Surendra is a retired social worker and photographer living in Japan, and
she lived in Rajneeshpuram for nine months.
I grew up in the East End of London, a very congested
area with no greenery around, and now suddenly I was in the cowboy set — this
was Oregon, this was John Wayne country. It was so wonderful for me to be out
in the wide open spaces. I was working the 12-hour days and I used to run to
work.
Watching the documentary was shocking, there was sort
of doubt whether anything was really as bad, and gruesome, or heinous [as it
turned out to be], like the salmonella poisoning and the extent of the
wiretapping and the attempt to murder Osho’s doctor. I had no idea just how far
Sheela and the group around her were prepared to go to. The other big thing
that shocked me is, it sounded like the FBI and other big law enforcement
organizations were getting ready to actually attack the ranch with machine guns
and helicopters.
I had no idea how it might be coming close to sort of bloodbath, that
was even more shocking than anything else.
Having said that, I wouldn’t point the finger at Sheela, in a way
because I think she was under tremendous pressure from outside and wanted to
protect what she believed in.
Sheela was an unusual Sanyassin. She was a politician with a
politician’s ability, and in a way she was the only person who could have done
that. Most of the Sanyassins didn’t have the “tough titties” bit to go out
there and challenge and really sort of heckle with other people or be very
provocative.
I was there during the “share-a-home” program when all of these
so-called street people were bused in, and Sheela was becoming quite active politically
around the commune.
For the first time I was in meetings, which, instead of just being sort
of a silent bunch of meditators, were becoming like political rallies with
Sheela trying to enthuse the people on the share-a-home program. She was very
much doing things which I’ve never seen Sanyassins do before — we were mostly a
sort of more inward-looking lot. I thought, “Well, she’s got a lot of energy
that’s for sure”.
The share-a-home thing was quite something. I was building fences at the
time and then I suddenly got given the few people who were on the share-a-home
program and I was really frustrated, because they were unfocused; they weren’t
working. And I complained to one of the bosses — we always had female bosses,
Osho put women in charge of everything — and she said:
-
“Look, it’s not about production, this is about
connecting and sharing our commune and sharing what we feel.”
I ended up with two guys and we really created a friendship between us.
I can still see their faces and their gradual sort of relaxation: they were in
a safe place, there was no crime, no one was going to beat them up, they had a
place to sleep, good food, and work to do.
We were all a bunch of kids in a way, wanting to get hold of our tools
and go out and dig holes and put out fences. Like young children have that
energy, we had that energy. But I think there was sort of a blinkered attitude:
We were a a bit too much like playful kids and not aware of what was going in
the commune as a whole.
Much later, a few years ago here in Japan, I heard
from someone I knew who said she stopped being a Sanyassin because she was
being asked to take the clothes off the backs of people and it was cold weather
by then and people were just being sent back on buses and that just grated with
her. Most of us just saw the positive side of things.
(Note: Sheela brought many homeless to Rajneeshpuram because she wanted to
put them on the electoral list to they vote for her candidate, but when the
municipality refused to register them, Sheela kicked them off the ranch.)
(Source:
thecut.com/2018/04/9-rajneesh-followers-on-what-wild-wild-country-got-wrong.html)
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