ORRYELLE's EARTHDREAM 2001 ILLUSTRATED TRAVEL JOURNAL EARTHDREAM 2001, CENTRAL AUSTRALIA (Linked to HORUS-MAAT LODGE 11-STAR WORKING) Little did I expect a circle of over a hundred people to gather with the unified intent of World Healing. I was wondering how a party (for this is primarily what the solstice Earthdream gathering was proposed to be) would go on such an internal time as a (Cancer) new moon winter solstice eclipse (triple darkness!), but felt that if it sprung from a ritual base the potent energies of such a combination could be accessed and it might just work. Well it sure did! The time of the nu moon and eclipse over here was 9:30pm - just perfect to kick off the party with a chanting and meditation circle before bringing in the beats!  Leading into this for the first few hours from dusk (around 6pm) there was a Corroborree. The local Aborigines came to show us their traditional songs and dances. The clay pan (12km from the outback town of Alice Springs) is their land, and they had granted Earthdream use of it again after last year's successful solstice gathering there. The area is actually a traditional dance ground for them used for millenia -their Dreamtime myth of the land is of the Seven Sisters (Pleiades) coming to Earth there and dancing the surrounding ridges (caterpillar dreaming) into formation.  In recent years with the decline of interest in their own cultural traditions from most of their own youth and various social problems resulting from the invasion of white civilization, there have been no ceremonies or corroborrees there -until last year. As hoped, Earthdream's influx of various alternative lifestyles to mainstream western culture and interest in their indigenous dreaming has inspired the local tribes to revive their traditions at the clay pan. Again this year there was a local aboriginal corroborree leading into a mixed multicultural danceparty of locals and Earthdream travellers of all manner of race, heritage, cultures and subcultures together. Most of the Aboriginal communities out here (at least those that are visible) are beset with alcohol problems -having no physiological or psychological defenses or adaptation to this new poison used by caucasians for millenia- and cultural disintegration, so it was truly heartwarming so see another side to the local tribes when they performed their traditional songs and dances. Raw yet lilting chants so in tune with the earth and the local spirits. Quite a few of us were affected emotionally by the gentle trance they created. Several Earthdreamers joined in with some of the women's dances, being body-painted and shown the moves by the Aborigines. We were also invited and encouraged by the elders to photograph and film the performances - a special opportunity.  After a few hours when the dancing was finished and the chanting drifting away the sound-system was being tested. This was an interesting cultural cross-fade -a short burst of techno, ska or reggae, then this stopping and the voices of the aboriginals around the fire rising again for a while, as it drifted and thinned another blast from the sound system. When eventually the amplified music was consistent, gradually some aboriginals would begin to dance with the whites, even as we began to move in around the fire with them rather than watching from the peripheries. Gradually we began to merge together... At around 8:30 I went off to draw together a small Horus-Maat Lodge circle linking in with the global energies of this double current being worked on this nu moon night. In the afternoon I had contributed a sculpture to the makeshift amusement park of fluoru-painted structures we had constructed of old metal junk from up the road.  Finding a thin flat strip of metal already twisted into the suggestion of a lemniscate (infinity symbol), I gaffa-taped the ends together to form a moebius strip. I propped this on an old fishing rod as an axis and stuck it in the ground, with my decorative set of scales perched precariously on the top, to represent Maat, the Egyptian Goddess of Truth and Balance. When the wind picked up, they did a fine dance, the pans jiggling up and down in a dance of equilibration. Around the base of this totem I made from small rocks the N'aton bindrune, a symbol used by the Horus Maat Lodge for the last few years to represent the awakening collective consciousness of humankind. There were six of us at the HML circle, off in the shrubbery on the edges of the claypan, and the rite was kept brief and simple this time as it was really just an opening for the greater circle to follow upon it at the imminent nu moon and solar eclipse time, for the purpose of opening links to other Horus Maat Lodge operants globally that night. Each direction was cast with invocations of elemental deities from Egyptian (Nema's 6-fold), Mayan and Aboriginal pantheons. Although it had not been my plan to do so, at the last minute I felt compelled to also add Incan elemental deities, including the Sun God Inti. We sat around the fire and breathed deep together for a while, visualizing the N'aton rune and HML sigil. Then Evan, Kestral and I invoked our sephirothic thrones within the Eleven-Star Working. This felt powerful, as the three of us had at last come back together into the same physical space in the desert after several seperated nu moon rites. I drew the energy from Kether (Unity consciousness) down through my crown into my heart, invoking Tiphereth and assuming the God/dess form of Hrumachis-SekhMaat with mudra and mantra. As the eclipse was imminent I also invoked (using the Bes-Kali mudra-mantra) Rahu, the Hindu god/demon who consumes the sun, RaHuNath being the name given me by my initiator into the Adinath tantric tradition.  I had found a hand-size red wooden six in the dust out there so, this being the number of solar Tiphereth, I presented it to Kestral (left), turning it upside-down as I passed it, so that it became the pale (other side) 9 of lunar Yesod. He claimed his throne with resonant Words of Power, then passed the number to Evan, who invoking Malkuth, placed the token on the ground and earthed the current into the realm of physical manifestation. There was a pause, then Diana asked that the Seven Sisters -the Aboriginal deifications of the Pleiades who came to dance in that place in the Dreamtime, causing the rippling ridges around the claypan- to come and dance with us. Kestral was surprised to see the Pleiades constellation appear 4 or 5 nights later towards dawn, visible from that area for the first time that season, beyond our expectations... We consumed the compressed elemental energies of the circle while closing it, carrying this within us to the larger new moon circle in the claypan. On our way over to the dance-floor I asked a few people around peripheral fires to spread the word to other fires about the imminent World Healing Day circle. When we got over to the main arena it was not quite time for the eclipse circle. There were a few people around dancing, and some at the main fire, but it was generally pretty scattered. I built up the main fire a bit with some big logs and when the music stopped began calling out to groups around the edges to come and join the World Healing circle. Some hesitated, but gradually everyone in sight came and gathered around the central fire, and as we spread out to form a large circle, more and more kept wandering in from the dark night. There was about the same amount of locals (mostly Aboriginal) as travelling Earthdream crew. We kept spreading and spreading the circle, until the large fire was an ineffective speck in the middle, not doing much to warm us from the cold wind. Once everyone was in (I didn't get a chance to do a headcount but there seemed to be at least a hundred present) and we had formed a more or less round circle, we all sat down. Having to now present the purpose and means of the circle to a much larger gathering than I expected, I felt a bit overwhelmed. Nevertheless, I took a deep breath and managed to project my voice enough for those on the other side of the circle to hear me. I explained that people all over the world, individuals and groups of varied size, were meditating at this time on the idea of World Healing and peace, and that this meditation was timed with the full solar eclipse visible in Africa. I then presented the chakra tones as a unifying chant to lead into the meditation. We all joined hands, left hands up right hands down to circulate the energy. There were probably only about fifteen or so people who knew the tones from previous circles I had held, so I started each new tone, which went for a continuous round of three. A few tones up I noticed Kestral was directly opposite me way over the other side of the circle, and Evan at a half-way point between us. Despite this unconscious distribution of powerful chanters who knew the tones, it was difficult to carry the tones around such a large circle -to hear people way over the other side. It worked, but only just; nevertheless, there was definitely a unifying power in everyone resonating the same sounds together, as was expressed by several later. From the chanting we lapsed into the silent meditation on World Healing, peace and unity. Well, it was supposed to be silent -it wasn't long before some people started muttering and giggling. This was a bit distracting, but what could be expected from such a large and diverse circle? Laughter is a healing sound, and it all seemed part of it, that those who didn't have the focus to silently meditate still held the common intent and desire for world peace to be there! Community in diversity exemplified. The cold was another distracting factor, and one which probably helped cause the noises. So I cut the meditation fairly short, suddenly realizing an effective way to bring such a large circle together. There was just enough time for me (and therefore probably most of those in the circle who were focused) to feel a basic heart chakra connection with Gaian and humanity at large. It was all represented quite wonderfully even in the microcosm of the immediate circle, people of many cultures, races and places sitting there together. Us all being there then like that almost seemed like a manifestation of the whole global Healing Day process happening across the planet. Then we all stood up and I let go of the hand of the person on my left, and began to slowly spiral in towards the fire, calling out for everyone to spiral in with me, all singing or chanting our own songs or sounds. I led the train of linked people in a tight ring within the outer ring, then spiralling in to create a further ring and so forth. As I got closer to the fire the rings became tighter, so that by the time the centre was reached everyone was right next to each other, the various sounds and tones rippling through the great human serpent we had become. Everyone could hear each other well now, and we were all warm. As the spiral completed itself around the fire, the sounds spontaneously escalated in volume, pitch and intensity. Everything converged into a climactic ecstatic cry. We all raised our joined hands high in a joyous holler of union. At this point the P.A. kicked back in, and almost everyone began to dance. I realized later that if the DJ had followed our original loose schedule of half an hour for the circle, then the energy naturally peaked at the turning of the moon into Her new cycle, and the peak of the solar eclipse in Africa... The party really went off for the rest of that night. We all danced and talked around blazing fires and communed harmoniously through the longest night of the year (winter solstice southern hemisphere) out there in the barren centre of Australia. It was only with the rising of the long-awaited sun that things got gnarly; who could have imagined that a healing circle could stir up so much trouble? Trouble, I eventually realized, which was all a part of the healing process... Straight after the circle as I stood by the main fire two friends from Earthdream last year who had just arrived that night and I had not seen yet came and greeted me. One of them, Jose, was from Peru and he introduced me to another South American friend of his, Marcello. The timing of this was wonderful, like a direct link to the other side of the world, and reminded me also of the rites I had done out that way on Earthdream 2000, weaving together the serpent dreamings of Australia and the Americas fromwhich I had just returned. Marcello and I got into a great conversation about the Incan and Mayan cultures of south and central America, and he told me how that very night his friends over there were celebrating Inti-Rani, the festival of the Sun God, returning on this solstice night! I understood now why I had felt to include the Incan pantheon in my invocations earlier that evening. Then some reggae came sliding and chinking from the sound system and, via Brazil, I thought of all the Africans celebrating the sun returning from its eclipse.
 Later I was over at the surreal Gobblyn Camp (above) Amordios had set up from his tardis-like old bus. Amordios was taking a break from serving chai, lying in his 'laboratory' (strange pipes and skulls and apparatus everywhere) with someone squatting on his back giving him an intense Shiatsu massage. Suddenly one of the little oil lanterns he had hanging around him flared up into a brilliant blaze of crackling and sizzling flame. As everything in his intricately-set-up space seems so connected to him, I had to ask Amordios what pressure point she had just hit in his back. His demented laughter (and later words) confirmed that she had indeed just hit an intense release point! Only an hour or so after the circle the PA went off again briefly so someone could announce that some cars had been broken into, so everyone should check and secure their vehicles and camps. This was an unexpected shock, but there were some pretty drunken redneck locals around -at least the word got out quickly so as to prevent further theft. We checked the Gobblyn Camp and discovered that Amordios's trailer was missing; A rather large thing to get away with! The irony (and relief) about it was that we had only twenty minutes earlier finished taking all our musical equipment, P.A. and welder out of it, as we were intending to set up to play at dawn. All that was left in the trailer was a heap of heavy scrap metal which had been hauled from down the road to make junk sculptures with - a fine bounty for the thieves to later uncover from the tarp over the top of it! A while later the police came by, ostensibly to find out about the thievery but more likely wanting to just check out the whole party, it being quite a weird and uncommon event way out there near Alice Springs. They were perfectly amicable however and quite friendly, at least the ones I spoke to who were offered free Gobblyn Chai but refused on the grounds that,'It's probably got drugs in it.'! They came by again an hour or so later, then drove their police cars around the peripheries of the cracked clay dance floor for a while, blaring their sirens and horns in staccato rhythmns to the pumping music! They obviously just wanted to party with the rest of us but weren't sure how to let go of their props. It was a surprise when hours later, not long before dawn they returned with reinforcements, six car-fulls all converging on the gathering from all sides. Apparently they had had noise complaints. Well this didn't bother us because we knew the only 'neighbours' in the outback vicinity were at the Pine Gap US military installation just down the valley. The hilarious thing was that when the police came in full force to tell us to turn down the music, there wasn't any playing! The generator had just ran out of fuel so they arrived to an un-amplified congregation. Twenty or so got out of their squad cars, ready for conflict, and looked kind of embarrassed when they realized they had nothing to complain about. We just at laughed at them and after a while they got back in their cars and drove off. We waited five minutes or so, fueled up the generator and resumed the party. Writing on a blackboard sign about our HarleQuintet performance soon after dawn, I drew one of the Egyptian hieroglyphs for Hrumachis -'Horus of the Double Horizon'- God/dess of the rising and setting sun. For we intended to begin our set with ritual theatre piece about the returning sun after the eclipse and the longest night of the year. As I chalked the glyph, I noticed how the shape the sun sat in it was just like the gap in the ridge on the periphery of the claypan. Wouldn't it be great if the sun actually rose there, I thought, but I knew from my one day there that it would rise over the other side. It seemed like such a perfect time to play, just after the dawn after the longest night of the year -return of the light after the cold solstice night and the eclipse. The problem was, because the night had been so long and yet so full of activity, we were all pretty tired and scattered by then! The dawn came creeping in very slowly, appearing first strangely as a slight brackish-yellowish glow in the west! This gradually spread over the sky, until it intensified in the east heralding the Sun's gradual appearance in tiers of violet and orange. It really felt and looked like S/He had been on a very long journey into the Underworld, and was crawling back up rather wearily! Or perhaps this was just a projection or reflection of our own weariness as we set up to perform. Lugging drums and speakers around and working out what to plug in where is hardly what we felt like doing at dawn after the longest night of the year, but we embraced the opportunity to play with the rising sun -it had seemed like a good idea the night before. I took a few moments to slip off and perform an invocation of my solar Tiphereth throne on the edge of the clearing, drawing the energy of the rising sun into my heart and solar plexus chakras, while resonating solar deity names from various cultures. When I performed the Bes-Kali mudra-mantra to draw the taste of Ra into RaHu, I actually felt the fragnum lignum muscle under my tongue tear slightly - as if after the eclipse it was a bit too much of a mouthful!
 There were only a few survivors on the dance-floor and by the time we had our extensive rig all set up, and as we tuned up and sound-checked they thinned further. We should have been all ready to start straight away, but the Gobblyn Bus having only arrived the previous dusk with all our gear aboard and everything else that had been going on this had been night impossible. It must have been a bit torturous listening to us slowly getting our shit together after such a long night, and we were stone cold when we began to play. Nevertheless we began our 'Fresh Fever' opus which introduces the Hrumachis solar double lion rite. I took the two skull and hair lion masks off the stakes Amordios had set them on within the elaborate totemic installation he had decorated the front of the makeshift stage with, preparing for the theatrical rite. The music was just starting to warm up as we began to find our flow. However at this point a rather obnoxious individual burst forth from the back of his van behind the stage and started screaming abuse at us. This threw Kestral's concentration on guitar and he stopped. I suggested shifting to an easier song, and we went into the melodic, 'Hivemind'. However the shouting continued, then stopped, then the generator stopped, then the culprit returned and continued abusing us. Evan asked the objector what his problem was. He said he'd been trying to make love with his wife in his truck behind the stage, and our music was disturbing his intentions (of course it couldn't have had anything to do with a hangover); apparently he felt this warranted him yelling abuse at us as we tried to perform -and this ironically from someone who had inadvertantly tortured several Earthdreamers by playing bad ska music for hours at dawn at previous parties! Evan's caustic remarks in reply to his complaint made the objector lunge towards him. Physical conflict was narrowly averted by cries of protest from onlookers. Evan asserted that we were just trying to play music, his adversary was calmed down and eventually retreated. Kestral by this stage had had enough and left the stage. After a confused pause we decided to persist without him. I went and restarted the generator and we played a few songs, starting with the appropriate, 'Circus dances with the Circum-stances'. It went okay but we were a bit thrown by the situation and lack of guitarist. We left the stage feeling incredibly cheated. We had put a lot of energy into preparing the Hrumachis piece and into the party in general, and it seemed unfair that we had copped the brunt of someone's personal problems, and the whole wonderful night had effectively ruined for us by this incident. It seemed like by everyone being so external and social on the solar eclipse, winter solstice and dark moon, everything had inverted and the dawn, instead of being a glorious celebration of the return of the light, had twisted into a shadowy sting in the tail. I felt like the healing circle had been unsuccessful -how were we supposed to spread a message of peace and harmony across the globe if we had such conflicts within our own convoy? I looked over to the sculpture park and saw the scales had fallen from the top of my piece and lay askew in the dust. Fifteen minutes or so later a big Wirly-Wirly (spiraling wind and dust funnel) swirled through the camp and over the vast claypan, gathering momentum until it eventually dissipated in the shrubbery on the far side. In the process my altar at the Gobblyn Camp, multicultural talismans within a chamber of mirrors, exploded and collapsed, a rather eminent reflection of my mood. It was hours later that I remembered what line of 'Hivemind' I had been singing when the confrontation had climaxed: 'Open yourself to Diversity, then close yourself into Unity, That's the Point, In the ever-expanding circles of Diversity...' The irony of this made me laugh, as I saw the absurdity of the sick joke the HarleQuin had played upon us all. My ego began to dissolve. Later as my disappointment gradually subsided I began to realize the full implications of that conflict happening at such a point. Many of our songs are intentional magickal vessels, and some kind of process had obviously been instigated here... Over the next few days there was much discussion around campfires of what had gone down that morning, between Evan, myself, the objector and others. He apologised for his behaviour, obviously genuinely sorry once we explained to him that playing live musick takes a bit more preparation, warmup and concentration to go into than the buttons and dials of the DJ. This was a minor point, the main being that Unity in Diversity was what Earthdream was supposed to be all about. He accepted that others may dislike his music but would not stop him mid-set, and that he should pay the same respect to other DJs and performers. A lot of deep stuff came up for him, us and others in the process of realizing and resolving all this, and I came to realize that it was all a rather vital part of the healing process instigated on Solstice night. Another, more major aspect of basically the same issue which arose was some alleged complaints from local aboriginals who had witnessed the healing circle from the far side of the claypan. Apparently they didn't like the idea of magic from other cultures or religions being performed there, understandable after the way their culture has been fucked over for the last two millenia. Some of the white Earthdreamers who had also not participated in the circle had taken up their cause, but it was all a matter of misunderstandings. I explained that the circle was no more religious than the wide range of multicultural musical styles played through the P.A., or the various icons and installations set up around the area. Acceptance of diversity is highly neccessary in our modern multicultural global society. I had deliberately made the healing rite as universal as possible due to the diverse range of people present, working with basic energy systems of the body (chakras exist in many ancient cultures - Hindu, Mayan, Chinese, etc.- and may be experienced by anyone who meditates upon them) and common intentions of unity rather than any specific cultural pantheons or magical practices. It was testament to the successful universality and sound intent of the circle, I explained, that no one who had actually participated had expressed any objections whatsoever. These issues and more were gradually worked out in the claypan camp via an extended process of communications, reconciliations and resolutions over the next week or so after the solstice gathering. Some of this process was harsh and severe, but it cleared a lot of misunderstandings and confusion very quickly and effectively, and it was all ultimately very Healing. Our trailer was even eventually returned! It is significant that most of these issues related to the Manipura or solar plexus chakra, as Alice Springs is near the Global Manipura chakra of Uluru, at which we performed a group Global Manipura Rite on winter solstice the year before (2000). The solar plexus chakra concerns outwards-directed energy and issues of power and social interaction. It was only a few nights after solstice that I finally saw the sun set from the Gobblyn Camp where I had drawn the Hrumachis hieroglyph for our dawn performance. The sun set rather than rose exactly in the gap in the ridge I had compared the symbol to! Hrumachis is the God/dess of the setting as well as the rising sun, and it was this aspect of Hir I had particularly attuned to in my workings with the solar throne of Tiphereth.
  Har! Hru! H'yum Kin! Om Tare Tuttare Ture Soha! Viva Gaia! Skork and HarleQuintet photos (c) 01 Bonsai. All other photos and text (c)01 Orryelle.
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