tatsou,
you want to explain to me how I am going to do altar practices without an altar?
When you take any little statue you find, every little bell or shiny rock you find and put them on your altar, it's a knickknack altar because you collect and arrange your Buddhist odds and ends like a person collecting and arranging knicknacks.
Individual,
lesser, really?,.... so like,.. next time a lama is giving out HYT initiation and they set out all sorts of complex tormas and mandalas, why don't you go up to him and tell him what you said here about his initiation being a lesser esoteric whatever.
And you know, why don't you find a nice quiet room in your house and fill it with dirt and when other people start thinking it's magical you can sell it and give the money to charities.
Am I really going to have to explain the history, benefits, procedure and how the activity gets results on a Buddhist forum?
Well I guess I don't have to.