Flower of Blood

True to my words i am back again...

With that aboriginal story. But the great talker that i am it would leave me feeling incompetent if i'm not finished with what i have to say first.
It is strange how we can be miles apart and yet our stories have the same refrains. And in these stories we get to see teasers (for not knowing a better word i would prefer to call them that because i have not lived there to know it all) of the same rituals, cultures, beliefs and even dogmas...
When i had started out blogging i had done a post once which was followed by few others with stories linking the trees/plants and the first in the series was on Frangipani/ Plumeria which many of us in India know as Champa.   http://shivanidiwani64.blogspot.in/2010/04/whats-in-nameplumeria-or-frangipani.html

Not surprising then why Maneka Gandhi & Yasmin Singh's book ' Brahma's Hair' still remains one of my best books of all times.

''Ever wondered why coconuts are given as offerings in temples? Or why people prefer not to sleep under a tamarind tree? Or how the teak tree got its name

Read more at: http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/book-review-maneka-gandhi-and-yasmin-singh-brahmas-hair/1/314808.html ''

i actually blogged about this book too...

Now to the Flower of Blood...remember...yesterday's flower...Strut's Desert Pea/ Glory Flower/ Swainsona formosa the state floral emblem of South Australia...
This flower has a story too. A Koori story.

The Koori are the indigenous Australians that traditionally occupied modern-day New South Wales and Victoria.
http://www.kooriweb.org/foley/indexb.html 
And this is their story...a Koori story.

To the Kooris this flower is known as ' Flower of Blood '.

Legend has it that there was this beautiful young woman who did not want to get betrothed to this elderly man because she was in love with someone else. So to escape this sad marriage she eloped with her young lover. She and her lover took refuge in a relative's home far away and lived happily. Only thing this happiness was short lived. The shunned elderly man tracked the love birds down and mercilessly butchered both as well as the entire family of the relatives who had offered them refuge. Few years passed and one day that elderly man who had now become a tottering old lonely man was passing through that same place where he had slain the lovers and the relatives. He found the ground covered with blood. His eye sight had become poor. Fearing of some evil spirits he started shrieking and shivering in fear. His companions helped him and informed him that what he saw was not blood but that the ground was covered with, '' Flowers that looked like blood..."
Strut's Desert Pea... that's the story...short and tragic...with all the trappings of believe it or not...
We have many stories like that too..of our own trees...sacred or otherwise.
Yeah one has to be obsessed like me to be able to read...about believing well that's another topic and maybe later...

And all this talk about Koori...takes me to the film Australia and no not Nicole Kidman but that unique bond between Nicole Kidman and Nullah. How can i not remember Nullah's grandfather...and now i'm wondering if he was a Koori too...he could speak to animals...talk long distances in whispers...and make things happen...

Much like how our saints and sages who have achieved these powers through penance are able to do...
Finally thoughts come and halt at this...

All differences in this world are of degree, and not of kind, because oneness is the secret of everything.

Swami Vivekanand

Also because my thoughts took me to that movie some endearing images of that movie Australia uploaded from the net because i would like them to be here on this page. After all love is also ONE. If only we can understand that... 

image courtesy:
http://silviadimauro.deviantart.com/art/Aborigeno-Film-Australia-276430035
http://leciliegiedelcinema.ilcannocchiale.it/?TAG=recensione