Naitauba Island

A Snake and a Dove

A story by Stuart Camps

In 1989 when I was on a service retreat on Naitauba (Adi Da's hermitage sanctuary in Fiji), making walking trails across various parts of the island, I remember coming across a small Fijian boa. It was a beautiful little creature, gray/brown, with shiny new scales, having sloughed its old skin just days before.

Feeling that Adi Da would enjoy seeing the snake I caught it and took it with me into the village. In the morning the snake was presented to Adi Da, Who took it gently in His hands, letting the small python crawl up His arm, under His sleeve and inside His shirt. Adi Da's young daughters were horrified, squealing their amazement at Adi Da's playfulness with the snake. He took it from His shirt, allowing each of them to gently hold or touch it.

All the while, Adi Da's sensitivity, respect, and enjoyment of the snake were very instructive. Obviously pleased, Adi Da returned the snake to me with Instructions for its release. He said that it should be returned to the exact spot from which it was removed the evening before to ensure that it find itself in familiar surroundings, and be as little disturbed as possible. He wanted to be certain that this would happen. Once the snake was back in the forest I notified Adi Da that it had been done.

I took the little reptile back to where we had first found it—a large tree trunk beside the new trail. I placed it on the exact part of the trunk, facing the trail, from where we had taken it. Another time, when He was presented with a Fijian forest dove, by one of the Fijian staff, Adi Da gave similar instructions for the bird to be returned to the exact place from which it came, even going so far as to request that it should be released facing in the same direction it had been facing prior to its capture.