Atitaguna devi dasi Remembers Srila Prabhupada
Prabhupada Memories
Interview 01
Atitaguna: We were able to go on a morning walk with Srila Prabhupada to the beautiful Botanical Gardens in Melbourne. The ladies were in the back and the very intelligent ones would pick up the leaves as Srila Prabhupada stood on the leaves. But one devotee, Gopal dasi, said, "Let’s go to the front. We can’t really hear what Prabhupada is saying, so let’s run to the front." We did and Srila Prabhupada stopped at a tree and took a leaf from the tree, crumbled it up, smelt it, and said, "Oh, what kind of tree is this?" The devotees said, "Srila Prabhupada, it’s a camphor tree." Srila Prabhupada said, "Oh, that is Radharani’s favorite fragrance." Then one of the devotees, Cittahari das, said to him, "Prabhupada, we are always talking about living in Vaikuntha, but I find that I am always in anxiety. Can you please explain that?" Srila Prabhupada said, "Yes, to be in a living body means we are always in anxiety, but we have a choice. We can either be in material anxiety or spiritual anxiety." Cittahari said, "Yes Prabhupada, when I am distributing books or trying to cook an offering, I am in so much anxiety. I thought maybe I was not a very good devotee because of that." Prabhupada said, "No. If you’re not in anxiety, you are a zombie. You are the walking dead. But you are in anxiety and it is the right kind of the anxiety, so that’s wonderful." |
To view the entire unedited video go to Memories 63 - Atitaguna dasi, Krsnarupa dasi, Mishra Bhagavan, Niranjan, Pancharatn
The full Prabhupada Memories Series can be viewed here and also at www.prabhupadamemories.com
Following Srila Prabhupada
Interview DVD 10
Atitaguna: Somebody said to me, “Service in separation is better. So stay back and do the sandalwood paste for Prabhupada, and you will get so much benefit.” And I said to the person, “If there’s so much benefit staying back doing the sandalwood paste for Prabhupada, why don’t you stay back?” So then we both got in a car and went to the airport. At the airport, there were many doors that Srila Prabhupada could come out of and somebody said, “It must be down here.” So we were down there and we were all chanting and dancing, it was absolutely ecstatic. And then all of a sudden someone looked around and said, “Haribol Prabhupada!” So he came out of one of the doors that we didn’t expect him to, and I was more than surprised and I didn’t realize how effulgent he would be. I was absolutely flabbergasted. |