Jagat

P.C. K als Pics.  śrī-kṛṣṇaikānta-bhāvaṁ kva nu sakala-jano’vaśyam āpnoty ayatnāt kṛṣṇasyāścarya-sīmā parama-bhāgavataḥ kutra līlārtha-mūrtiḥ | kutratyā kṛṣṇa-pādāmbuja-bhajana-mahānanda-sāmrājya-kāṣṭhā bhrātar vakṣye rahasyaṁ śṛṇu sakalam idaṁ śrīla-vṛndāvane’tra || Where else can everyone with all certainty get single-minded devotion to Krishna, without making any effort? Where else can one find this exclusive supreme form of God in his personal manifestation, Krishna, the ultimate limit of wonder, who is inclined to love dalliance alone? And wherefore can you attain the highest manifestation of the empire of great joy that is bhajan to Krishna’s lotus feet? Oh brother! Listen, I will tell you a secret: all these things can be found here in this divine land of Vrindavan. (1.47) Commentary After asking questions about the nature of Vrindavan in the previous verse , Prabodhananda now asks rhetorically about the beneficial effects of living there. Wha...

Boat on Yamuna near Keshi Ghat. Well-meaning volunteers diverted the Yamuna stream to come to the ghat, but polluted water draining into the river from town sewers still predominates. If I had to say what the main event for me was in 2011, it was definitely the move to Vrindavan. Since the end of 2007, I have been spending most of my time at the Swami Rama Sadhaka Grama in Rishikesh, which was recently named the fourth best yoga ashram in India. Life was good there and, in terms of my own spiritual practices, I was given plenty of time to study, learn, teach and write. This year, I finished editing the revised and enlarged edition of Swami Veda Bharati's Yoga-sütras.  I went back in September for a month to complete the project, and there are still bits and pieces left. I am also signed on with Swami Veda to work on a couple of other books. I like Swami Veda and I like his people; I also like the ashram. But Vrindavan has been calling for a long time. Vrindavan is my home. A...

So I will be heading back for Rishikesh tomorrow, unless something happens. There has been a big agitation by the Gurjars in Rajasthan over the past month, which has disrupted traffic throughout the region. They are threatening to do something really big tomorrow, so this might mean that my direct overnight bus to Rishikesh will not operate. We'll see. Today I went to Jai Singh Ghera to talk over things with Shrivatsa Goswami. When I got there, I was surprised to see an event of sorts taking place in the main hall. The Friends of Vrindavan was showing a slide show of their achievements to a group from Delhi who are walking along the Yamuna as far as Agra, taking samples of the water and generally speaking to people about bringing the Yamuna back to life. They are called the Yamuna Jiye Abhiyan . Most people were young college students from Delhi belonging to a group called Youth for Justice. There was also one Gopal Krishna disciple who seemed to feel a little out of place. Their l...

I came across the announcement of the World Toilet Conference quite by accident, as this event has not attracted a lot of reporting from the news media in the West. Only it seems on Australia's Asia-Pacific service. Interesting statistics, though a bit inconsistent. According to the W.T.O. , only about one-fifth of the world's people are hooked up to a sewer system, and at least half of those sewers do not treat the sewage, but simply dump it into lakes or rivers. The worst situation is in the world's two most populous countries, India and China. Though Beijing, in preparation for the Olympics, has renovated more than 4000 public toilets. Jack Sim, the founder of the W.T.O., says that that you need to make toilets a status symbol in order to have them accepted popularly. People who have defecated in open fields for generations cannot always see the need to do otherwise, even when they step barefoot into the remains of the last person to use that particular field. Wom...

A Sampradaya Sun article about the Friends of Vrindavan prompted me to write a letter to the author, Jagannath Poddar, in which I congratulated him on the progress that FOV has made and offered him my moral support. I also expressed the hope that the methods they had developed and the achievements they had made would be taken up elsewhere, such as in Govardhan. Jagannath wrote back the following: Dear Jagat ji, Radhe Radhe! We at Friends of Vrindavan, wish you a Happy Radha Ashtami. Thanks for your commitment for supporting us morally. I have forwarded this message to Michael. We are also concerned about the situation in Goverdhan. But to set up the infrastructure in a new place in Goverdhan costs a huge amount and we have yet to achieve our goal in Vrindavan. Secondly, we have made our foundation strong in last one decade and we really didn't try to raise fund for the organisation. We appreciate you for giving value to Braj seva. As you don't reside here, thus you can't ...