I’m thinking about Giriraj Govardhan

I’m thinking about Giriraj Govardhan…actually I can not think of Him clearly because I don’t know Him! When will I know Him? When my heart clears of all dust accumulated over millions of lifetimes! Yet that merciful personality was...is...so incredibly kind to me! Please, Giriraj Govardhan, Supreme Servant and Supreme Godhead, please, please shower some mercy on a fallen soul …I have no right to even think of you what to speak of addressing you in this way. Dear Hill, who was declared Haridas Varya (the best devotee of Lord Hari) by the gopis of Vrindavan, please bless me that is in some future time I can be with You again…the kindness of the Lord is overwhelming.

Namaste Girirajaya!

Holy names vibrating off the walls

Gurudev looks well in health and in spirits! Haribol! :o)

Some things from the class: the nitya sidhas have 10 million times love for Krishna than they do for themselves! Wow! What is love? To give ... just to keep giving, and keep on giving. What Srila Prabhupada wanted us to do was to preach so we need to do something even if we can not be in the forefront but we must do something for Srila Prabhupada’s mission. Our service must be balanced with our bhajan. We need to find the balance you can not practice Krishna consciousness by doing one and not the other. We must develop attachment for the previous acaryas, than if we can think of them and remember them and pray to them then what is their hearts will come in to our hearts!

All glories to Srila Gurudev! Who is an ocean of transcendental bliss and mercy :o) Krishna Chandra Prabhu and Ashish Prabhu performed this hilarious play taking us back to the 1979 when Maharaja was at his prime conducting the tent campaigns. I think being inspired by that Maharaja had us all raising our hands shouting out the Holy names, first the right side than the left, first the Prabhus than the ladies …the ladies were louder ;o))

How much good fortune the Lord has bestowed upon me to be connected, in the most amazing way, to the most amazing person! How unfortunate am I that am too shallow to fully appreciate and love and serve my Guru. I beg the sweet Lord to be guide this fool in serving her spiritual master with humility, love and attention.

All glories to Srila Prabhupada for giving us so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so much!

kalpataru…touchstone

After a long time I am blogging , at a personal level, again! This weekend is the vyasapuja of my spiritual master. Every year we take the 5 hour drive to sunny Durban to relish this sweet festival. I can’t wait to see my spiritual master after so many, many months. The last time Maharaja was very sick and we had a 24 hour kirtan to pray for his recovery, so this vyasapuja is going to be extra sweet I think.

If you read Sri Harinama Cintamini chapter six you’ll realise what good fortune it is to have a spiritual master..don’t ever think it is mundane…only after many lifetimes if one is very fortunate will one find a spiritual master. The spiritual master must be kalpataru…touchstone. My spiritual master is certainly a touchstone to have captured my iron like heart – I pray he turns it to gold.

Simply by serving the spiritual master according the scriptures one can attain all perfection.

My dear Lord Sri Krishna! Please have mercy on this poor fool so I may be able to serve my spiritual master to the best of my ability on my own I can not do a thing.

Seconds from disaster

Couple days ago on the way to work we were about 6 cars back from where this one car on our side of the freeway sped across to other side where another car was speeding down, they crashed into each other causing another car to spin across to our side of the road causing several cars to bump into each other in which we were just missed because my brother swerved to the side of the road.

This was the first time I had witness an accident to this extent. It left us with our hearts thumping at the horrific sight. If we had been couple of seconds earlier that morning it could have been our own fate that we had witnessed. This thought brought me very quickly to reality. Am I ready for death? Ready to leave this body? The answer is obviously, sadly no. Although we both said Krishna couple of times during the accident all I was thinking about was “I don’t want to die!”

As a Hare Krishna devotee the whole point of devotional practice is so that at the time of death your only attachment will be Krishna and you are confident that the Lord will care for you.

The time to start working on your final exam is now, because you never know when your finals will come – so look sharp, Sitala, and use every moment to come closer to Krishna.

Devine personalities

HH Bhakti Caitanya Maharaja visited us again before flying of to Russia. Fortunately Maharaja’s visit fell on the auspicious day of Srila Bhakti Vinode Thakur and the Supreme Personality Sri Gadadhara Pandit’s disappearance day.

On the one day Maharaja spoke about Srila Bhaktivinode Thakur. Actually the Thakur use to worship the deity Gaura-Gadhadara so he chose to leave on the same auspicious day as that personality. We are truly indebted to Srila Bhaktivinode Thakur for unlimited reasons. The obvious one is Mayapur Dham. It was Srila Bhaktivinode Thakur who excavated the different important holy places and established them so that future devotees (us) could come and absorb its spiritual potency. Actually there was some controversy over the actual birth place of Lord Caitanya and Srila Bhaktivinode Thakur revolved this for us.

Another important development Srila Bhaktivinode Thakur made was that he was the first to reach the broader globe in terms of spreading literature to many universities in England. Maharaja told us that Srila Prabhupada’s disciples went to these universities and found the books and also (lowered voice) sold them! :o) but we’ve reprinted these books so that is ok :o)

On the next day Maharaja spoke about Sri Gadadar Prandit. Gadadar Pandit is a form of Srimati Radharani. Srimati Radhika has 2 natures to Her personality – the one is very fiery and the other is soft and abiding. Gadadhar Pandit takes on this soft, abiding nature. Actually He is very sweet and extremely merciful. There was one devotee who constantly wanted to be in the close knit association of Lord Caitanya and always felt that those devotees who were and indeed Lord Caitanya Himself didn’t realise his true value. So he thought he would say something truly remarkable that will make all the devotees think he was very wonderful. So he said something really ridiculous (that I can’t remember) and all the devotees they used to find his association a bit “heavy weather” and now well it was little worse. So then he thought “oh no, I haven’t achieved my goal.” And then he thought about it and the different devotees and decided that Gadadhar Prandit is very, very nice, He will not ignore him. So he started sort of following Gadadhar Pandit around. And Gadadhar Pandit thought, oh no , why does he have to be with me all the time. But then He actually took this devotee under His wing and eventually gave him initiation that finally got him accepted in the close knit association of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu.

Jai Gaura Gadadhar bol, haribol, haribol!

I hate winter

Winter means wearing a ton of clothes.
Winter means attachment to your bed.
Winter means sneezes and coughs.
Winter means grey mornings, dry days and cold nights.
Winter means heaters.
Winter means dry, itchy skin.
Winter means …

This weekend my spiritual master, His Holiness Partha Sarathi das Goswami Maharaja, stayed at my sister’s place. This meant an opportunity for me and my other siblings to perform some personal service to Gurumaharaja. But as luck would have it I came down with the flu and so I now have a personal grudge against winter.

I still got to serve but my service lacked enthusiasm and I missed out on one of the programs. I am so lucky to have these opportunities, if I don’t take proper advantage of it that would be a great misfortune and offence.

mukam karoti vachalam
pangum langhayate girim
yat-kripa tam aham vande
shri-gurum dina-taranam

"I offer my respectful obeisances unto my spiritual master, the deliverer of the fallen souls. His mercy turns the dumb into eloquent speakers and enables the lame to cross mountains."

I experience a fraction of this verse. How can a mellecha such as I be able to serve in this divine movement even up to the stage of intimate deity service. I can not be called a brahmana, I can even be called a civilised human being yet with the mercy of guru I am here.

I pray to the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Sri Krishna, the original cause of all that be that He may spare some divine energy for me to be able to become in tune with Gurudev. To become one with Maharaja’s mood. Asking for this is practically impossible but: “His mercy turns the dumb into eloquent speakers and enables the lame to cross mountains”

All glories to Srila Gurudev!

Man, what a weekend!

Saturday was nirjal ekadasi – that means no water or food for the entire day. Impossible? Not at all – with Krishna’s mercy it turned out to be a very cool day. In Srimad Bhagvatam class Gaura Shakti Prabhu made a good point. First the devotee rises early in the morning each day and tries to remember Krishna at that time and then every second week on ekadasi the devotee tries to remember Krishna for the that whole day, then in the month of Kartik the devotee tries to remember Krishna for that whole month and then during the months of Caturmas the devotee tries to remember Krishna for that whole time – like this we learn to remember Krishna all the time!

Anyway I didn’t have much time to focus on reading and extra chanting - we were to busy serving. With the BTG marathon a week away and the first ever Randburg Ratha Yatra a day away we had lots of blissful service to do.

On Monday evening news I heard the President gave a talk urging the youth of South Africa to once again come forward and lead the nation (as was done in the past). It was youth day (more importantly a public holiday! ;o) ) when I heard that I thought, “Man, you should have been at today's Ratha Yatra festival!" The whole festival was planned and carried out by the Krishna Balarama youth group of Randburg. I offer my dandavats at these youths lotus feet for offering Srila Prabhupada such wonderful service. The festival was incredible! I assisted at the book table and that was enough testaments to the success of attracting new people to Krishna consciousness. The books were flying of the table with no effort from us. Amazing!

Recently I had this realisation. I am most happy serving Krishna and so actually service is enough there is no need to desire anything extra like recognition for what you are doing – just to serve is enough. It really is truly, blissfully blissful! Isn’t that what we want? Bliss? Service at the lotus feet of the spiritual leaders and Gaura Nitai is bliss. What more do you want?