By Josephine Grever BABYYOUCAN Photography Rick Guest DRIVE MY CAR In the old days she used to go off on spontaneous jaunts in the Mini with her husband George. Now, Olivia Harrison is auctioning a modern replica of the BeatIe'sfavourite car. •e t! ~\~ .. POP HISTORIE:Olivia Harrison's Mini as seen in negative energy into positive. All around beside this cult carriage. A new MINI in the Beatles' film Magical Mystery Tour. are texts in Sanskrit (the language of clas- the style of the" enlightened" original will sical Indian literature and scholarship), be auctioned in June to raise funds for the lotus blossoms (symbols of purity) and foundation. Olivia Harrison will never Friar Park in Henlev-on-Thames west of fish (the 22nd incarnation of the Hindu part with the original. As she says nostal- London, on a morning in the middle of god Vishnu). On the car roof, in a charac- gically, "We had such fun in it. It was per- March. Before he died of lung cancer at teristic dancing pose, is Shiva, who with fect for spontaneous jaunts." George was the age of 58, ex-Beatie George Harrison Vishnu and Brahma forms the trinity of an uncomplicated person, she adds. "He occupied this imposing Victorian man- supreme deities. was never very interested in material sion. Protected bv high walls and security "Shiva embodies preservation and things. But he loved this car." sYstems, he lived in complete seclusion destruction simultaneously and through The Austin Mini Cooper S was a pres- and liked nothing better than pottering his dance symbolises the cycle of the sea- ent from the Beatles' manager Brian around his garden. sons," explains George Harrison's widow, Epstein. In 1968 the "Fab Four" travelled Olivia. She manages her husband's musi- to the pilgrimage city of Rishikesh in the My Sweet Lord. On the lush green lawn cal estate and runs the Material World Indian state of Uttarakhand in order to stands a monument to the great age of the Foundation, which was founded by find, in the ashram of the Maharishi hippie: an Austin Mini Cooper S, built in George in 1973 and since then has sup- Mahesh Yogi, inspiration for their White 1965, and decorated with numerous ported over 70 charitable organisations. Album. Thus began George Harrison's life- sacred Indian motifs. The figure on the That is why, today, the publiCity-shy Mrs long devotion to Indian philosophy that is radiator grille symbolises George Harrison is allowing us to photograph her so clearly expressed in the Mini. "No other Harrison in meditation. Down the middle country has such spiritual strength as of the bodywork you can see a vertical MODELLED ON THE "ENLIGHTENED" ONE: India does," Olivia comments. "You find line of seven chakras - the energy centres, The MINI which is to be auctioned in June. there a kind of equanimity, and an ilmate each of which stands for a particular wisdom which leaves scarcely any west- sphere of life and gives strength to it. The ern observer unaffected." In India, she geometrical symbols on the doors are says, George learned Simply to accept yantras, which - as a bridge between the every unexpected turn of fortune in life. gods, the cosmos and the self - can change The Beatles summed it up: Let It Be. c:::=:).