Newsgroup: it.hobby.fai-da-te
Titolo: Quirky alternative to sunny spring breaks

A quirky alternative to sunny spring breaks
Rod Feuer
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March 27, 1996
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While most students seek out lands with sun-a-plenty during Spring Break,
some feel compelled to retreat to an environment that stimulates the mind,
body and soul by providing an escape from the monotony of everyday life.
This is just the type of trip 30 college students experienced when they
traveled to the Ozarks to beat some drums, do some dancing and connect with
the nature that surrounded them. In case you didn't realize, this
soul-searching opportunity was mentioned in the classified section of The
Chronicle during the weeks preceding Spring Break.
The five day trip was sponsored by the Renaissance Universal Club of the
University of North Carolina at Asheville in an attempt to provide a means
of self-enlightenment for those involved, says Janet Dorf, office manager of
Alternative Spring Break, an organization within the club. Students from
colleges all over the country traveled to the Retreat Center in Well
Springs, Missouri to "create a renaissance in all spheres of life-physical,
mental, spiritual, emotional," adds Shanti Dorf, the co-founder of the
Renaissance Universal Club at UNC-Asheville. The vacation included service
projects such as local highway cleanup and visits to the nearby nursing
home, where the students explored their instinctual theatrical ability
through spontaneous acts of comedy to entertain the residents.
Students got their daily exercise by participating in yoga classes and
hiking through the beautiful hills of the Ozarks. They also gained
experience in such activities as cooking, martial arts and even journalism
during daily workshops. The students were taught methods of caring for the
environment in a meeting with an ecologist; the ecologist taught them how to
test water for harmful chemicals and how to be more aware of the delicate
environment around them, Janet says.
Shanti, who was raised in a family which practiced yoga meditation, ate
vegetarian meals and instilled a strong sense of the environmental world,
says she started the alternative spring break program because she "wanted to
meet people who had similar interests."
Part of this year's program entailed a ceremony of a "Council of All
Beings," an animal and environmental sensitivity workshop. The purpose of
the workshop is to get people in tune with the environment and with animals,
Shanti explains.
Before the daily exercises in yoga meditation, the group performed the
Kiirtan, a spiritual Indian dance that helps one prepare to meditate. The
Kiirtan attempts to remove the individual from the distractions of the
external environment and helps him to focus internally, Shanti says. The
universal mantra "ba ba nam kevalam," meaning "love is all there is," is
chanted during the dance to help individuals with their internalization.
Cathy Wirth, a freshman at Swarthmore College, said that she went on the
alternative spring break, not because she had a strong desire for the
alternative sounds of Superchunk or Korn, but rather, because she, "really
needed to step back, take time, and think about myself... It gave me time to
appreciate myself and look inside myself."
And sometimes, isn't that just enough?
-Rod Feuer
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© 1998 The Chronicle / Duke University / 
comm...@www.chronicle.duke.edu

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o questo tipo e' completamente fuori di testa oppure io non riesco a
camprendere il sottile legame fra questo bel romanzetto e il presente NG
ciao
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andypi

 Chronicle during the weeks preceding Spring Break.
Ne prendo atto...
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