Kurma das Remembers Srila Prabhupada
Prabhupada Memories
Interview 01
Kurma: As the customs doors opened and closed, all of us were excited and were jumping up to try to catch a glimpse of Srila Prabhupada. With my first glimpse of him, I saw that he had an attaché case in one hand, his cane in the other, and his chader folded over his shoulder. He appeared effulgent. He was standing patiently, peacefully waiting for something. In fact, he was waiting for Vegavan, who had been held up at immigration. The immigration authorities had told Vegavan that he could not enter the country because he did not have a visa. It appeared that Vegavan, who was Prabhupada’s servant for the trip, would not be allowed into the country. But Vegavan explained to the immigration official that he was married to an Australian. A few weeks before, in front of thirty thousand people, Prabhupada had married him to Padmavati at the Cross Maidan pandal program in Bombay. The immigration official asked him for his marriage certificate. Vegavan told him that he didn’t have one, but he showed the man a photograph of his wedding, and in the photograph Prabhupada was performing the wedding ceremony. The immigration official had noticed Prabhupada when he came through, and seeing Prabhupada had moved him. So Vegavan received a stamp in his passport, “Indefinite Stay.” Vegavan could understand that this was Prabhupada’s potency. So we were waiting for some time while all this happened. Finally, Prabhupada entered the airport terminal where there was a huge kirtan, and it appeared that the whole airport stopped. Prabhupada attracted a very large crowd. It was quite amazing how many people were there at that time. Everything appeared to come to a standstill. Caru had told all the ladies, “When Prabhupada comes through, don’t scream.” But when Prabhupada came, all the ladies screamed. Everybody, including the ladies, paid their full dandavats wherever they were, and Prabhupada couldn’t move because we were crisscrossing his path. A lot of devotees stayed down there and didn’t move. They weren’t sure how long they were supposed to stay down, so they just stayed. Some other devotees had to tap them on the shoulders. Then we all stood up and followed Prabhupada through the airport terminal with kirtan. Caru recalls that when he paid his obeisances at Prabhupada’s arrival, he banged his head on the floor so heavily that he had a mild concussion, and everything was very, very hazy. We were all delirious in some way or another, spiritually or materially. I don’t recall the press conference, but there definitely was one, because in the newspaper there was a nice photograph and a description of it. In the article Prabhupada described the four orders of life: brahmachari, grihastha, vanaprastha, and sannyas. He explained that he was in the fourth order of life, which meant that now his business was to travel and preach. Prabhupada’s arrival was noted in the Sydney Morning Herald and a Sydney daily newspaper, although at the time we were not familiar with accessing newspapers.
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To view the entire unedited video go to Memories 17 - The Australian Yatra
The full Prabhupada Memories Series can be viewed here and also at www.prabhupadamemories.com
Following Srila Prabhupada
Interview DVD 06
Kurma: The lecture in the Melbourne Town Hall, right opposite where our current Gopal’s Restaurant is today…there’s a Lower Melbourne Town Hall and there’s an Upper Melbourne Town Hall. The upper one is a gigantic cavernous concert hall with the organ. So we chose the Lower Town Hall so it wouldn’t look out of place if we only got a few hundred people because the large one holds thousands of people. We got quite a few hundred people along to attend Prabhupada’s 1974 Town Hall lecture, and it was quite a wonderful event. We see Srila Prabhupada wearing that gorgeous saffron silk outfit that he’s wearing there on that incredible saffron vyasasan that was built by Shyamananda das. It was made of saffron silk, and it was quite astonishing. It all came to pieces, and we were able to carry it to various venues. Some places we even had extra pieces attached that were on a motor and would spin around with little lights on them that would attract the spotlights, but that turned out to be rather of an over-endeavor.
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Interview DVD 08
Kurma: Srila Prabhupada’s lectures at the Melbourne temple were actually held in the evening. Normally Prabhupada’s Bhagavatam classes were held in the mornings. But on the advice of Madhudvisa Swami, with whom he always took counsel…he had a lot of respect for Madhudvisa Swami, and Madhudvisa had suggested that we’d get more guests along to the temple in the evening time. So Prabhupada, with a slight movement of his head and a smile, he agreed to Madhudvisa that “Yes, definitely we’ll do that.” So Prabhupada would take his morning walks at the Botanic Gardens, as he always loved to do. It was one of his favorite places to walk, he said. Then he’d come back to the temple, there would be greeting of the Deities and then Guru Puja, and then he’d return to his room and we’d have the Bhagavatam class in the evening.
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