A Nightmare of a ceremony , A Warning from the Medicine Buddha,

Back in 98 I was training Kung fu regularly with a Chinese Master who is also a Buddhist teacher of the True Buddha School. One day he called me and said he needed some rubber ink stamps, the old fashioned type with individual letters that you assemble into words to create the stamp.
My teacher didn't often ask me to do things for him so I knew he expected it to be done.I thought it would be easy task to complete because I knew my mother had set of rubber stamps just like he wanted and I could borrow them. So I said "sure no problem" and promptly called my Father who said he would put them in the post. A Few weeks later the stamps had not arrived, and my teacher came to me very angry and said I told you to get me those stamps.He was unusually angry.So I called my Father, and asked about them, my Father was irritated and said why are you bothering me about this when your Mother is ill. I had not known she was ill and it transpired she was very ill , so made arrangements to go home to visit her. (The stamps were never mentioned again). I stayed a few days spoke to her and we agreed I would return to London that weekend for a Medicine Buddha ceremony.(she was quite a religious person)
The ceremony was in a different space to usual , a hired space. There was visiting Master.It was a logistical nightmare to set up the space for the event.The event started late and the visiting Master insisted on chanting the "Medicine Buddha" mantra endlessly , as he did so the letters spelling the name of the Medicine Buddha above the shrine began to fall of the wall.My teacher looked extremely concerned.The event overran causing issues with venue and to top it all it was pouring with rain as we had to pack everything up.When we finally all got back to our Temple space and after we had unpacked the van.We were all standing with our teacher who turned to us and said , "What an absolute nightmare! I have never been to a Buddhist ceremony like that.Even the letters fell of the wall! Something very bad is going to happen!"
At that precise moment the phone rang it was my Father to let me know my mother had taken a turn for the worst and did have long to live.I returned on the train to see see her that evening and she died a couple of days later.

Mr K's Nghtmare - The Old School House (Part 2)

 

Back in about 94/95 when when i was deep into the Ldn Acid Techno scene i went to two parties about a month apart in a old old school house in north London. The main room sounds were supplied by the Liberator Djs and Dj Aztek among others. A friend of mine D.C. was playing house and "dope beats" in the chill out room. These parties were memorable for a host of reasons. In addition to the music and the hedonism, there were some awesome looking "Sabrettes" in the house, The decor was minimal and Tribal . Hung from the rafters in main room was a large wooden sculpture of a pterodactyl.

In  Part 1 I wrote about the sense of group telepathy and communion ,experienced at some of the early raves, described by Terrance Mckenna as a "trance state" evoked by the music, dance an urban ritual,  at times akin to shamanism . These two parties at the old school house were memorable in all those respects ,the highs and the ultimate low was immense.

I've blogged elsewhere about these parties in relation to the "Maya" and "Dreams becoming reality" with my friends, Kris G, and Snooze. It was also at one of these parties as I sat in thd chill room that I had a conversation with an Arabic looking skinhead who told me about the Optimist Creed and showed me his "ohm" tattoo.
Another vivid memory at one of these parties was seeing a young child at a rave playing with his toy drum , it gave me a new perspective on the idea of psychic youth and was around that time I first saw the film Akira. In fact the flyers to these parties reminded me of Akira's jacket in the  film.
I think it was these parties that led me to  MegaTripolis, Nuclear Free Zone and Zero Gravity
But it all came to a frightful end as at the height of the second party some unfortunate fellow was destined to meet his maker and to quote Mr Kirk's nightmare again "He died of an overdose," . I was dancing next to him when he had a seizure. I felt an intense energy rush as he has the seizure and a distortion of time light and sound. Till this day I've never really talked about it, (I probably should have, I found it quite traumatic to experience death up close in such a heightened sensory environment.) The ambulance arrived and the rave ended abruptly. Everyone who attended had to give our names to the Police as we left the party. In fact I remember someone saying as we left  they didn't know  how the rave ever happened as the police station was just the other side of the road.

Mr K's Nightmare (part 1) Club Telepathy

Back in my early twenties when I was first awakening to the phenomena of synchronicity, I found it at times quite exhilarating but also at times quite scary.There were times when I felt I had unlocked latent psychick/magical powers including among others telepathy.

This period coincided with me being quite immersed in early rave culture.There were a number of events at raves, some of which have become the stuff of urban legend which opened my eyes to the dark side of synchronicity. One was "DJ Rap's" story of "Mr Kirk's Nightmare" at "Club Telepathy" So the story goes... DJ Rap was booked to play Club Telepathy (which was located a stones throw from where I lived at Clays Lane/Temple Mills) On the night in question decided to play the tune "Mr Kirk's Nightmare" which was popular in the scene at the time. It depicts a police officer speaking to a father with the vocal "I'm sorry Mr Kirk your Son is dead" In DJ Rap's account at the precise moment she dropped the vocal, there was fatal shooting at the door of the club" this synchronicity deeply affected her.
I too have experienced death at a Rave which deeply affected me. The event of which I detail in Part 2

One of the things I loved at early raves was the sense of empathy , communion and connection experienced (which Terrance McKenna described as a group telepathy in the track re-evolution which he did with the Shamen )
This communion brought me many highs, but the same increased sense of connection can be quite devastating when experienced in connection with death and or the oppressive nature of the police state when faced with perceived insurrection as documented by the Spiral Tribe

Kano / Kane / Caine

Kano - Japanese Jujitsu / Judo

Kano (M.C.)

Citizen Kane - Orson Welles

J Saul Kane

Caine

Superhero's , Owls and The Samurai

A couple of weeks ago I purchased three books as "lockdown reading" . The first "Our Gods Wear Spandex by Christopher Knowles is about the similarities and connections between modern superheros and the Gods of ancient mythology. Chris Knowles is a synchromystic and is referenced in the second book "The Messengers - Owls synchronicity and the UFO abuductee" by Mike Clelland. It was Chris who made me aware of Mikes book having commented on some observed of the sychronicity  connecting  individuals who had experiences with UFO's and whose mother's had an interest in Owls .

 
I finished "The Messengers" and went to change my facebook avatar from the image of an owl on the front cover. I thought there was no connection with the third book, "The Book of Five Rings by Miyamoto Musashi - 

 I looked for my goto image of a White Rabbit Samurai ,  The Ronin "Usagi Yojimbo"     from "The teenage mutant ninja turtles" this character was based on Miyamoto Usashi . I was surprised to find a few months ago I had downloaded (but never used) a slightly different image of Usagi, accompanied by an OWL! - it seemed the perfect fit; a Comic book hero , an Owl and a Samurai.

Kalachakra - Father Time

Kalachakra

Father Time

Mahakala - Dharma Protector

A year or so ago a family member, became ill so my wife went to look after her.When my wife arrived at her home ,my Kung Fu Master (a Buddhist) who had been looking after her her said "The cause of the illness was at least partly spiritual" He gave her a Mahakala amulet to wear and mantra to say for protection from the spirit he believed was attacking her.We decided to take her to our house for a few days, he said to me you should do the protection too as the demons may now attack you.We went home that evening and the next morning I went to the hairdressers (forgetting about the protection advice) as I got out of my car, two dodgy lads who were drinking whisky in the street came up to me and said "nice car give us the keys" in a threatening way.I was in no mood to hand over my keys and prepared to defend myself. At that moment my hairdresser who was watching the incident came into the street and once it was 2 on 2 they thought better of it.

Recently the Drum and Bass producer "om unit" from Bristol released the
Mahakala trilogy