Letters to the editor

A G T S P !

(paoho)))

Is is dark and cold outside. Sunset at 4.30PM. Cars rushing by on 4-lane street out side to go home. Across street is back of a low class shopping mall.

We lost a check for $10,000 today and were attacked by extreme panic. "Aaaaaah!".

We started efforts to compensate for the problem. Went across the other street to our bank, USBank, with Abhiseka, NGD's son. Talked with our Branch Manager, Elizibeth about her cat and farm and wired $10,ooo from NIOS to Goloka Education in Bombay for 150-Sanskrit sets.

The revolution begins.

She put a stop payment on the $10,000 check.

We came back and went through our world of files for the fourth time --and--  finally found the check! We had not even signed it yet as a precaution. It was where it was supposed to be but we thought it was a $200 donation from Dr. Desai and didn't look at the details!

Ooof!

Also did work on our Bhakti Vaibhava, Canto Four Studies. More to do.

We see that we are not "pure devotees" or Rupa goswami. Srila Prabhupada is a pure devotee. We have to make more progress. It is not that we have to work "harder", we have to just work more consciously. It is so simple to just get absorbed in dove-tailing some Karma, typing letters,  in Krsna's service but not stay on the Jnana-yoga or dhyana-yoga, or pure Vaidhi bhakta yoga level.

Ooof.

Old age pushes you to perfection.

Our eyes burn from the screen.

Our breathing is a little congested from old age.

Our feet are a little swollen.

Our neck aches from screen etc.

We have pain in our inguinal ligaments from something.

We have a little indigestion from not honoring Prasadam properly.

Now our right ankle has started to itch.

And it is dark, lonely, and cold here (but the electric heater is making it too hot, but we don't want to get up to go over to adjust it).

And it is 5.48PM... but that is O.K. because now we can go for a quick bath before NGD calls from the Mad House and says he is on the way home. Then we take off in the dark and drive in Rtadvaja Swami's, Mother's car, to NGD home and get a little association with the family and go for our 44-1/2 minute walk. Have two jackets, hat and gloves. We sing Gaura-arati on the drive over. Because of your association we will sing Shayana arati Bhajan on the way back. 12-minute drive.

Except for our little 12' x 12' office the rest of the mobile home is like 50`F. About 10`C. We have another electric heater in the bath room and we turn it on 30-minutes before we go for a bath. It works pretty good.

Floor is still foot burning cold, but water heater is good.

This office is nice because we have our own private cave.
Good internet.

Association of Lord Nrsmha deva and Srila Prabhupada.

Pretty regulated chance to do service. Become more self realized.

We have to learn how to do better Karma yoga. Look for more things that we can dovetail into useful service for Krsna. Won't be the best like Janana--yoga etc. but will be better than sleeping and then we will become more expert and come to more jnana-misra-bhakti yoga!

Jaya!

AGTSP.   paoho and bw!

Respected Guru Maharaj,

Please accept my humble obeisances.  All glories to Srila Prabhupad.

Just came back from the temple after my weekly Friday afternoon cooking, Priya was helping me, we made like 08 items, and plenty.

                  HpS - AGTSP and the Kids? They didn't help!??

After offering, head pujari said that Gaur-Nitai are very happy with the offering.  I don't know about that, but whenever I enter the kitchen or do anything important or important, I alway say,"Jay Hanumat Preshak Swami Guru Maharaj, Jai Jagatguru Srila Prabhupad".

             HpS - Mukhan karoti vacalam... !

Yesterday, we had very sweet Prabhupad disappearance day festival, presided over by our local gbc man HH Ramai Swami, he gave a nice class sharing with us Prabhupada's life in a Chronological way.  Your God-brother Abhilash Prabhu came, he said that please apologize from Maharaj on his behalf that he could not come while you were here in Brisbane and then, he gave me a nice flute to give to you.

I am not happy to know that you have been biten by spiders, hope that now you are recovering.  Can you kindly use some kind of mosquito net etc?

             HpS - Hmmmm. We don't know what it was. Is gone now. Basically is like to much pitta and then it pops out some place. We have to  be more and more and more careful of honoring, prasadam, dancing and properly associating as we get older. Old age is a good friend for a devotee, pushes us to become pure devotees. We don't know how much more time we have left. If we don't artificially try to maintain body then it may go quickly, even in a few days! One day!
We have given up.
What Krsna wants, let it happen. We just do our transcendental eternal service to Him.
Who is a Abhilasa Das???  His name sounds so familiar.
This is last letter this evening and then we will write the Kapi dhvaja for you!
Please tell Priya and Kids that they are great heroes for loving you even though you are a Bufalo Headed Punjabi.
Respects to so many devotees in your Yatra. Was so nice to be there
Of course, we go to India 9th Feb - 1st March.

have chanted 12 rounds, still 4 more to go, jai Guruji, HARE KRISHNA.

yours servant,

Raktak Das

Hare Krishna Maharaj,

Please accept my humble obeisances, all glories to Srila Prabhupada and Gurudev.

It’s been a while that I came on to the blog and my sadhana is going well. At least I become serious in my chanting (most of the time I’m completing all my rounds in the morning) and my reading become regular.

              HpS - ASA -  AGTSP!   paoho.  Wow!    In Kali-yuga this makes you a Saint!!!   AgtSP!

With your mercy and blessings, I took a small step towards preaching and working with SARITA mataji (who is a president of BHAKTI YOGA club in VCU in Richmond, VA) in the Yoga club. We gather every Thursday, chant a round (just started) and go over Bhagavad Gita (As it is)

At present, they don’t have a regular preacher, so I’m attending (our Bhakti Vriksh is providing the prasadam and I’m taking that to club every Thursday) and got an opportunity to talk to these kids and understand their view of life.

So far I gave three classes and attend two (one given by SarvDrik Prabhu)

1.    One is on Yoga (what is Yoga, why, different type of Yogas and what is Bhakti Yoga – touched briefly)

2.    Why do we need to study Bhagavad Gita  and little back ground about Krishna/Arjuna (Maha Bharat – a bit)

3.    What is that we are all seeking (Happiness) – a little bit about senses and their functions and Soul?

We recently conducted a musical concert (Sacred Sounds, different tunes of Hare Krishna and other Kirtans – by Gauravani’s team) in VCU and distributed “Journey of self-discovery and meditation kits (around 200 I believe may be more)

Yagna Sankirtana prabhu (from Potomac temple, DC), who is instrumental in starting this Bhakti yoga club, got the feedback from Sarita and the students and spoke to me and appears like everything is good so far, and discussed about further classes.

Maharaj, at present, they don’t have any particular agenda what to cover etc. in this semester.

Please advise or provide some suggestions (most of them are 1^st timers)?

Here is the list that I came up with, after discussing with couple of devotees and in other Yoga clubs etc (Touching on the practical side with Philosophy/spirituality as foundation)

1.    Nature and Modes of Nature

2.    Jiva tattva (self) and Vishnu tattva (supreme)

3.    Time and Karma

4.    Mantra Japa

Please correct or advise me, if I’m wrong or better way of go about this.

Waiting to hear from you…Maharaj.

Your Humble Servant

Subhala Sakha Das

Richmond, VA

..........  AGTSP.  So nice to hear from you!!!!  Was wondering what happened to all of you!!!!    Sankirtana result sounds very nice. What about just reading the Upadesamrta together? Going through a little bit each week. Little homeworkd assignment, and Srila Prabhupada's one volume bio-graphy. Those who are more serious can read in detail and then for others there can be a summary each week.

If you base it on those two books it seems it will be nice program.

Then you can also ask questions.

Kirtan, lecture, Kirtan, Prasadam!!

AGTSP

AGTHpS

Hare Krsna Guru Maharaja!

Thank you very much for your reply to my letter of October. Very inspiring about Houston Elementary School, hopefully here in Chile can do something similar one day, with Candrabhanu we thought it would be great to live in community with more devotees; find out from other countries living well, for example in Brazil.

Candrabhanu is finishing up the thesis, to finish his college career in social work, still working in a supermarket packing and Friday cooking for Srila Prabhupada Festival with two devotees, sometimes cooked for some parties and Vyasa Puja also, devotees trust their service as a cook.

For my part, I continue with the offering cooking service on Friday afternoon at SS. Gaura Nitai and Berfi and sandesh cooking for a week. Yesterday was exhausting but beautiful afternoon, as I cooked the offering so that he could eat subji maha prasadam, Bhakti Sundar Goswami Maharaja. Also Jagannatha, Baladeva and Subhadra have been all this week in the temple, since last Wednesday was the first Ratha Yatra this year and November 3 this Sunday will be the second and yesterday I also made preparations for Them. I was very tired and so I plugged it into Joe Japa Saturday.

Well, I wanted to mention that I'm going to sankirtan and we are coming out with Fernanda Leiva (aspiring start with you), she helped me a lot the first day, as sankirtan did long ago and she is an expert :) It has been very inspiring and enriching the sankirtan and sadhu sanga with Fernanda too, I'm very happy. Thank you very much for your blessings and enthusiasm to continue doing so. Finally, here I send you some photos, Ratha Yatra truck on Wednesday, one of SS. Gaura Nitai temple and another yesterday in the kitchen of SS Gaura Nitai when preparing Berfi and sandesh sweets.

I hope you are in good health. Thank you very much for your effort every day to give your association through Japa Joe.

Please accept my humble obeisances.
trying to serve, Guna Manjari dd

            HpS - ASA --- AGTSP....   Paoho. Is so nice to hear from you and about Candra-bhanu Das and everyone. We will be in Chile en less than 8-weeks, no?  It is nice to visit other Yatras. You can even make an arrangement to trade service with devotees. Some couple that wants to visit Chile can do your service and you can go to their country and do there service for some time.
Narada Muni visited all the homes of Krsna in Dvaraka to see the Grhastha life of Krsna in different places. Then we can appreciate our own temple much more. Get ready for Goloka!!!

Thank you so much for your association in our Japa sanga.
We can all be birds in Radha-Krsna's garden at lunch and sing together for Them!! !

Nice fotos!!

Hare Krsna Querido Gurudev!

todas las glorias a srila prabhupada! todas las glorias a sri sri radha madhana vihari!

Espero se encuentre muy bien y feliz en conciencia de krsna! trato de leer sus mensajes en el blog, me alegra mucho que se este cuidando. Gracias por su respeusta anterior!

 Ahora estoy leyendo el guerrero espiritual 2 de SS. Bhakti thirta Swami. El explica que estamos en una escuela de amor y que es realmente amor y lo que no es. yo tenia muchas preguntas acerca de lo que le conte en mi carta anterior. Vi que con algunas personas no tenia una relacion real. y no me sentia bien al ver lo malo de las personas. estoy viendo ahora lo malo de mi mism y al ver mis limitaciones, veo que ellas me alejan de krsna. Maharaja dice muchas cosas hermosas, una de ellas es:

uno puede amra de verdad y tener que alejarse por amor.

HpS - ASA - AGTSP  paoho. Muy bien oir de Vds. que significa "amra"

Me di cuenta que soy mas feliz amando, auqnue tenga que alejarme por el bien de la otra persona y el mio, que alejrame porque estoy enojada. Estoy entendiendo que es normal que todos tengamos malas cualidades por eso que estamos en este mundo. Pero si quiero salir de aqui y ayudar a otros a salir tengo que asociarme con almas que me ayuden. Hay muchos motivos para amar a personas " no tan agradables" todos tienen hermosas cualidades y sino las  puedo ver puedo amarlas porque son parte de krsna. Entonces me doy cuenta que cuanto mas siga mis practicas espirituales, mi sadhana,etc, mas podre amar a lrsna y por lo tanto tambien a todas las personas. Le cuento todo esto por que queria que sepa como me siento ahora, estoy mucho mejor.

        HpS - ASA -- Y mas que estamos dando amor a personas que no nos gusta mucho como acto de voluntud, el mas que podemos ver y eliminar los malas cualidades en nosotros!

Mi hijo esta muy bien, gracias a krsna, ya camina y esta muy hermoso e inquieto, cuando baño a las deidades, le gusta estar a mi lado y mirar como lo hago, como los levanto y acuesto, etc. les sonrie mucho. Franco le hizo una cuna a gopla  nuestra deidad.

Gracias por desear que vivamos en una comunidad de devotos, a mi me encantaria!! por ahora trato de vivir  mas en el presente. Nos estamos organizando ahora para comenzar con nuestrao proyectos el año que viene. ya tenemos el pasaje del 30 dic al 6 de enero a buenos aires, para poder tomar Su asociacion!

          HpS - Vamos a Mar de Plata para Viernes y Sabado. PUede hablar con Ambarisa Das de los detalles. Vamos a poner en Kapi Dhvaja.

Estoy muy inspirada con la danza, sigo ensayando por las mañanas cuando gopalito duerme despues de mangalartik y rondas.

Gracias por su tiempo y Asociacion! Que pase un hermoso mes de damodara en compañia de Gopal!

Intentando ser su discipula: Radha japa prati jalpa dd.

P.D. nuestra compu casi deja el cuerpo.. tenia algunos fotos para enviarle , sera para la prox carta!

      HpS - Hay una devota se llama Yamila, regresa de programa de Dhanvantari Swami in Brazil y ya es con su familia en Cordoba. Pienso Vd le gustaria mucho encontrar a ella y posible ella le gusta mucho comenzar aprender baile. Ya es alumno en la universidad.

Revenencia a su "Swami"!!!!!   Ya un altar para Gopal!

Dear Gurumaharaja,

Please accept my humble obeisances. All glories to Srila Prabhupada.

I wish to report bookscores from last month. I went to the closest town some afternoons, and distributed 9 big, 10 med, 7 small and 1 dvd. No gita's, but had good meetings and inspired several people without them taking a book. It was a while ago since i went out, and it was great! Very enlivening and cleansing. I desire to go more often, perhaps in small groups with stationary harinam, and bookdistributors and prasadam. Nice idea, but so far i haven't been able to execute much of my sankirtan ideas. Perhaps when spring arrives this one can actualize.

Other than that, listening very inspiring and helpful classes from Vrindavan dham on the chapters of king Puranjana / Pracinabarhi. Practically they are my siksa shelter. Started working fulltime yesterday. My schedule is irregular, from very early till very late, but the work has its advantages. I feel enthusiastic about it.

Please forgive me for my kanistha shortcomings. All good fortune in your busy-ness.

Following in the back,
Raghava Pandita dasa

             HpS - ASA - Jaya! Hare Krsna!  "Nearest town" - where do you live? In the forest with Hansel and Gretel?  Yes, working is chance to meet people! I told you how Jayananda Das did Sankirtan as a Taxi walla!  Now, by the mercy of Srila Prabhupad and Lord Nityananda you can do more!!!