During our first visit in the fall of 2006, we came into the cemetery at about 2 AM, just before the exact full moon. We filled a small bowl with spring water and walked with it from tree to tree throughout the cemetery, greeting the spirits who abide here. It was a very windy night. Clouds were racing by so fast overhead that I could just about feel the earth we stood on spinning away in the opposite direction. One minute the bright moon was illuminating everything and the next we were walking blind in pitch blackness. As we approached each tree, holding out the bowl of water in welcome, the joy of exquisite communication welled up in our hearts and the water in the bowl brightened with effervescent life.

     So that’s what we did today. We filled two bottles with fresh spring water and added a few drops of the vibrational essence to each. Then we walked up the northern ramp to the hawthorn tree above the spring. This place is energetically quite different from below, where the water pours out of the rock. There’s the feeling of being behind and inside the spring, closer to the source. We sat on the short rock wall beneath the branches of the tree and played the wooden frogs that we had brought with us. Each one is hollowed out inside and has rasps along its back so that when a mallet is drawn along them the frog croaks. We noticed that this sound has a particular affinity with the root chakra.

    After about 15 minutes we got up and walked down the southern ramp to the southeast corner of the cemetery. We both felt that it wasn’t time to leave yet - something was making us linger. We were waiting for some sure send-off, without knowing what it would be. Because this was the first of the four walks we didn’t yet know to look for signs of the gathering energy or of the dispatch of the pulse as it begins its journey along the G-chi path. We would learn these things by experience as the days’ events unfolded.

     Two days earlier when we were moseying around here we had crossed paths with a man who was walking towards what used to be a hole in the fence at this southeast corner of the yard. He was very directed and had the gait of someone who was going someplace specific. We knew that hole had been closed off, though, so we wondered where he was going. If not there, then where? We didn’t stop to watch, but Allen became very curious and said he would investigate where the man was heading next time we returned to the cemetery.

    So now here we were again and that incident of a few days ago was remembered. Allen led the way and as we approached that corner we veered left as the man had done. We walked up a sloping path which had stone steps embedded into the grass. It curved around and led to a narrow, level path overlooking the cemetery below. We were level with the tops of the tall cemetery trees. This path was cleared of any growth and was easy to walk along. Set into the rock on our right side were about 10 open niches, one after the other in a line along the path. Most of them had been cleared of the vines that grew on the rock wall, and they must have been recently cleared because the vines were profuse between each one and would otherwise have covered the entrances and made them invisible.

     We walked along the path northwards past the remaining catacombs. It became more overgrown the further we went and by the time it reached the open area around the hawthorn tree it was well tangled with brambles and other plants which would make the path unnoticeable if approaching it from this end. We stepped through the brambles and descended the northern promenade into the main cemetery. Alerted by the dispatcher, we joined with the pulse that comes into the Giant’s body through the root chakra. This pulse would take us up along the Giant’s inner west energy channel to the crown, then down the outer east path to the fork, at which point we’d lead it off its usual circuit and onto the path that goes towards Sweetheart Park where the chimes are hung.

    We had been walking slowly through the alley, enjoying its qualities on this fine spring morning. It’s only a block long and when we reached its end and looked out onto the street, we saw that the pulse had gone on ahead of us and was heading west down Mount St. Of course the pulse is invisible in a material sense, but neither of us had any doubt as to its whereabouts, its speed and the direction it was heading. We caught up to it near the pile of Beatles’ suitcases cast in concrete on the plaza at Mount and Hope and kept with it as we went down the Mount St hill along the north side of the street. This was easy passage along a familiar route. We were cruising along with the wind behind us, still with the original momentum from the experience in the root chakra cemetery. Now we were riding the pulse and it was flowing steadily along the channel. We were becoming increasingly and more acutely aware of the landscape of the Giant we were within – a body so much bigger than our own, every outer element a manifestation of the innermost life of the Giant. It is an intimate landscape – that which is hidden and inaccessible within our own selves is here available all around us. This is a significant shift of consciousness and it feels great. We hold this hugeness inside of ourselves and have no way of expressing or even acknowledging it in the confines of a small, isolated body. But in the body of the Giant we experience the intimacy all around us without the need to bring it inside our smallness and personalize it.

    There’s great freedom in traveling with the pulse along the G-chi path in this way. Our minds were becoming easier and certainly more spacious. As well as the quick, local vibrations that we move through and around, there are qualities in the landscape that are large and steady flows, that don’t change from one moment to the next but are experienced continuously while we travel along. We feel grateful and joyous because the landscape contains, indigenously, gratitude and joy.

    We had turned north onto Roscoe St and arrived at a parking lot which borders on Roscoe Lane rising up the hill from the west. We’ve often stopped to sit for awhile on the short concrete wall that surrounds the parking lot and looked down that incline. These days Roscoe Lane is a short street, only one block long and really more of an alley. It could have been part of a longer, much-traveled route in days past. It seems to hold a memory of a time when people employed at the docks climbed this slope routinely on their way home after a long day’s work. They laid down their history with their footsteps, ground it into the road and the earth below it. Occasionally we’ve seen someone trudging up here with a tired and heavy walk as if they’re soaking up that history of hard labour through their feet. It’s not visible with everyone – there are other things going on in this lane – a café and artist studios, the entrance to the parking lot and often a congestion of traffic. But even without slow-moving people expressing history through their movements, the past is still palpable here. To the Giant, a span of 200 human years is not very long at all. It’s just over 3 weeks, Giant-time. The past is not forgotten.

    In the Giant’s body Roscoe Lane is a channel in the hara chakra which is not on the main G-chi path we travel now, although it intersects. It’s one of very many smaller energy paths in each chakra which are like tributaries, reaching and interconnecting local areas. Our main concern for now is to travel the long oval paths which span the full length of the Giant’s energy body. Future work will lead us into more explorations of the local paths to see how they operate within each chakra.

    Back to today’s walk: After we came down the steps at the northwest corner of the church, we immediately saw that the pulse was hovering around a man who was sitting on one of the benches just outside the fenced-in churchyard. There was a glow around him and he saw us coming at the same instant we saw him. He raised both arms into the air above him and waved his bag with liquor bottle inside, calling out for help to unscrew the cap off the bottle. He was already very drunk and couldn’t open it himself but he also wanted some company. He was willing to share the liquor with us if we’d join him. We got the cap off and stayed with him for a few minutes. It was a melancholy time - we laughed together but also felt the sadness that he lives with. He’s been at this for many years and it’s not so easy anymore.

    This event was very emotional. And also indicative of what goes on here. There’s lots of heavy drinking in this area and often there are people either on these benches or in the churchyard, drinking the day away. In the body of the Giant they’re an integral part of the functioning of the hara. What they bring to the hara chakra is valuable to the Giant. However right now it’s stuck in the hara and it needs to go to the Giant’s heart. There’s lots of deep feeling but unless it’s sent to the heart it overwhelms whoever’s carrying it and blocks the smooth flow of energies in the Giant’s body. This guy genuinely made us feel good – we were laughing together. He certainly knows something we don’t but he doesn’t know what to do with the huge emotions. He’s alone with something too big to handle, making what he knows inaccessible by drowning it daily in alcohol. It makes him both happy and sad.

    With this encounter we got our first look at how the pulse interacts with energies that are produced in the Giant’s chakras. Certain energies that arise in one chakra are needed in another. They are drawn to one of the main G-chi paths. As the pulse moves along it is naturally attracted to these energies and when they meet there is a simultaneous arising that takes the form of an event. (This is similar to the occurrence of the dispatcher that shows up at the start of the path – the pulse as it begins to move off arises simultaneously and inseparably with the energy that has accumulated at that place, and this occurrence manifests as the appearance of the dispatcher.)

    The meeting of the moving pulse with a ripe energy on a G-chi path is an auspicious event with heightened emotional qualities – it’s lit up in some way. There’s an exchange of energy – both picking up and dropping off occur. The pulse is imprinted with the structural essence of the arising energy. At the same time, some of the original energy that first formed the pulse when it entered the body of the Giant from the root chakra (in this case) is released into the chakra where the energy is now arising. This energetic exchange is seen as an event. And a remarkable event, where it’s recognized right away that “something’s happening”. The man on the bench was affected and changed during the encounter – we could see him basking in its glow for several minutes before the pulse moved off. And the pulse was affected by the event as well – it was imprinted with the symbol of the encounter and carries this imprint with it as it continues along the path.

     This event we entered into was the first of a number of such imprint exchanges we would encounter as we traveled along with the energy pulse. It’s hard to put such encounters into words because of the multi-leveled content these exchanges contain. Perhaps it’s better to view them as symbols, and we will do this for each of the imprint exchanges we encountered this day. So the symbol for this first exchange is

    The pulse crossed Hardman St in the middle of the block before reaching Rodney then continued up the north side of Hardman, eventually turning north onto a small street to enter the area of the will chakra. The will chakra takes up a relatively small area in the body of the Giant compared with the other chakras. In keeping with its overall compact size we’ve discovered many compact places within it, each one buzzing with energy.

    One such place is on the street just west of the one we were on now. It’s an internet café situated a few steps down from the sidewalk. Inside are several big poster boards loaded with notices of upcoming events of all sorts. An inner door of the café links it up to the lobby of a travelers’ hostel. The people who work here always seem to be involved in several activities at the same time. They move between the hostel and the café, making arrangements for travelers and taking orders for lunch. They disappear for extended periods of time to do who-knows-what. The 5 or 6 computers are busy with people checking their email. The whole place is vibrant with crisscrossing lines of energy moving through.

    It’s clear that the café has a very specific function in the Giant’s energetic body. We expect that any giant would have such a specific landscape in its will centre, expressed only slightly differently and still recognizable as the same vital part within the whole. We don’t know how the activity of this place affects and influences the whole body. We need to see and experience a lot more about the Giant before an understanding of the workings of such places evolves. All we know for sure is that it’s a significant place with an important function in the energy landscape of the Giant.

     Today the pulse is not moving along the internet café street, though. There are sometimes variations in the exact route of the G-chi paths although these variations are not extreme. One street to the right or left is still within the range of the channel. The pulse takes the path of least resistance.

    If a straight line is drawn from the spring in the root chakra all the way to the firepit in the crown chakra, it passes right through this courtyard. We sat down on one of the benches beneath the spreading branches of a tree. From this perspective we could see the back of a small chapel off to the west. The yard surrounding the chapel looks open and approachable as if you could just walk right up to it and step over the crumbling wall into it. In fact, though, the chapel is boarded-up and fenced-off all around and is unreachable from any direction. Between the chapel and the bench are some large trees and a bit of open space that shines with a unique and delicate light, like moonlight, that’s brighter than everything around it. Although the history of this courtyard location is unknown to us it seems likely that it was associated with the chapel and the church that stands beside it before it became part of the university campus. The fenced area that now surrounds the chapel and church is very small, just a minimal yard crowding the buildings and a tiny cemetery. But this courtyard is alive with an energy that has an affinity with the chapel. Boundaries change, they come and go in the world. But energetic landscapes are not necessarily defined by fences.

    We played the frogs quietly. Students were milling around and lots of birds were singing. People were coming and going from the library and other buildings around the courtyard, others were passing through along the walking paths. Conversations, footsteps, birdsong, traffic sounds, the frogs, all mixed together. A quiet radiance touched everything. After a few minutes we both noticed that all the movements were harmonious - steps were in sync with sounds, there was a refined dance going on. At the same time, nothing was different from normal. No one stopped their regular ways to remark on the rare quality, nothing was changed. We watched and listened to this together, without a word. After about 10 minutes the show stopped. Suddenly there were no more people around. The square was deserted. The music dissolved into the usual separate sounds again.

    Something about this place makes a shift of perception possible, even likely. Several times before while sitting on this bench we’ve had a sight similar to the one we had today. There’s an awareness residing in the landscape itself and when we show up here we have an opportunity to join in with the landscape’s own experience. It’s definitely worthwhile. The reliably transcendent perception available from the bench makes this courtyard a remarkable place in the will chakra. It’s similarly strong to Sweetheart Park in the heart chakra. And both of these places are situated along the midline of the Giant.

     Even from this angle, and standing as it does behind a very prohibitive fence, the chapel has a lovely presence. We stopped to appreciate it for a few minutes. It seemed as though the chapel was surrounded by, even floating within, a graceful energetic field. Although the building is physically inaccessible, it would be a mistake not to acknowledge that there’s an energy here that is very accessible indeed. Here it’s not hard to see the unseeable, to move beyond the obvious physical limitations and to accept the open-hearted invitation to enter. There’s a steady, unchanging hum, a song that might or might not be sung if the chapel was open for people to come in.