Sanatana Prabhu's Remembrances ~ Page 8

Remembrances by
Sanatana Das
part 8

Brahmins

Srila Prabhupada said to three Brahmin disciples in his room at Bhaktivedanta Manor near London in 1973, “So you were all Brahmins in your last life. Otherwise how is it possible for you to become Brahmins in three years? Not possible.”

He Sent You

Srila Prabhupada said: “My Guru Maharaja sent you all to serve me, so now you must serve me.”
“Chaitanya Mahaprabhu sent his devotees to take birth all over the world and prove that devotional service to Krishna can be practiced in any material situation.”

Saksi Gopal Das and the Vyasasana

Sri Sri Radha Gokulananda were going to be installed in the temple room at Bhaktivedanta Manor near London.
Srila Prabhupada was inspecting the work we were doing on the new temple room. Sri Sri Gaura-Nitai were being worshiped in another smaller room and we had just had mangala arati there.
Asleep on the new vyasasana was Saksi Gopal Das who had been up all night trying to finish it and had fallen asleep. Someone said: “Shall l I wake him up?” But Srila Prabhupada said, “He is very tired, let him sleep.”

Gold

Srila Prabhupada: Gold has one fault, it has no fragrance. If you Americans take to Krishna consciousness you will be like gold with a fragrance.”

Empires

Srila Prabhupada said: The Roman Empire has fallen, The British Empire has fallen and if you Americans don’t take to Krishna consciousness your American Empire will also fall.”

Maya

Guru Krpa to Srila Prabhupada, “Oh Prabhupada, the karmis are in so much maya.”
Srila Prabhupada: “Never mind the karmis, you are in maya.”

Ratha Yatra Lilas.

When devotees started arriving from all around Europe and the USA for the Ratha Yatra 1973 in London we already had barely enough to eat. But no matter how many arrived, there was always enough prasadam, in fact, it seemed to increase!
We were already sleeping eight brahmacaris in one small room and ten in another, so now we were sleeping on the stairs and landing, on tables and under them, into the attic and finally on the roof. There was a short wall around the roof, and although the roof was slanted, sleeping there was not dangerous. However the neighbours, who had flats overlooking our roof complained for some reason. They also got upset with the sound of our mangala-aratis early in the morning.
Between the back of our temple and the back of the flats on the other side was only about ten metres and one day a woman lost her temper and threw a milk bottle out of her fourth floor window, smashing our fourth floor window.
The devotees had spent part of the night towing Lord Jagannath Subhadra and Lord Baladeva’s chariots to the starting point at Marble Arch.

It had been raining all morning. Prabhupada’s car drew up near the chariots, the door opened and the rain stopped. It didn’t rain again all day. Prabhupada walked in front of Lord Jagannatha’s chariot all the way from Hyde Park to Piccadilly Circus and on to Trafalgar Square. The Times of London did a front page headline the next day that said, “Jagannatha conquers Piccadilly” Srila Prabhupada was pleased.
Srila Prabhupada gave a short speech from between the lions at Trafalgar Square. (There is a large stone block at the bottom of Nelson’s Column and Srila Prabhupada sat with most of the devotees on top of that. The Times newspaper estimated the crowd at thirty thousand.

Prabhupada said, “There are many living entities, ‘nityo nityananm, cetano cetananam’, but what we don’t know is that one living entity, Krishna, is taking care of all the other living entities, just like a father with a very large family. ‘eko bahuman yo vidadhati kaman’

Krishna fed that huge crowd with popcorn, sabji, puris and barrels and barrels of cordial.

When asked, “Where did the money come from?” Srila Prabhupada asked in reply, “Did you think that God was a poor man?”

Page: One • Two • Three • Four • Five • Six • Seven • Eight • Nine