Dear Jaime,

3 years ago your voice was silenced. I sent you and your brother to school to safely learn. I rushed you out the door that morning never expecting what would happen next. A school shooting!!! You were 14 and only a freshman in High School.

(1,11)

Did you know?
Ahilyabai Holkar was one of India's
greatest women rulers of all time.

Ahilyabai was Born on May 31,1725 in the village of Chondi,Jamkhed distt,Maharashtra to a man named Mankoji Shinde,who was the Patil(Chief) of a village and a member of proud Dhangar Community.

Despite the fact that girls' education was a farther dream in those days, Ahilyabai was homeschooled by her father.
Ahilya didn't belong to any royal family but in a twist of fate she is still remembered as one of the most revered Queen in the history.

While they were living their humdrum lives, one day Malhar Rao Holkar, commander of the Peshwa Bajirao & Lord of the Malwa stopped in Chondi on his way to Pune, where he couldn't help but notice a young 8yrs old Ahilyabai in the temple service feeding the poor & hungry.

He was so impressed by the sheer innocence&beauty with simplicity character of Ahilyabai dat he asked her hand in marriage for his son Khanderao Holkar.Just like that she got married to Khanderao in 1733 at a tender age of 8&became a bride of esteemed Maratha community of Holkars

But destiny had something else in store for her as her husband died in the Battle of Kumbher in 1754 leaving her widow at 29.Distressed Ahilyabai was to commit Sati when her father-in-law Malhar Rao refused to let it happen.

SRI KANTESH HANUMANTHA, KADARAMANDALAGI (KAR)
#bharatmandir

KANTESHA means Prabhu full of brightness.
Here, Sri Hanuman appears with a front face and sparkling eyes. Earlier, the village was also called KANTESHPURI on the name of Kantesha Hanuman.

Several thousands of years ago, Hanuman lived in this village. He once saw the Sun and mistaking it to be a fruit, began flying towards it. Since then, this village came to be known as Kadara Man Dalagi. (Kadar means rays, mandala is cluster of rays).

It is believed that King Janmejaya had set up the shrine to get rid of his difficulties.
There is a small pond on the right side of the kshetram where Teppotsava (Float festival) is celebrated.

Kanaka Dasa has praised Sri Kantesha in his various poetic compositions.

Kanaka Dasa was the first devotee to popularize the power of Kantesha. It is said that once Kanaka Dasa was deeply wounded in a battle. To seek blessings, he visited Tirupati but Sri Venkatesha appeared in his dream and advised him to see Kantesha first before seeing him.

Ok, I'll hop on this Elizabeth Warren/Native American testing bandwagon (gently and non-politically).

I've been a @23andMe customer for a while, and have followed their ancestry updates closely.

All is more or less as expected....except for this bit about Native American.

The family is almost completely composed of Spanish peasants (from various regions) who emigrated, along with a massive wave in the late 19th-cent./early 20th-cent., to Cuba back when it was a booming economy (richer than Spain's) and worth emigrating to (Communism killed that).

Also, the native population of Cuba was annihilated early on---was the first place the Spanish colonized after all. Having a native background in Cuba would be like having the same in, say, Massachusetts, particularly if you're (say) mostly Irish. Just really, really unlikely.

(Note: the North African/Arab background is less mysterious. The Iberian peninsula was part of the Muslim world for centuries. It would be odd *not* to have some Arab/Middle Eastern background coming from Spain. Given the family is mostly from Northern Spain, it's small though.)

I have a Spanish passport, have been back to the ancestral villages in Spain, seen the church where my grandmother was baptized, my grandfather told me stories about growing up as the child of Spanish colonists in rural Cuba. The native bit just clashes with all the family lore.

SRI KALAHASTI KSHETRAM, CHITTOOR (AP)
#bharatmandir

Panchbhootasthalam representing vayu element, also called Dakshin Kailasha.
As per Shiva’s boon, Vayu is incarnated here as Shiva and worshipped as Kalahasteeswara.
The kshetram is also associated with Rahu and Ketu.

The Kshetram is named after 3 devotees of Shiva- a snake, spider and elephant who worshipped a lingam in the forest. Elephant did jal abhishek with water from its trunk, spider protected it from dust by weaving a web on it and snake adorned it with his jewel.
@GunduHuDuGa

Once, the web and jewel got washed away when elephant sprayed water on the lingam. Angered snake entered elephant’s trunk and bit him but died in the process. The agitated elephant trampled the spider accidentally. Shiva gave moksha to all three.

Hence the name-Sri for Spider, kaal for snake n hasti for elephant.

Shiv bhakt Kanappa is said to have plucked his own eye to put it on the lingam here when he saw blood oozing from the eye on the lingam
This place is the ultimate location for Rahu Kethu Sarpa Dosha Nivarana.