In 2010 I followed an international leadership programme at an American organization based in California. Their programmes are developed in cooperation with the Mayans. White Eagle sometimes visits the meetings of this organization. Our training was delivered in Sitges, Barcelona. We were 9 nationalities; 20 participants in total. We came together 5 times a week during the year. We have built an intensive relationship with each other and we try every year to meet up. We already met in Poland and Milan and this summer in Alicante. A total of 10 Adders have come together. Yes, we are called the Adders.

Competences of the Adders according to this organization:

The Adder indicates that we are each our own leader; wise and very environmentally friendly. The molting would indicate that we are constantly transforming. We have an Adder Talking Stick which gives us the opportunity to be able to express freely our observations and conclusions.

However, I have always had a struggle accepting this name for our group, because the Adder is a reptile and I associate reptiles with, for example, The Rothschild-Rockefeller Cartel.

Negative properties:

When I looked up the description of an Adder it says: The adder is a venomous snake and appears in almost every country of Europe and in parts of Asia. In Europe they mainly live in the Netherlands and Belgium. The Adder has the greatest range of all snakes on land. Adders live strictly solitary lives and avoid each other as much as possible; except in the mating season and during the winter when they look for each others company. Males ' fight ' sometimes because of a female but they have no specific territory limits.

Like all snakes, Adders play because of their long misunderstood way of life; for many centuries they have played a role in the daily life human beings. The Adder was seen as the personification of the devil and turns up in various horror stories. The Adder is a key ingredient in black magic. The Adder was already around in prehistoric times. The severed head of the Adder would speed up healing by pressing the head on the wound. Also wearing an Adder tongue as an amulet was supposed to protect you against evil. Among the Romans the medicine theriacum was discovered, where parts of the Adder are used as ingredients. The French pharmacist Moyse published the book D'Andromachus Charaspubliceerde Thériaque  in 1668 in which the drug was described. It consisted of 72 different ingredients, among them dried adder meat. It was only in 1908 that the ' medicine ', mainly because of the narcotic opium content, was officially eliminated. In Europe the fat of the Adder was used to heal people of syphilis.

Positive properties:

Happily I also found positive features of the snake. In some cultures, such as ancient Greece or India, Adders are honoured as gods and snakes are a symbol of eternal life. This is because snakes shed their skin and it seems that out of the old snake a new one appears. 

The rainbow snake plays an important role in the life of the Aborigines. The Adder would dig and cause floods of rivers and valleys if he gets angry. In Hindu Mythology, many snake-like figures appear. Shiva, one of the most important gods, is shown with a snake around her neck.

I again came to the conclusion that all life is necessary and perfect. Just as in ourselves the snake has duality it just depends which part you trigger. 

On the next page you will read a well known story about this.

Besides this subject I enjoyed very much how Alicante celebrates the arrival of summer with the bonfires of San Juan. A big festival which honours the fire. Beautiful structures on which local people have been working for a year were burned on the night of 23rd June to 24th at 12 pm.

Monique