One woman’s journey of helping to create the new society.
Written 2023
I came to India in 1974 looking for a Guru like so many other young people at that time. I was drawn to India when in Singapore I was staying in a Sikh temple and awoke to a bustling crowd of Sikh women all dressed in beautiful colorful clothing.They were cooking food and tea in many huge cauldrons for the feast to celebrate their Guru’s birthday, and I became part of this. I was delighted and fell in love with India.
I was staying in Pondy, where I lived for a year. Here I befriended a young Indian man. Every day he read a canto of Savitri to me with a deep rich voice that penetrated into my soul and opened me to the journey of my life. We would walk out to Auroville quite often and slowly befriended some Aurovilians. Very soon I knew this was my true home, as I felt more and more the immense embrace of the rarified atmosphere of Auroville and felt a deep and lasting gratitude to Mother and Sri Aurobindo for creating Auroville. I decided to return to Australia and prepare to move to Auroville. I returned in 1977.
From the beginning I became highly motivated to DO, as there was so much to be done. It was in the very beginning of the manifestation. There was a powerful feeling, a movement of drawing Auroville, the invisible city, out of a dream state onto the land.
A group of us began the cycle paths, as there was an urge to be off the roads that were very dusty. I ended up the last survivor of the original small team who wanted to see them built. And to this day I am still working on them.
We created a waste management system which became Ecoservice. Houses, schools and kindergartens were built. Farms were started to grow food for Auroville.
Everyone was planting trees for their garden and forests to protect the land from the burning sun.
I was drawn to working in Kuilapalayam village, as there were big settlements of Auroville interspersed in that area. There were no toilets at all in the whole village, and it was very unsanitary. So I built several public toilets and slowly introduced private toilet schemes funded by the local government. Then the garbage developed and added to the chaos. Nothing has really developed that has been sustainable in the village, as time has shown it requires a large amount of money to establish something that can last. I have developed a project waiting for funding.
Slowly over fifty years, there emerged a Vibrant Sustainable Microcosm of a new society built with good will from the people who came with their skills and lives.
Aurovilians have been woven together into a tapestry of care and love and faith and joy that can and will endure.
By Gillian