Snapshot of the Visitors Weekend at Merimbula

Eastern fringe of property, adjacent to Bournda NP

The recent Visitors Weekend at Merimbula was a lively gathering with plenty of food for thought.

We had great interactions on our zoom calls with the most experienced people in the movement on Ideal Village developments.

We started the weekend with a puja to inaugurate Maharishi Peace Village and traditional candle lighting and cake cutting ceremony.

Our first link up was with Dr Bevan Morris, who warmly endorsed Maharishi Peace Village as precious opportunity for growth to enlightenment and creating coherence for Australia in an ideal vastu environment. There were some delightful reminiscences from Bevan of his time with Maharishi in Rishikesh which engendered some moments of hilarity.

Pacific Ocean entrance to Merimbula Lakes with Main Beach isthmus reaching in from the south, and which extends all the way to Pambula.

On the Saturday was discussion and insight into the unique nature of living in a development based on key insights from Maharishi on living in a vastu environment with a like minded TM community and access to knowledge, group program, local organic food, beautiful pure surrounds, and regional infrastructure to support professional, commercial and medical requirements. Within a village entity on this property itself there are excellent options for a Peace Palace, the well developed plans for a Maharishi School (with the possibility of a full consciousness-educational curriculum in an affiliated college alongside residential course facilities), Vedic organic agriculture, a micro-grid, an Ayurvedic Health centre and panchakarma clinic, not to mention options for MPV members to continue their existing professions and trades within the village domain.

This discussion also in went deeply into the Rural Land Sharing (RLSC) format designated by the local council under NSW legislation, which lends itself to a unique and visionary structure to support community developments. This included the recommendation of an expert in community developments of the appropriate legal structure to manage the project.

We linked in with this expert briefly to discuss key elements of RLSC and ongoing legal and town planning support which he has offered.

In the afternoon we linked up by zoom with the Vastu consultants David and Betsy Kettle in NZ who have looked at the main vastu elements of the 70 ha property here and drew up a preliminary map indicating best options for vastu allotments. David gave an excellent presentation on the essential benefits which accrue from living in vastu and a vision of possibilities for this particular property with its abundance of vastu favourable land. Following is a video recording of the zoom linkup with David Kettle and his presentation:

[this video temporarily is being updated and will return soon]

In the evening we had another zoom linkup with Anthony Hardy, who is a leader of Rendlesham Garden Village in Suffolk, UK, which is now well established with 60 homes and an extension of this about to break ground for another 40 homes. Anthony explained how an active team he was part of over several decades worked together to create this very successful fully functional ideal village. He described the similarties and distinctions of Rendlesham with our own plans here at Merimbula, and offered his ongoing assistance and support for our plans for Maharishi Peace Village.