Memories of Birnagar Dwadash Mandir
Tonight I am back here in Vrindavan. It is very interesting for me to observe this differences in worlds as I constantly go back and forth between Rishikesh and Vrindavan, the two places where I have spent most of the last nearly seven years. Now, in a few days, I will go to my guru's home. I am barely able to imagine what it will be like. It really will be the first time in ages. I went once a few years ago, in a rented car with Gadadhar Pran. It was a very unsatisfactory visit in that there was little closeness between the two of us white foreigners and the people living at the mandir. This time I go in the company of my godbrother, Harigopal Dasji. Thirty years ago, I knew Harigopal as Bhakta Das when I first went to Birnagar. There were three young men staying in the ashram; Badol, Madhav and Bhakta Das. Though Madhusudan and I only stayed there a few times for an extended period of time, we developed friendships with all three of them. But Bhakta Das was always curious an...