The Synchronicity Mumbai Attacks

I am astonished at how often I see news items to which I can personally relate, despite my current lack of contact with the world at large.

In Mumbai, a place that has undergone one of those unfortunate changes of names, after having been called "Bombay" for so long, teams of gunmen with a bias against Westerners staying in and otherwise using the swankier establishments in that city roared into that area a couple of days ago, shooting, bombing, and taking hostages. Indian commandos have now largely taken charge and wiped out those guys, but the toll of victims is 80 or more dead.

Among those are two people from Virginia, and more specifically, from right here in the small rural county where I live, Nelson. A man named Alan Scherr and his daughter Naomi, age 13, were found shot dead in a cafe, near a hotel where, as part of a 25-member delegation from Synchronicity, a meditation group based about 20 miles from here, up in the northern part of the county, they were in Mumbai to attend a conference on high tech meditation. Also present was Synchronicty's leader, identified as a "swami of Tahtric Mysticism," Charles Cannon. Four other members of the group were also shot, though apparently Cannon was not among them.

Twenty-five or so years ago my wife and I were invited to attend one of their sessions. It was held in a circular building that, to the best of my recollection, suggested a huge metal teepee. This was a meditation hall, complete with comfortable reclining chairs, earphones for listening to rarefied space music, dim, bluish lighting, and interesting scents of incense being wafted from little machines mounted high overhead.

This was long ago, but I think the leader at that time was also named "Charles." I remember the name "Brother Charles," or maybe "Master Charles," and I wonder if Cannon is the same man. He was a sleek-looking, dark-haired guy, and he seemed almost too young to be the leader of a group that was obviously doing so well. I was told that in fact he had played one of the children on a highly popular TV comedy of the '50's or '60's, most likely "The Brady Bunch." If he is the same man, he is now, like the rest of us, almost old.

I think that he -- or someone -- appeared briefly on a small stage at one edge of the building to instruct us on how to medidate, and that was what we tried to do for the rest of the time, and failed miserably, though it was interesting and relaxing. At least I failed. I can meditate with the best of them, but apparently not on purpose.

I still have a tape and some literature of theirs from that era somewhere. Otherwise till just now Synchronicity had completely dropped off my radar scope. Not being notorious in any way, I don't think they ever attract local attention.

I only encountered them when they ordered some honey from me and a beekeeping friend who is now long since deceased. When we delivered the honey in 5-gallon containers, it took us a while to find anyone moving about. They must've all been in their "teepee" meditating. We took the time and the opportunity meanwhile to poke around unobtrusively, wondering what it was all about, looking over the exteriors of a melange of newly built, indiviculistuc buildings, and theorizing that it was a commune of some sort, of which an unusual number in some form or another could be found in the county or nearby.

It was very quiet there. It must be even quieter now.