morning at a zen garden - pune

the quick trip to pune.
catching up on the effervescent folks at the urban ashram.
who took me to taljai hills.
to the zen garden created by pandurang tambe.
a simple man who has spent over 7 years years regenerating a plot of 3 acres in the midst of a degraded forest area spread over 500 acres.
and just as a simple, ordinary citizen.
the Pune Municipal Corporation 'arden' report of 2006 says:

Making good use of his morning walk time for gardening, Mr Pandurang Tambe, a resident of Sahakar Nagar, single-handedly transformed a 3-acre wasteland into a green patch on the Taljai Hill. He used the process of Trap water, percolate water and changed the look of the land.

so a bunch of 7 of us landed up at this spot and joined tambe kaka in this work.
today was essentially de-rocking the slopy section of the hill.
uprooting rocks (all igneous) of all sizes was the plan.
the small ones get gathered in piles which he then uses to create bunds to prevent water/soil run off (erosion). the large ones become spots of assembly for people's backsides.
for over 2 hours, we had a blast - all this just by simple labour of shifting rocks and watching his dedication, simplicity and energy.
just rocking.