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I traveled through Africa with two important books, the first was Margaret Hone's best known book The Modern Text Book of Astrology, which was adopted as the official text-book for the F.A.S. (Faculty of Astrological Studies) of the United Kingdom for many years. The second was The Tarot - A Contemporary Course on the Quintessence of Hermetic Occultism. by Mouni Sadhu (1962). However I did not really get to study these until I was aboard the SS Congo returning to Marseille from the Ivory Coast. Here I had two full weeks alone in my cabin, wherein I accomplished, at length, the full re-calculation of my own chart. Arriving back in London I then set up a full workshop and began casting Horoscopes for all and sundry. (1972) But to tell a fuller story of how I became interested in Astrology. I must return to the fall of 1971, I had just returned to Vancouver after a long trip back home from the Marquesas, I was dead broke and returned to driving a Cab as a quick way to get out of debt. When you are driving a Taxi you often wonder if there might not be a better way of making money, and not long afterwards I devised a better way, which was based on a system to win at Roulette. My system was nothing more than an elaboration of the martingale (I didn't know then that this system had already been invented in the 18th-century). and so after some considerable testing of my system at home, decided to set off for Monte Carlo at the soonest possible occasion. By chance I saw one day, in the fine print of the Want Ads, someone offering Astrological services. This, I imagined, was someone who might be able to tell me whether or not I would have good luck at the tables. I gave him a call and set up an appointment after supplying all the necessary birth data. When I arrived at his place a week or so later, my chart was fully elaborated and he proceed with my reading, which was not so much about my future as it was my past. At the end of which I was so impressed that I asked the Astrologer how I might also learn this useful Science. He recommended Margaret Hone's book along with a number of others. Not long after, I booked a flight to London, as a first leg to Monte Carlo, and purchased the books that he recommended. He was not able to tell, or resisted telling me how things might turn out in Monte Carlo and soon, with these new books the idea of going to spend endless hours at the roulette tables faded and I was lured onto a different path which was to attempt an overland trip, going through Africa to Zanzibar to get a boat that passes through the Seychelles to Bombay and then continue on to in the usual way to Katmandu, Thailand, Bali to eventually return to Sydney and Cremorne Point. Normally such a trip is a huge undertaking even for a seasoned traveler. Sometimes called the Hippy trail, going through Africa was an even yet more complicated and dangerous variation of that trip. It all started though, quite accidentally one day in Twickenham, when I spotted in the street, a small hand written poster advertising a dirt cheap bus ride (something like 17 pounds) going from London to Marrakech, another legendary destination. (Note I have just found my original itinerary for this trip, the round trip ticket was 44 pounds, see Nirvana Overland.) I had not really planned out the overland trip but here was suddenly a chance to get headed in that direction. (see my web pages on this trip through Africa). After a few months of casting horoscopes in London I made up my mind to just fly out to Australia, as I was longing to return to the beautiful environment of Cremorne Point in Sydney (which was also a lot closer to the paradisiaque Islands of the South Pacific). There I planned to continue my Astrological work and Occult research. As it happened a friend of the family who was working in England, needed an assistant selling Central Heating door to door. He took me on and we traveled far and wide, while knocking on a lot of doors. In a short time I saw and learned a lot about England and the English. In some countries that you travel to or through, you sometimes feel, instinctively that you are not somewhere that you belong. However in England I always felt at home, of course some parts are better than others but on the whole I very much liked the place. Thus, traveling widely, and meeting a wide range of different people was a great and fortunate experience. That also yielded just enough money for the plane fare to Sydney. When I at last arrived, I found Cremorne point was unchanged and ever beautiful with its wonderful climate. I launched into my studies straight away and tried casting horoscopes in a semi professional way. It was around this time that I started looking into lucid dream control and astral projection via books from the famous Sydney Theosophical Bookshop. At some point I decided to try to systematically read all of The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky (1888). However some unexpected planetary influences soon guided me onto a new and completely different path. Go the next page: The Absolute Plan - 1974 |
