Cloud Cafe

India, the mother, the great Sacred Cow amongst nations, has produced a display stand of Bollywood magnificence, and considerable opulence. I scratch my head at what this means and why. The image I remember is a photograph of the ruthlessly political and extremely worldly wise Narendra Modi sitting in half-lotus on the Janpath in Delhi, with the magnificent Empire architecture of Lutyens as a background to hundreds and hundreds of Yoga practitioners joining with their Prime Minister to practice. If there is one thing I do know, it is that all people who practice Yoga are equal on the mat, so the image pleases me. And even though I know I am being a sucker for being pleased a soft smile comes to my mouth that there are certain things that cut through politics.
Every evening at 5, all comers from every nation on Earth, no questions asked, nobody excluded however unpromising, are welcome to come onto the Indian Stand to practice for an hour under some really delightful, stylish and expert Yoga tutors. Here we are, stretching ourselves in thirty languages. Thank you India!

The sinuous tarmac way to COP23 in November 2017 upon which the eternal thunderous ribbon of European prosperity snakes its way nose to tail into Germany, and I am part of it. But my purposes are different from almost everyone else in this procession.

I am sitting in a darkened room on a plastic chair, one of hundreds of minds and brains and energies organised neatly into serried rows in the Forestry conference day at the COP, a tiny speck of being, but the one I call me. As the speaker intones, I allow my eyelids to half close, and the sense of warm cosy sleepiness lulls me dangerously towards that indolent den of comfort, the oblivion of Morpheus. The speaker speaks of forests, forestry, forestry initiatives, of measures and protocols, standards and protections, parternships and planning and a whole lot else besides. Suddenly I snap out of it: there is some creativity to be done. I am instantly taken back to 1994 when I first went to a forestry conference. A sudden spark of realisation comes to me. THE LANGUAGE IS IDENTICAL. I have heard all this before. This single speaker has been speaking for twenty three years and nothing has changed!. Furiously I start to scribble down the words as they pour in an endless torrent from his mouth. I write them as they are.

Egged on by the magnificent and formidable Bianca Jagger, every shaman in the place is assembled in revolutionary defiance. WE NEED A SEAT AT THE NEGOTIATING TABLE! Yes, we do.

The faceless men……there they are, faceless, and there they are, men. Oh man! There must be money in it, no other explanation fits for the rapt attention, the full attendance, the complete order, such conformity. The room hangs on every word….or does it? I wonder what is going through the mind of the shaman sitting in front of me. I wonder what ancestral memories lie under that magnificent headpiece, what magical knowledge there must be on those shoulders.