Venugopala das Remembers Srila Prabhupada

Following Srila Prabhupada

Interview DVD 06

Venugopala: Prabhupada would be giving a lecture and his glance would fall over you, and he’d just be looking straight through you. The devotees, they felt that Prabhupada was seeing right into their heart. I’ve heard that from a lot of devotees, and I’ve felt that also. Definitely that’s reality because it’s confirmed by not just me but it’s confirmed by so many devotees, they felt Prabhupada looking right into their hearts even though he was giving a lecture. And certain things he would say in the lecture, he’d look at you and that thing that he was saying was applying to you. He wasn’t just talking to the crowd, he was talking to you, and what Prabhupada was saying at that particular point in time really penetrated deep into your heart. When we were on morning walks, Prabhupada would, of course, be chanting japa and we would follow in unison. Then Prabhupada would stop and he would say something or point out some philosophical point. He would walk on again, and everyone would start chanting japa. And this little mataji – Ramaniya her name was – her chanting was over and above everyone else’s chanting, very loud. And sometimes you couldn’t hear what Prabhupada was saying, so you’d have to really snuggle in around Prabhupada as close as you could to actually hear what he was saying. So you might hear someone chanting japa in the background, not knowing what to do when they couldn’t hear what Prabhupada was saying. So then Ramaniya was chanting this japa very loud and everyone else was thinking, “Oh, she’s chanting so loud.” You could feel the vibe of the devotees, “Turn it down, please.” Then Prabhupada actually commented, “She is chanting very nicely. It is good chanting.” So that put us in our place.