Minutes of General Meeting on Auroville Water Maintenance Service to clear out the dead point on the unit(or service???) closure, splitting assets...In the goodwill of all present resident, with the reminder of Residents Assembly Service before the beginning to keep it to the agenda which was (except little outburst of "washing the laundry") kept at most of the time, the meeting was steered in real process of work - collective yoga. Result is a suggestion that last existing team along with Marcus and Dirk find the proposal for the new AWMS. Read more

Featured are minutes of yesterday's General Meeting at Unity Pavilion in International Zone which was very well attended. Proposed agenda was about Working Committee sharing agenda points fro the upcoming Governing Board, which they have received from the Secretary's office : 1. process for procedure for selection of WC. 2. suggestions on term&mandated for the WC. 3.process&procedure for constituting various working groups of the RA.4. suggestions on securing land for the Master Plan&manifesting the city. That agenda was impossible to keep. Read more

Featuring recordings are of yesterday's one day workshop on the research on the 12 qualities and their practical implication in the relationship with those who come to Auroville - tourist, guests, volunteers, newcomers at Unity Pavilion in International Zone. Participants, of which all are on daily basis in contact with all those who come to Auroville by different reasons and purposes, sincerely dedicated their time to explore and go through 12 qualities without looking for problems or solutions but merely searching for a useful tool. Read more

Yesterday's General Meeting called by a group of Aurovillians concerned about the work of Working Committee, facilitated by RAS in Unity Pavilion has attracted many. Politics in its worst to some, struggle for power ,and who got control, or what it is perceived by some to opposite of what we might expect from working groups...what are spiritual core vision and values of Auroville. All those questions and some particular answers were given to the table, and a call of many for a transparency and sincere service to the community with interactions Read more

Extract of an interactive session within Steps Ahead, Sri Aurobindo Centre for Studies-India and the World (Bharat Nivas) held yesterday at Unity Pavilion in International Zone. Interesting session where the discussion revolved around the present state of the International Zone and the possible courses of action. Most participants  were active members either of pavilion groups of core group of International Zone. They expressed dissatisfaction with the speed of the development. Read more

After electrical fire two week back at the rooms of the Entry Service in Town Hall, the facilities are already restored, and beside only missing fans things work as usual. As members of the Entry Service Team explains it was due to the quick response of the several working teams as ACUR, Blue Light, BCC and Electrical Service, moral and enthusiastic support , and understanding of many that they have been able to return to their work in merely a week after the fire. Read more

Second part of informative session on if and how Auroville would become a World Heritage Site under UNESCO. Gathered residents yesterday clearly expressed many doubts, and over all was the tone that we still don't know enough to take a clear decision if YES or NO. Decision making process supposed to start this Friday, and end in two week. The fact is that Auroville needs to consolidate and protect the land of the master plan, where green belt is of huge importance. The question would be which price are we prepare to pay? Read more

This morning within Sustainable Habitats Workshops under the umbrella of Auroville Green Practices, and organized by Auroville Consulting, Toine has started with brief introduction of Auroville. Small number of participants, mainly architects will deepen their knowledge on sustainability in the next few days, while the lectures and workshops will be going on on different locations, until Friday. This morning Suhasini was talking on principles of design and evaluation processes of architecture in Auroville and other cities. Read more

The purpose of yesterdays's General Meeting at Unity Pavilion in International Zone was basically to explain the criteria on which a site can be on the tentative list for applicants for the World Heritage Site at UNESCO. Luigi and Toine have done that, which was followed by the discussion. It is inevitable for development to happen in the area, and the increased flow of the tourist has started to burden Visitor Centre and city itself already. Yet the biggest concern residents has expressed yesterday was how much more that would increase if Read more

To whoever that has came to Town Hall early this morning was obvious that something isn't really right , no power, no sound of generator... people gathering at Le Morgan..."Entry Service Burnt Down" where the calls and surprises, and joke followed. Following is a short interview with Kripa, member of Entry Service, explaining the cause of the fire, which has occurred around 5am. Electrical sockets took fire, which melted the wiring, computers melted ... but team is positive; Kripa says "Like the Fenix we will would be re born out the ashes" Read more

At Auroville Bamboo Research Centre they've organized bamboo construction workshop for 1st years students of DY.Patil College of Architecture, Navi, Mumbai. 85 students have managed to construct a dome out of bamboo, were making instruments, toys, chair, geometrical dome and yurt, they did get to know many facts about incredible values/qualities of bamboo. Following is the interview with three of them- Mallika, Prateek and Vini. Each of them is full of enthusiasm over bamboo, and its uses...Nick talks on organizational part of the workshop. Read more

ONE BILLION RISING - is an invitation to a dance, invitation of new way of being, of an unique contribution of women, of sustainable life ... to both women and men, says Irena while inviting all of us to join the billion of those who would be celebrating that day with a dance to raise the awareness on violence toward women. Statistics proves that one billion of women on our planet do not receive any love but abuse in different ways. V -Day movement started about 20 years ago by Eve Ensler as work on reconciliation between women and men

Recently published video Crownways in which they have tried to catch up the idea of dreamcatcher from 2007 on crown road, when money was donated to build it. As David explains this video is there to see the richness of ideas if one goes to collaborative process; the video is there for archive purposes. The idea to start developing the area from Solar Kitchen towards Central Guest house was never set to be a finish product, it was mere an alternative in supposed collaborative processes when it comes to the town planning. Read more

Joint interactive workshop of L'Avenir d'Auroville and Resident Assembly Service at Unity Pavilion was called for the purpose for community to come together and discuss on which guidelines we should all agree to be undertaken when one is about to start to build. After Helene's presentation with some examples of exercises participants have divided in smaller groups to find the possible suggestions for future guidelines in building. Recording are minutes of HElen's presentation and some outcomes of the workshop. Read more

Helen, a volunteer from UK, participates at L'Avenir d'Auroville, and is an expert in decision processes, talks on the guidelines. On Monday 28th of January at Unity Pavilion in International Zone between 4 to 7pm she with Elvira, member of RAS will facilitate the workshop for the community to develop building guidelines. Those should be simple, clear, more transparent yet basic, clearly expressing of what the community wants in the building application processes. That would be the first review of the application process after 25 years.

 

Musical Offering of Russian Singing Bells at Matrimandir Amphitheater organized by Vera, Ashesh and Matrimandir Team was perfect for the start of the New Year 2013. The night before the scene at Matrimandir was completely different - darkness with candle lighted Banyan tree, and opened Inner Chamber, but full of silent prayers, expectations. Sunny afternoon with chirping birds, flying over our heads, footsteps, and soft whisper of children all immersed by Light of the sound of Russian Singing Bells telling story, joyfully for the new beginning Read more

Urban Planning Graduate Students from Queen's University in Ontario, Canada presented at Multimedia Center in Town Hall results of their exploration and workshop done in past ten days. The student's project was focused on public spaces on the Crown Road from Solar Kitchen toward Arka. Ten students summarized all their findings, and clearly presented some guidelines and recommendations deriving out of their observations and specifically of Auroville as a social space on its own. Read more

Hillary and Nicholas, two of ten visiting Urban Planning graduate students from Queen's University, Toronto, Canada talk on their project: "International Studio". Within a short two weeks they will try to gather as much input as they can, in order to create a proposal for public space implementation guidelines for the Crown Road. Today they will share with the community a workshop at 3:30pm at Afsaneh's Guesthouse; they hope for as much interaction as possible. On Thursday 19th at 5 pm they will present their proposal.

On Saturday at Arka was the second meeting on affordable housing topic with a bit more than handful of participants. Two short presentations on possibilities in the range of affordable housing were shown by Gilles Boulanger and Krishan. In depth were discussed possible reasons for the pumped up prices of costs per square meter of either individual houses or flats. Out of all was given a practical option to start with the "pool" to collect finances for housing in order to foster the housing available for all, more align with Auroville spirit. Read more

Following are the minutes of yesterdays Values&Priorities Meeting on Success Team Meeting. The Action Teams - Participatory Planning, Affordable Housing, Entry, Economy, Violence and disobedience of the accepted rules in Auroville presented what actions has been taken at their team for the last two weeks. At the same time need for more action teams was expressed by participants, and those were added to the list. Since the presentations, and raised questions have taken most of the time there was no time left to work in the groups. Read more

After months of discussing, and trying to make sense of what the community really value, and where do we want to go on collective level-which should be our priorities, yesterdays meeting brought lots of positivism. Despite rain shower the number of present residents was high, participants eager to start with the work. After short introduction by RAS members Jesse and Elvira, groups were around the tables with chosen topics - affordable housing, entry, participatory planning, economy, and violence in Auroville&disobedience of decisions. Read more

After a long selection process by the Selection Committee, names of the new L'Avenir d'Auroville Town Development Council were announced to the community. At the General Meeting at Unity Pavilion in the International Zone residents had the chance to meet most of the new members. The introduction was set up to allow each of the residents to interact with the team, by asking questions to set precedence on certain issues. It was clear that residents request most of all clear communication and interaction from the new team. Read more

Values and Priorities meeting no.6 facilitated by Residents Assembly Service was set up for topic of planning, for all participants to discuss on near future since Auroville will celebrate its golden jubilee. How we want to proceed, and if there are any frictions in the community how to overcome them. Aim of this meeting was also to actively communicate with suggestions for the new L'AVenir d'Auroville/TDC 2012 2018 team. All agreed that we do not share, not communicate enough. Many in the community feel that we have gone astray from the path Read more

Which are the signs of human unity in Auroville? "In my third visit to Auroville, I came to prepare the plan for my Master, about public policies under an evolutionary perspective. As Auroville aims at realizing human unity according to Sri Aurobindo’s vision, to me it seemed obvious to consider Auroville the right place to develop my research. Inspired by the question Arjuna asks to Krishna, and here I have to quote freely: when the Divine manifests on the earth, how He walks, how He sits, how He talks?" Read more

Between 14th to 21st of September in Dehli at the India International Centre, Auroville will held its festival for the first time with the official title and leading theme - City for Transformation. In continuation of interview with the core team - Aster Patel, Anu, Bridget and Sebastian(who is missing at this one) we have dwelled a bit deeper on the significance of the sharing the diversity of aspects, projects, ideas that embody Auroville life as a living experience.Presence of eminent guest will also have impact of its own at the occasion. Read more

The RAS called (Aug 30) 'Working Meeting of the Residents' in response to Foundation Secretary, Mr Bala Baskar's invitation at last week's meeting (to hear feedback on a draft version of the Entry/Exit policy), to "get together and decide what you want" with regards the content of the document. The meeting aimed to work through the draft towards a clear response but did not achieve this due to complications arising from confusion over the policy's role and discussion of details regarding the community's internal processes of Entry and Exit.e

Between 14th to 21st of September in Dehli at the India International Centre, Auroville will held its festival for the first time with the official title and leading theme - City for Transformation. Anu and Sebastian share with us some of the details on organizing the whole event, which overgrown out of annual seminars, colliding this year with some crossing points in the history. Tremendous energy, enthusiasm with energizing effect emanates from Sebastian and Anu, and should spread to the public through festival which aim is to share.

For many participants the proposed agenda for the Values and Priorities meeting no. 4, was not really acceptable; on Restriction to Entry, when we should have examined the proposal for outlying lands be converted into resources to buy land within the Master Plan Area (in order to develop affordable houses) the meeting concluded after more than two hours of lively discussion. It was clear that we need to explore further the costs of present construction, which seems to be blown up; let's come up with concrete plans for alternative housing. Read more

General Meeting called by Residents' Assembly Service on behalf of the Working Committee and Auroville Council on Tuesday 14th of August was about feedback of the residents on the Proposed Regulations for Admission and Termination Regulations of Persons in the Register of Residents. The Auroville Foundation's proposal on regulations of admission and termination of persons in the register of residents supposed to be put up for consideration to the Governing Board in the meeting to be held in September

At yesterday's 3rd Collective Priorities and Values Meeting organized by the RAS, Pashi and Luigi from Land Resource Development team presented a proposal on outlying lands, which was a request from the previous meeting. After a few years of intensive research, mapping, and collecting data on the spot (along with many consultations from outside experts) Luigi and Pashi presented quite a concrete plan, business-oriented with applied Auroville values. A debate went on afterwards that expressed feelings and views of various residents. Read more