July 17
Sri Chinmoy gives a talk, entitled ‘What is Religion?’, at the home of Sudha (Miss Carmen Suro) in Santurce, Puerto Rico.
Sri Chinmoy juggles three balls over 450 times in London, UK.
Sri Chinmoy delivers a lecture, entitled ‘Force’, at the University of Swansea, in Swansea, Wales, UK.
An exhibition of Sri Chinmoy’s Jharna-Kala artworks is officially opened by Puerto Rico’s Secretary of State, Juan Albors, at the Department of Education in San Juan, Puerto Rico.
Sri Chinmoy gives nine spiritual talks, part of a total of 100 lectures in 20 days.
Charity, 7:35 a.m., and Examination, 8:40 a.m., at Jamaica High School Track, Jamaica, NY, USA
Gifts, 3:00 p.m., Who Is The Winner?, 3:05 p.m., Two Trains, 3:10 p.m., Who Is Knocking?, 3:15 p.m., Disobedience And Penalty, 3:20 p.m., and Secrets, 3:25 p.m., in transit from Jamaica, NY to Washington, DC, USA
Something is missing, 9:10 p.m., American University, Washington, DC, USAThese talks (nos. 50-58) are later published in Everest-Aspiration, Part 2 and Part 3.
Sri Chinmoy is interviewed in Bengali by journalist Kamal Ashish Chakravarty from ‘Voice of America’ in Washington, DC, USA. The taped programme, which includes a short esraj performance by Sri Chinmoy, is later broadcast on Hindi and Bengali radio stations throughout Bangladesh and India, and is heard by Sri Chinmoy’s family in Pondicherry.
An exhibition of Sri Chinmoy’s Jharna-Kala artworks opens at the Confederation Centre in Charlottetown on Prince Edward Island, Canada.
Sri Chinmoy inaugurates the first in a series of chalk poems, which he writes on the green scoreboard at the side of his tennis court in Jamaica, NY, USA. He refers to the tennis court for the first time as ‘Illumination-Ground’. (Later, he will give it the permanent name of ‘Aspiration-Ground’.)
Sri Chinmoy offers a Peace Concert and delivers a lecture, entitled ‘My Peace-Life’, at Stockholm University in Stockholm, Sweden.
Sri Chinmoy offers a Peace Concert, dedicated to Dag Hammarskjöld, and delivers a lecture, entitled ‘Who Can Grant Me Peace?’, at Uppsala University in Uppsala, Sweden.
Sri Chinmoy meets for the second time with President Mikhail Gorbachev, at The Ritz in London, UK.
Sri Chinmoy offers Peace Concert with an organ performance — the 20th of 39 concerts held in honour of Swami Vivekananda — at St. Peter’s Lutheran Church in New York, NY, USA.
Seventy thousand of Sri Chinmoy’s Soul-Bird drawings are exhibited in the United Nations Secretariat South Lobby at the United Nations in New York.
Sri Chinmoy celebrates the one-year anniversary of his sitar playing with a performance in Jamaica, NY, USA.
A photo of Sri Chinmoy is featured in an article published in The Vancouver Sun about the Parliament of the World’s Religions.
An exhibition of Sri Chinmoy’s Jharna-Kala artworks opens at the Regional Museum in Donetsk, Ukraine.
About On This Day
January 1st, 2011, saw the launch of a special feature on the front page of Sri Chinmoy Reflections — On This Day — a day-by-day account of Sri Chinmoy’s achievements. The accompanying pages expand the theme further by linking specific dates and events to video, audio and literary resources from this and many other related websites, enabling the reader to explore, in a systematic way, the vast catalogue of information about Sri Chinmoy’s life.
Many years ago at Aspiration-Ground, there was a large blackboard that displayed the scores of tennis matches Sri Chinmoy had played. Each morning, before Sri Chinmoy arrived at the court, the board would be cleaned and the date of the new day would be written in chalk at the top. Then, in yearly order, a list of different activities Sri Chinmoy had accomplished or had participated in would follow. Every day a new list would appear, and very rarely would there be a day without something to report.
Just before starting play of his usual round of morning tennis, Sri Chinmoy could be seen walking slowly across towards the blackboard to carefully study the list, and many times he would comment on what had been written. No doubt it brought back many fond memories for him.
Since his arrival in the West in 1964, many disparate lists have been compiled – running times and athletic highlights; poems written and songs composed; concerts performed and lectures delivered; weights hoisted and people lifted; paintings completed and drawings sketched; meditations, meetings, peace initiatives and prayers – viewed altogether, they represent an impressive chronology of achievement that reads more like the combined biographies of several highly talented people rather than one individual.
It is by the dedicated efforts of many who have meticulously recorded these events, which form the narrative of Sri Chinmoy’s remarkable life, that we are able to look back across the decades to take in this grand overview. We are grateful to all those who have collected and preserved this information over the years.
It is hoped that this section will, in some small way, carry on this inspirational tradition.
— Animesh Harrington
The information in the following pages has been compiled from many sources – Sri Chinmoy Library, Sri Chinmoy Songs, Sri Chinmoy TV and Radio Sri Chinmoy; Sri Chinmoy Centre newsletters, magazines, periodicals1; and informational booklets2; newspaper and magazine articles, radio and TV interviews; yearly calendars and index cards; as well as analog and digital recordings.
Bibliography:
1 AUM (monthly magazine)
Jharna-Kala (art quarterly magazine)
Meditation at the United Nations (monthly bulletin)
Anahata Nada (monthly newsletter)
2 A Galaxy of Luminaries, Agni Press, New York, 1978
Sri Chinmoy: The Student of Peace (second edition), Aum Publications, New York
Sri Chinmoy: Emissary of Oneness-Peace
Sri Chinmoy A Global Man of Peace
Sri Chinmoy Dreamer of World Peace, Agni Press, New York, 1998 & 2000
Sri Chinmoy A Oneness-World-Dreamer
Oneness-World Peace-Blossoms, Sri Chinmoy: The Peace Meditation at the United Nations, 25th Anniversary
500 Compassion-Blessing-Blossoms