Odiyan

[Yazata]

This post is inspired by Zinj's thread. His post sounds like Odiyan here in Northern California. Totally flabbergastingly mind-bogglingly amazing, but largely unknown and even a little mysterious. Almost zero publicity. I think that's the way they want it to remain. It would be a tourist attraction if people knew, which might be why they don't want people to know. They figure that those who need to know about it will learn about it.

http://odiyan.org/

Odiyan is built entirely by volunteers, for whom the work is kind of a meditation. The overall effect that they've accomplished is psychedelic. You just don't expect something like this to be over the next hill.  

You don't have to be a Buddhist to volunteer (but it helps). Volunteers get a shared room with a roommate, vegetarian meals and $150/month expenses and plenty of Buddhist teaching (if you want it, it's optional). For 12 hours/day and 6 days/week hard physical labor. (What a deal!) They want a minimum 6 month commitment. You can't approach it like a job, it's more like temporary monasticism. On the other hand, you might learn several useful trades here.

http://volunteer.odiyan.org/work/

This thing has a large central temple, made partly of marble, surrounded by a moat, with architecturally striking temples surrounding it in three of the four directions. (The fourth northern direction is up the mountain and is vacant, seemingly awaiting something especially cool befitting the location overlooking everything else.) In this photo, the central temple is shown along with one of the outlying temples above it, this western one with walls of glass blocks (each with a Buddha sculpture). (It looks very cool at night, illuminated from within.)

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And this southern one is metallic, made of bronze. I believe that it was made in several huge pieces that were some of the largest bronze castings ever attempted. All done by volunteer metalworkers.

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Here's the eastern one covered in gold leaf

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An air-view from the north.

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More photos here, including the kitchens, foundry, sculpture studios, animals that roam the property (from horses to peacocks) and various stuff.

http://volunteer.odiyan.org/photos/

[Magical Realist]

Meditative hard labor. Hmmmm...I'll have to think about that one.

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[Zinjanthropos]

Too bad.....the moat looks great in first shot but algae seems to have claimed it in the last pic.

[Yazata]

Too bad.....the moat looks great in first shot but algae seems to have claimed it in the last pic.

Yeah, it's true. But they probably have people working on it. I suspect that the algae bloom is seasonal, that it comes on during the summer (our dry season) and goes during the winter (our rainy season). They should drain the moat periodically and let the streams and rains refill it, to keep it from going stagnant. Maybe they couldn't refill it as often as they should have during the recent California drought.

(Would a Buddhist want to kill those poor algae, fellow living beings just trying to survive? I guess that algae aren't sentient beings and hence wouldn't suffer.)

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Meditative hard labor. Hmmmm...I'll have to think about that one.

Hey, free room (shared) and board (vegetarian), plus $150/month! And just for 12 hours a day, six days a week hard labor. How can anyone complain about that?

On the other hand, you have the opportunity to learn all the construction trades (carpentry, concrete, electrical, plumbing, hvac), ornamental bronze foundry work, welding, light and heavy machinery operation, along with landscaping, gardening, quantity cookery, farming and animal husbandry (they raise horses), food preparation and preservation, as well as sculpture, Buddhist art and religious architecture. After people have been there for sufficient time, they can get into project management, budgeting and crew-training. There are opportunities to learn Tibetan language, meditation and there are even philosophy discussion groups.

You could come away from this with some practical skills, able to perform real jobs out there in the real world.

And perhaps most important, it's an opportunity to learn some very different mental habits.

http://volunteer.odiyan.org/learn/

[Secular Sanity]

OMG, I’ve seen it, Yazata.  I love old cars and there’s a guy in Cazadero that restores old jeeps. I think it’s called Willys America.  There’s a great little deli there, too.  If you're ever there, you should try their pizza.  I caught a glimpse of it through the redwood trees.  It's way out in the middle of nowhere.  You can barely see it from the road. I tried to get a better look at it, but there’s a prison type fence surrounding the entire property.  And you’re right, most of the locals don’t even know that it's there.