serpent to crawl on its belly suggests that it had a previous mode of transport.  Wings perhaps?”

Gustav Moreau's Oedipus and the Sphinx located in the Metropolitan Museum of Art

By the time we get to Moreau’s 1864 Oedipus and the Sphinx we see the traces of the ancient goddess: Wadjet  the cat/lion, Nekhbet’s wings, and the female head all rolled into the Sphinx the “winged monster” Oedipus confronts.

Eve and the Serpent demonstrates the power of a good story.  In western civilization, Genesis chapter 3 chopped off the Goddess’ wings and completely changed her-story.

Happy Halloween – An Update

31 Oct 2011 1 Comment

by Eva the Dragon in Island Tales - Expatriate Living Tags: ,

Now - Rockin the Tomb

Ace informed me this evening, “Mom next Halloween you can save your money.  I am not going to dress up.”

My favorite holiday no more?  They grow up so quickly.

Then - Just a pack of cubs

Wanna Be My Chammak Challo?

30 Oct 2011 Leave a comment

by Eva the Dragon in Island Tales - Expatriate Living, When Dragons and Rabbits Make Me Laugh - Humor Tags: , , , ,

Ra.One at a theater near you

Ra.One now playing in 5 of the 7 cinemas in Bahrain.

If you missed the dance number for this sci-fi action comedy romance click here!

Shahrukh Khan & Kareena Kapoor in Chammak Challo Attire

Standing Out in Saudi Arabia

29 Oct 2011 5 Comments

by Eva the Dragon in Island Tales - Expatriate Living, Stories from Far Away Lands - Travel Tags: , , , , , , ,

Starbucks in Saudi Arabia. On the left with the chairs is the men's section. On the right behind the wood panel is the "family" section where women can go. During prayer everyone was asked to leave and the doors were locked.

“You live in Bah-rain,” the Saudi woman whispered Bahrain as if it were a dream, or Disneyland.  “You take my sons,” she declared.  “You take them Bahrain.  Learn English like you.”

I apologized to her saying I had three of my own children to care for and assured her that her husband was a wonderful father and provider for her family.  But this was not the first time a Saudi woman engaged me.

Because I don’t cover my hair, I stand out in Saudi Arabia.  Often when I sat alone, women veiled from head to toe in black approached me.  Sometimes we talked and sometimes they pulled out their phones and took a picture of us together.

To many Gulf citizens, Bahrain continues to maintain its 2300BC reputation.  The Sumerians wrote about Dilmun the ancient name of Bahrain.

“Blessed in Sumer…blessed is the land of Dilmun..

When he settled there, the first at Dilmun, the place where Enki settled with his wife,

this place (became) pure, this place is radiant.”

Although now Bahrain is connected to Saudi Arabia by a 16-mile bridge for many Saudi women Bahrain is still only a legend.

“At Dilmun, no crow cawed

The lion did not kill,

The wolf did not carry off the lamb…

No one with pain in their head said “My head hurts!”

No old woman said “I’m old!”,

“No old man said, “I’m old!”…..

People from every corner of the planet consider Bahrain to be an island paradise where they can dress, live and pray however they want.

In Bahrain, Mojo and I along with 700 other people similarly dressed attended the Think Pink Charity Fundraiser. Women's breast health was highlighted, donations were made and men and women danced together.

The Magic of Jo Malone

28 Oct 2011 5 Comments

by Eva the Dragon in Island Tales - Expatriate Living Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

Before leaving for dinner last night, I sprayed on Jo Malone’s Pomegranate Noir cologne.

Instantly I found myself transported to my friend Deborah’s guest bathroom one warm morning.  Next to the sink, she had set out Pomegranate Noir hand cream and cologne for her guests.  I softened my hands and sprayed my hair.  When I rejoined my three friends on the veranda, my essence enveloped everyone.

Deborah teased me, “I forget how much I love that scent.”

We laughed as we sat around her table under the fan, sipping Russian Caravan tea, telling about our most recent trips to Syria, Ireland and Oman and recounting stories of our mothers, fathers and children.

Living overseas is like a pomegranate.

You move to this entirely different land with its own smooth skin.   At first the round red orb is like a completely different planet, one you have never seen before.  Then after a bit of study and adjustment, you figure out how to peel the skin.  When you open the fruit inside you discover lots of different cultures, both expat and local.  Generally the people are quite interesting and before you know it, you find you have all these amazing friends from around the globe.  Each is packed with tiny, sweet stories about the lives they have led.  The richness of your time together stains your hands.  Just as pomegranate juice is known to keep us young, the memories of your expat years stay with you forever.

Then there’s the noir.

The Pomegranate Noir lingered on my pillow, waking me.  And in the blackness of the night, I began to think about my friend Deborah who returned to Australia last summer.   My rational brain knows being an expat means my friends will eventually go home or depart to new assignment in a new country.  We can stay in touch.  Someday I will visit her.

But still – my heart misses my amazing friend and I weep as I remember sitting together in her garden surrounded by palm trees and bougainvillea.

The Pomegranate Noir of expat life.

Who was the Sphinx? and other interesting questions

27 Oct 2011 3 Comments

by Eva the Dragon in Food for the Mind - Books, The Most Interesting Roosters - People Tags: , , , , , ,

The Woman's Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets by Barbara G. Walker

If you ever sat down to eat your lunch and “just” took a peek at your friend’s new photos on Facebook, then looked up and saw it was dinner time, you understand the genius of Facebook.

Before Facebook and Wikipedia, there was a genius named Barbara G Walker.  When I open her book The Woman’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets, I find the hours have disappeared as I jump around exploring such things as Montanism, to Cybele, to Antaea. Then I discover when witches were carried to prison their feet were not allowed to touch the ground.  Why Not?

Answer: So they could not get power from the earth ie, Mother Earth.

In the 1960s journalist Barbara G. Walker began investigating the disappearance of a Goddess.  No one seemed to why the Goddess no longer starred in ceremonies or why no one wrote rave reviews about her anymore.  Occasionally close observers noticed her small cameo appearance in books and films.  For twenty-five years, Barbara Walker sifted through the clues to see if she could write a story about her.  Walker discovered the Goddess existed only censured by centuries of patriarchy.

In 1983 The Woman’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets was completed. Walker wrote about all the clues she found: 1,350 entries on magic, witchcraft, fairies, elves, giants, goddesses, gods, and psychological anomalies such as demonic possession; the mystical meanings of sun, moon, earth, sea, time, and space; ideas of the soul, reincarnation, creation and doomsday; ancient and modern attitudes toward sex, prostitution, romance, rape, warfare, death and sin, and more.   Then she linked and cross referenced ideas, religious traditions and people across centuries.

By opening The Women’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets your mind will be introduced to perspectives and ideas never discussed in a classroom or in Bible study.  And you will know why some libraries have banned the book.  If this encyclopedia wets your appetite, you can read one of her eleven other books about myths, symbols, crystals, tarot, spirituality and rituals.

Or if you knit, you can join her fan club at the Walker Treasury Project.  A woman of multiple talents, she wrote 13 books on knitting including the renowned “Treasury of Knitting Patterns”.

I have never met Barbara G. Walker but I would love to.  Born in Philadelphia in 1930, Walker read the King James Bible as a teenager.  “She decided the Bible “sounded cruel. A God who would not forgive the world until his son had been tortured to death–that did not strike me as the kind of father I would want to relate to.”

Walker obviously thinks for herself and has enough confidence to say this idea does not resonate with my soul so I better look at it more closely.  She displays all of her human complexity and allows herself to be passionate about many things: writing, researching, atheism, knitting, humanism, social criticism, social work and dance.  Just like the Goddess she searched for, today, Walker the person is a bit elusive.  She lets her work be her legacy.

Facebook is criticized for revealing too much minutia about people’s personal lives and Wikipedia carries warnings about its lack of authoritative sources yet people “go to” both of them if they want to find out something.  Opponents criticize Barbara Walker for the quality of the information and her feminist bias.   But her bibliography is 15 pages and her cross-referencing is fantastic.

Just like I use Wikipedia for a quick answer to a question or Facebook to find someone, Walker’s encyclopedia is a go-to source if you want to begin to explore anything about women’s spiritual or mythic history.  And 30 years after its first printing, HarperCollins reissued the book with an updated cover proving the Goddess is still in demand.

Whether banned, criticized or lauded, I love it and always find something that makes me say “Now that’s interesting.”

Hvov, “The Earth” an Iranian form of Eve.  Zoroaster’s followers called her Mother of All Living.  Known in India as Jiva or Ieva.

Hmmmm that’s interesting.

Oh yes, the Sphinx.  Look up the Great Goddess Hathor and compare to Oedipus and the Sphinx.

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