It’s springtime in San Diego, and the Sri Chinmoy Peace Garden in North Park is in full bloom!
Sri Chinmoy was a spiritual leader from India who taught meditation in the United States. What better place to meditate but in a place of tranquil beauty.
The Sri Chimnoy Peace Garden was established in 2013 and includes a statue of the spiritual leader and benches for quiet sitting.
The small garden, located off Adams Avenue just east of Arizona Street, has been maintained by the San Diego Sri Chimnoy Centre, which according to Google is permanently closed. As a sign explains, the natural setting is intended to enhance the beauty of the area and offer the community a place for reflection.
Spring is a time for renewal–perhaps for the soul as well.
Sri Chinmoy – STUDENT OF PEACE – CHAMPION OF THE INDOMITABLE SPIRIT OF MANKIND
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As it rained in San Diego yesterday, children played hide and seek on a sidewalk near Father Joe’s Villages. The bronze sculptures of small children caught my eye as I rode a bus past the Saint Teresa of Calcutta Villa, where homeless people transition into permanent housing.
I had discovered the Father Joe Memorial Promenade.
The promenade was completed two years ago. It honors Father Joe Carroll, who during his life helped thousands of unsheltered people in San Diego. His footprints are in the sidewalk. A memorial plaque remembers his unselfish love. There are words to be read on several planters. More plaques can be read near the Saint Teresa of Calcutta Villa entrance.
The Father Joe Memorial Promenade and its hopeful sculptures were designed by architect Jowaan Lee from J2 Ventures.
Would you like to follow Father Joe’s footsteps? Will you touch many in San Diego who feel hopeless, and provide hope?
Learn more, and perhaps provide a donation to Father Joe’s Villages on their website here.
THE FATHER JOE CARROLL MEMORIAL PROMENADE
During his 40 years of service in downtown, Father Joe Carroll taught the San Diego community to see those living on the streets as neighbors. Through the eyes of grace, he looked beyond the difficulties of the past and thechallenges of the present to believe in a better future for each person he met, and taught others to do the same.
As they beckon us to join in their game of hide and seek, the carefree children playing along this path–Faith, Grace, Hope and Peace–remind us that everyone we encounter was once a child whose life was full of possibility…
Faith sees the light in your heart when all your eyes see is darkness.Grace silences the past and opens you to the opportunities of a brighter future.Peace hears the calm within you amid the noise of life.Father Joe’s Villages has always been about neighbors helping neighbors. This is a place where people from all walks of life–rich and poor, educated and not, needy and well-off–come together as equals to change peoples’ lives. –Father Joe CarrollIn 2013 the Congressional Medal of Honor Society honored Father Joe Carroll as a Citizen Hero for his selfless service and dedication to all…
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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!
I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!
I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X (formerly known as Twitter)!
This morning I saw this and more as participants prepared for the 42nd Annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day Parade along San Diego’s beautiful Embarcadero.
Every year the MLK Day parade along the waterfront is a big deal. Thousands come out to watch community groups celebrate Martin Luther King, Jr. and his enduring message of human dignity, equality and love.
Dancers, marching bands, students, veterans, beauty queens, activists, club members, law enforcement, politicians, businesses, car lovers, charitable organizations . . . all would move proudly down Harbor Drive.
I took photographs of everyone coming together before the start of the parade.
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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!
I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!
I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X (formerly known as Twitter)!
A little-seen plaque in Old Town San Diego State Historic Park marks the original site of the San Diego Peace Memorial. The bronze plaque is located near the corner of San Diego Avenue and Twiggs Street, in an unobtrusive spot behind the Old Town Trolley Tours ticket booth.
The plaque reads: Honoring San Diego’s sons and daughters who lost their lives in the Vietnam War, and remembering those who remain missing. 1964-1975. First dedicated on this site in 1969. Relocated to the Veterans Memorial Center, Balboa Park, 2115 Park Boulevard, San Diego, in 1996.
Back in 1969, volunteers created two concrete monuments on Roman Catholic Diocese land here in Old Town. Plaques listed those from San Diego County who were killed or designated missing in action during the Vietnam War. Two more plaques full of names were added to the San Diego Peace Memorial in 1974. It was one of the first Vietnam War memorials in the United States.
In 1994 the diocese sold the property and the memorial was moved to the Veterans Museum and Memorial Center in Balboa Park.
In 2014, on New Year’s Eve, I visited the the renamed Vietnam Veterans Peace Memorial in Balboa Park.
You can revisit that old blog post by clicking here.
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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!
I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!
I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X (formerly known as Twitter)!
In San Diego this afternoon, blue and yellow umbrellas sheltered a tight-knit gathering from the rain. Supporters of Ukraine met near the El Cid statue in Balboa Park’s Plaza de Panama, waving flags, giving heartfelt speeches, asking for help.
It’s now a year since Putin’s Russia invaded Ukraine, and in San Diego many are appalled that dictatorship and murderous barbarism can rise again in the 21st century.
Powerful images and messages that concern one year of Defending Freedom surrounded the group.
As I stood in the crowd listening, a young person voiced her optimism that Freedom, in the end, would prevail.
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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!
I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!
I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
An exhibition of posters concerning the war in Ukraine is presently on view in downtown San Diego. I viewed the collection of posters today in the second floor art gallery at UC San Diego Park & Market.
These moving, thought-provoking, sometimes chilling posters are presented by AIGA San Diego Tijuana. The Graphis: Designers for Peace Poster Exhibition brings together juried posters from around the world.
The free exhibition is also working to raise funds to aid the devastated people of Ukraine.
I don’t know how much longer these posters will be displayed, so you might want to head downtown to UCSD’s presence at Park & Market and view them soon.
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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!
I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!
I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
Please enjoy this photograph of an inspiring mural in National City. Its message is perfect for the beginning of the Holiday Season.
This is a season for smiles, joined hands, and wishes for Love, Harmony and Peace in our world.
Riders can glimpse the beautiful artwork from the San Diego Trolley’s Blue Line, just south of where the tracks pass under Interstate 5. The mural is in a corner of a parking lot near the intersection of Wilson Avenue and Civic Center Drive.
As you can see, the words are very similar to the lyrics from that classic song Get Together by The Youngbloods.
COME ON PEOPLE, SMILE ON EACH OTHER.
EVERYBODY GET TOGETHER.
TIME TO LOVE ONE ANOTHER.
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Those who participated in this walk for peace were invited up in groups of four to ring the large bell, which was forged in Japan. The bell was given to San Diego in 1958 by the city of Yokohama, its Sister City, as a token of eternal friendship. The bell symbolizes the hope for everlasting peace.
The traditional bronze bell, six feet high and almost two and half tons, was cast by Masahiko Katori, who has been called a Living National Treasure by the government of Japan.
I was expecting a loud booming clang when the swinging wooden pole struck the bell, but the sound was surprisingly low and mellow. It was a dignified, subtle, spiritual sound. The bell spoke with a voice that was strangely sublime.
Before the ringing of the Japanese Friendship Bell commenced, the taiko drumming group Genbu Daiko performed nearby.
In groups of four, people approach the Japanese Friendship Bell on Shelter Island.
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Thank you for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!
I post new blogs pretty often, so you might want to bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and check back from time to time.
You can explore Cool San Diego Sights by using the search box on this website’s sidebar. Or click a tag! There’s a lot of stuff to share and enjoy!
I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
A very special event was held today on San Diego’s Shelter Island. The Pacific Rim Park Friendship Walk brought together many people who desire a better world, where everyone everywhere lives in peace.
The Friendship Walk was created by the Ilan-Lael Foundation, which was established in 1982 by world-renowned local artists James Hubbell and his wife Anne.
As we walked along Shelter Island’s Shoreline Park, led by the fun Chunky Hustle Brass Band, we saw several works of public art created by James Hubbell, and inspiring messages, and a sparkling view of San Diego Bay.
We started at Hubbell’s fanciful Pacific Portal, passed his female sculpture Pacific Spirit, and ended at the amazing Pearl of the Pacific. The Pearl of the Pacific is one of several Pacific Rim Parks uniting many nations, all inspired by Hubbell and built with many volunteer hands.
As you can see in the upcoming photos, we also passed the Shelter Island Pier and the Tunaman’s Memorial.
An awesome Japanese taiko drumming performance by Genbu Daiko was followed by many honorary speakers, including from a group that traveled to San Diego for the event from South Korea, and Drew, son of James Hubbell.
After checking out a couple of food trucks and an Ilan-Lael Pop-up Gift Shop, it was time to head over to Shelter Island’s historic Japanese Friendship Bell, to hear it ring. I’ll be blogging about that coming up!
I was told this was the first ever Friendship Walk. I hope there are many more to come!
Friendship begins with a smile.
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Thank you for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!
I post new blogs pretty often, so you might want to bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and check back from time to time.
You can explore Cool San Diego Sights by using the search box on this website’s sidebar. Or click a tag! There’s a lot of stuff to share and enjoy!
I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
I walked a little through downtown San Diego this morning and this evening. And the first thing I photographed was the above sign We Stand With Ukraine.
Later, I’d see other instances of San Diego businesses and residents standing in solidarity with the Ukrainians, who have been suffering for a month now during the brutal Russian invasion orchestrated by Putin.
The civilized world has been watching the shocking events in Ukraine with horror and great sadness.
May reason, compassion, and human liberty prevail.
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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
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