Fire of Transformation

The house is not only close to the University but also to Brera and everything that happens there. So many friends come to visit us and sexual relationships are a very important means of expression, our discovery of freedom and love, of contact, union. Even though he knows I'm still quite an atheist, my boyfriend Giuliano has given me some Buddhist books to read, and I do accept that the rational, scientific mind isn't able to know the whole of reality, it can't explain feelings in the heart, can't explain telepathic communication. Science and technology have taken human beings far away from nature, linking people to a reality that is mechanical, robotic, without a soul. Our cities have become stressful and depressing places, people living in isolation from each other, captured by television and the mass media, busily engaged in the pursuit of material toys, like restless children never to be satisfied. In order to earn money, humans are devastating the earth, cheating other people, adulterating food, polluting the natural resources through a lack of awareness, poisoning themselves. In some countries on the earth people waste so many resources, while elsewhere other people still die from hunger; where has humanitarianism gone nowadays?

I know that what we are really seeking is a change in people's hearts, for a revolution of the soul of the earth, and that it is communities like ours which are spiritual research centres. I believe that it is now possible for us to change our society, but only if we create change from inside it, slowly, slowly, with groups of people beginning to live in a different way.

3 October 1970

I am considering the idea of visiting India in order to study Eastern philosophy for a while, maybe it can offer some different answers to the puzzle of life.

Giuliano explained to me that the East and the West have very diverse opinions about life. In the West people pursue all their desires thinking that to fulfil one' s desires will bring satisfaction, bring them happiness, whereas in the East people think that desire itself is the cause of all suffering and that peace and real happiness are only found at the end of desire, in Nirvana.

The author 1970

18 February 1971

I have completed my degree in philosophy and my professor had nothing but praise for my thesis about Utopia. Now I would like to organize an experimental kindergarten, because I believe that in order to bring about change in people it is necessary to begin in childhood, when ideas and feelings are first shaped. I no longer have any contact with the political groups, because they have adopted very violent tactics and I don't agree with that approach at all.

Giuliano has spoken to me about Mahatma Gandhi, the great Indian saint and politician, who defeated a mighty country like Britain through a widespread and well organized non-violent movement. Our true strength is spiritual and if we really want to achieve something we should become spiritual warriors because our true power is the power of a new consciousness. We must live truth and show it to the world. Our revolutionary spirit need not die, but we should be able to change reality with new tools. Violence is an old technique and belongs to the past.

10 June 1971

It's summertime again and once more large groups of people meet up in the various haunts in Brera, many returning from India, describing their encounters with Indian gurus and Tibetan lamas. I have met Piero and Claudio, two young men who became Buddhists in Nepal and when they recount their experiences to me I find myself beginning to be really curious about India.

We invade the little streets like a new tribe, with our guitars, posters, outrageous clothes, smoking joints together, similar to the ritual pipe of the Native American tribes. We talk endlessly about India as if we'd discovered a new planet, about our dreams, our longing for an authentic existence, for a distant, mysterious wisdom. Many people have taken LSD and tell of psychic, inner journeys, exploring the deep mystery of the human mind, infinite in its potential. It seems that LSD can open up certain areas of the brain which otherwise remain unexplored, resulting in telepathic, divine experiences, unknown beforehand. It's like sudden enlightenment, a new knowledge of oneself. One has to be ready to risk everything, to die psychologically in order to be reborn in to a new reality, like the hero prepared to combat any peril in order to discover the truth, willing to undergo all manner of darkness in order to find the light.

Conventional members of the public think we are crazy, addicted to drugs, but in fact we prefer to be outsiders and risk ending up in jail or prison, rather than be addicted to television and advertising. Regular society rejects the psychedelic drugs, but readily accepts alcohol, because alcohol makes one oblivious to everything, unconscious, just ready to buy the advertiser's products.

Our movement is becoming an underground organization, virtually secret because society at large is unwilling to accept us, but we work on with a growing awareness of the deep changes happening and the possibility of a different world. Some of my friends have gone to live in the countryside, discovering a simpler way of life close to nature.

I think we can only change others by offering an example. People criticize us, call us freaks, drug addicts, but the psychedelic drugs are a medicine for our minds, a cure against mental rigidity and hardness, they help us to discover our soul, our heart, blocked by the lack of pure love. We begin to feel that life is a cosmic film, directed by a divine power to which we have been blind for too long.

Sometimes I become afraid, doubts surface, I think I may go mad, but our so-called normal society seems even more insane. Most people take a powerful drug on a daily basis that creates a strong addiction: the television screen, nourishing themselves with contrived fantasies, useless panel games, sport. Some spend thousands on buying a couture dress or a car, while at the same time so many millions are dying in the Third World.

I want to take a risk, to go 'on the road', like a pilgrim, or a beggar. I am thirsty for truth and for real love, but at least at present my life is joyful, full of warmth and friendship, of human exchange, of adventure.

We move around the city wearing our beautifully coloured clothes, endeavouring to give a message to the people, a message of freedom and creativity, of fresh hope. We have plans to construct alternative villages on the planet based on universal love, practical steps, whereas in the past our political movement has just been an act of great passion.

Sometimes there are difficulties to be faced, lazy people in our groups, parasites, people who escape from the responsibility of life into morphine and other heavy drugs, but one day we shall overcome. I know that we are the pioneers for a new world. In the meantime we are learning to help each other, to share everything, money, a house, a job or a business, friends and love, much love, again and again; it's the discovery of a new solidarity, a new human co­operation.

Formentera, 4 July 1971

I am here with Giuliano and Dinni, on this tiny Spanish island where hippies from all over the world have come to find new purpose in their lives. The island is arid, sunny, homely, with wonderful little beaches and the sea turquoise-blue. The landscape is flat and many people move around on bicycles, the houses are small and white, rather like Greece and on some of the walls people have written the forbidden word: 'LSD'. The three of us spend all day by the sea only eating fruits, nourishing ourselves with the energy of the sun and in the evening eating some brown rice. We have decided to take LSD together.

29 July 1971

The experiment with acid has been a huge revelation for me, I have seen all my past lives, or at least I thought I could see them. I had the experience of having been a thousand beings and that now I can be at one with everybody and everything if I can just expand my consciousness. At the end of the experience I saw only light, a blazing, white light enveloping all of reality. I feel a cosmic consciousness breathing through the universe and through myself. Dinni has also undergone a similar experience and Giuliano had visions of certain Christian saints.

We bathe naked on the beach in absolute innocence. Having sex is not so important any more, but we are thirsty for our fantastic, spiritual visions. I sensed an unknown voice talking to me from inside my body and telling me I should leave everything behind and go to India. It frightens me and yet I am also really tempted by the call. This island resembles a laboratory where people experiment with the light of the soul on a high frequency. Suddenly I perceive the magic of a new energy within myself, guiding my life.

Milan, 25 September 1971

On my return home I hurried to Brera once again in the evening to meet everybody and share my new discoveries. Piero and Claudio are visiting the community and have shown me some photographs of their Tibetan teachers, standing close to the snow-covered Himalayan peaks. There is something about the images that is both remote and familiar at the same time. When Piero and Claudio come to visit me in 'Via Mayr' they impress me, because I recognize something very serious and concentrated in them that is not present in other people, a special depth. Piero made love with me the other day in a soft, gentle way, detached, as if it were a strange meditation. They asked me if I would like to go to India with them, soon.

Last week we organized a huge, underground rock concert at 'Ballabio', in the countryside. We gathered all our hopes and all our songs: old revolutionary and anarchist songs, the American ones and our new repertory, Claudio sang Magic Fly. The concert turned into a huge gathering of people and in the night fires were lit and sitting around them I saw the new tribe of earth' s people: the Indians, the Tibetans, the freaks, the students, the artists, the musicians, the politicians, the journalists, all sitting together, like ancient gypsies looking for a new land. So many friends were present and their eyes were transparent, full of light and love and I sat around the many fires, to talk, or just share the presence, communion on a common path.

15 November 1971

I am working in the experimental kindergarten I organized with Giuliano's help, but I'm finding out that it's not easy for me to work with the children. We want to give them maximum freedom and fantasy, instead of repressing them with an orthodox, heavy-handed authority, but it's a difficult task. The children are very restless and I don't feel mature enough for this job.

I lead a crazy life not regulated by time, never eating or sleeping regularly, always meeting up with friends until late in the night. Gianni now lives with me and has transformed my room into an oriental shop, filling it up with clothes he is buying from Turkey and Afghanistan. Quite often there are four or five other people sharing the carpet on the floor with me to sleep on.

We continue to experiment with LSD and Piero has taught me some Tibetan and Indian prayers, which I have begun to repeat, and I even teach them to the children in the kindergarten. I still feel uneasy about the idea of God, but I have started to have many visions, seeing beautiful mandalas with perfect colours, hearing incredible music and mysterious voices talking to me. Sometimes I am afraid of going crazy, or becoming addicted to drugs, but at other times I feel I have been initiated into a hidden reality only revealed to a few people, to those who have the courage to risk everything, even their own life. What is certain is that we are looking for knowledge and for the mystery of life and death. Our projects take us so far away from the usual pathways of this world.

I have started to think seriously about going to India, to find the masters of the ancient wisdom, to seek an answer to all the many questions that are arising in me. I'm finding it extremely difficult to travel alone on this psychic path and at times even dangerous. Recently I read a Buddhist book about the life of Milarepa, where this Tibetan yogi explains that it's impossible to reach enlightenment without the help of a guru, without his knowledge.

My life here is exciting in many ways, but I've begun to feel very tired and restless. Something is missing; real love is such a difficult thing to realize. I feel that we are still too deeply involved on the physical level in our search and our minds are in no way clear enough to visualize the truth.

I would like to stop running around, to be able to be quiet for a while, even live alone so as to look deep within myself. We are continually meeting up with each other, over and over again making love, touching each other and talking endlessly, but I feel I want to stop this pattern.

During the day I work in the kindergarten, at night I hardly sleep, I experience so many sad moments in Milan and often I feel exceptionally tired. I am sure that an inner journey has begun, an adventure that is without boundaries, capable of taking me anywhere that is required. When I sit with people, often smoking together in a circle, I exist as if in a dream, and the oriental music, sweet, languid, resounding within me, invites my soul to another dimension. We are being called to be sure, maybe by God! Even though the thought of that is still difficult for me to accept, I'm beginning to believe that it's only Him we are searching for, only Him we want to see.

* * *

Trip to India

Milan, 5 March 1972

Today I am leaving for India and I'm really frightened. I made the decision all of a sudden when I discovered that Piero and Claudio were going. Gianni wants to come as well so that he can start up some sort of business buying and selling clothes.

A few nights ago we were sitting in the big community room in the commune with the dome of yellow brocade in the centre: Angelo, Tiziani, Serena, Gianni, Zizi and Marco, a group of friends lying on the carpet with a Joan Baez record playing. Angelo started to make sexual advances towards me again and suddenly I felt as if it was an old theatrical performance, too repetitive, leading nowhere, like one of the narrow, dark streets in Brera at night and it annoyed me.

I felt tired, bored, exhausted as well as feeling unable to find truth or experience real love any more; trying to rediscover it through sex, again and again, is exhausting and a pathetic illusion. Also I'd become tired of smoking dope interminably, even my thoughts seemed smoky and I had no peace of mind. What I would have preferred was to have a place of my own, to be able to take a break and stay somewhere where I could be alone for a while, look within myself. I'd also realized that the work I did with the children in the kindergarten couldn't continue the way it was, I was too restless, confused, not mature enough for such responsibility. Then the other day Piero and Claudio showed me the pictures again of Nepal and the Tibetan masters. I imagined a mysterious and magical place, ancient; it felt like a déja vu experience looking at those photographs. Piero has a special light in his eyes and I wondered if I should follow him.

So, yesterday evening I left my house to sleep with Gianni in his attic flat, in order to decide definitely what to do. As always we slept close together but like brother and sister, like children, and the next morning I went to the travel agents to buy a ticket to India; I secured the last vacant seat on the plane. Tonight we are travelling to London by train and then we will fly to India, to Bombay. I am afraid and who knows if it will work out! People think I've gone mad, because I am leaving behind my job in the kindergarten where I've worked for six months, my loving relationship with Angelo, my house and my friends. I have very little money, no return ticket, no luggage, but even so it still feels right that I should be leaving in this way, taking nothing with me. All I carry is a bag and one dress, the one Gianni brought me from Afghanistan.

Gian Paolo has given me a book entitled, Barefoot in India and whatever the cost to myself I have no doubt that I should just throw myself fully into this adventure. I know I must be extremely courageous to be 'on the road' completely, especially because at times I feel absolutely terrified. Even so I intuitively feel that on the 'other side of the river' I will discover an answer that will make sense of the mystery of my life; that somewhere there is another reality waiting for me. What's the point of living otherwise? Life here in Milan lacks truth and no longer has any meaning for me any more.

The whole situation feels extraordinarily magical as if a wise voice is calling me. In a way it seems that my journey had already begun a few months ago with my first experience of LSD in Formentera. Or maybe it occurred in a more subtle sense with Guiliano in Morocco, sitting on the beach, stringing beads together and watching the gulls flying over the sea. Their flight reminded me about freedom, a freedom that I had forgotten or perhaps never known and now, about to travel to India, I begin to experience those same spontaneous sensations of infinite freedom. I know that I will find the courage to jump into the void and the mystery, to search for and discover some sort of solution, maybe find a teacher.

Last summer in Formentera during my experiences with acid I had visions of many of my past lives as well as a realization of a unified universal consciousness. I envisaged an enormous light comprising of seven perfect colours and saw my soul exiting my body and immersing itself in space. From there I observed the immense flow of life, the lives I have lived, finally realizing that to remain in that state was the all and everything. A voice spoke to me, unequivocally telling me to leave everything behind and depart for India immediately, for a new adventure in consciousness.

The outer journey began by my being in Milan for these last few months; the inner journey involves seeking an answer, perhaps finding a Master.

* * *

Mother India

Bombay, 7 March 1972

Our arrival in Bombay was almost too much for me to take and I wanted to run away. Near the airport there are squalid huts, the weather is incredibly hot, the streets overflowing with people. The hotel is exceedingly dirty and full of hippies from Goa, crazy-looking, fascinating people. Outside the streets are teeming with beggars, lepers and children who tease me all the time, calling me a hippie, or shouting 'Hare Ram, Hare Krishna' in a mocking tone. I feel terribly uneasy, with my long dress, my wild hair; it's a completely different world here, a huge, incredible bazaar and I'm scared. Standing in front of the hotel is a strange hippie, a sort of holy man, with long blonde hair and a beard, dressed in dirty, white clothes and I'm afraid of him as well. I found myself thinking that he could take possession of my mind, and I automatically began to repeat a mantra which Piero had taught me, a prayer to the many Indian gods: 'Hari sharanam, Shiva sharanam, Ram sharanam, Prabhu Krishna sharanam...' - my refuge is in Shiva, in Ram, in Lord Krishna...

It's so terribly hot and I have to constantly fight off a feeling of drowsiness. Everybody is smoking dope in our room and it is hard to resist. We drink copious amounts of boiling hot, milky tea and stuff ourselves with sugary sweetmeats that are very greasy, and I feel nauseous. The restaurants are filthy and I don't like the food at all, everything fried and spicy. I try to console myself a little with some fruit juices, but the beggars standing around me with their hands held out take away all my pleasure. I am afraid to walk down the streets alone and Piero and Claudio laugh and make fun of me; Gianni has already lost himself by taking opium and morphine.

Today I saw a snake charmer; and what impressed me the most were the beggar's eyes, ironic, almost happy, smiling at it all. People here seem to live as if in a dream, in a different kind of reality, with the knowledge that everything is relative, some sort of game. In my mind I compare their faces with those sad and pale faces of the wealthy people I used to see in the mornings on the tram in my home city of Milan, so tense and cold.

11 March 1972

Today I met a group of fascinating people from California, the young men dressed in white clothes and having long hair: they appear to be at home in India, sure of themselves. I also came across Lillo, a young Italian woman who resembles a little magical elf and she encourages me to throw away all of my existing clothes and wear white instead. Then I discovered the 'Rainbow Gypsies', people from every corner of the world, travelling continuously, with little money, almost no luggage and suspect documents. They travel around dancing and singing in the streets; they are very beautiful and rely on the hospitality of others in order to live. There is something magical about the way they live and I find myself enchanted by them.

One of them, Rosa, a striking young Italian woman, walks around with a monkey on her shoulder sucking at her breast, but I am especially attracted to Daniel and Sitaram, two Americans, who even though they are young appear so experienced and wise. I would like to become like them, courageous, fearless, sure of myself and to have the consciousness that they have. I've decided to colour my hair with red henna and have my hand tattooed, I feel it's my first act of courage.

12 March 1972

This morning while sitting in my room there was a knock at the door and in came Carlo. These days he is called Shanti and I hardly recognized him, I hadn't seen him for six years. He still has his childish smile, but that is now mixed with the expression of an elderly, wise man. Also he wears Indian clothes nowadays and his unexpected arrival has made a deep impression on me.

Shanti was one of the first people I knew who left Milan in order to discover the East. He travelled overland through Afghanistan and Pakistan to India six years ago when he was sixteen, in the same way that many other people did at that time. I really admired their courage and faith, travelling 'on the road', practically without any money, risking everything for their search. People tell me that Shanti has been in the company of many Indian gurus during the past few years and that he has now become a guru himself. He speaks in a strange way, slowly, very quietly. I want to stay close to him, because I feel he will be able to show me something.

In 1966, in an old part of the city of Milan, a group of us had our first experience of community in a small, impoverished attic that was freezing cold. That's where we smoked our first joints together and dreamt for the first time about the mystery of the East. Shanti and a few of his friends were among the first long-haired hippies around at that time. People derided and insulted them in the street, calling out: 'Hey layabout, go and get a job!'

I first met him together with Gianni at a restaurant in Brera. I offered them a meal and after that met them frequently. We got involved in all sorts of crazy activities on the streets of Milan, 'happenings' and cultural encounters for which we were eventually arrested a few times. Gianni actually got thrown out of San Vittore after having been attending there for a year and a half, because he was caught in possession of a small amount of hashish and he eventually ended up in jail. Then Shanti suddenly left for India hitch-hiking overland and so I parted company with them. During the time that followed I concentrated on my studies in philosophy at the University and became involved in the student movement of 1968.