Sahadeva: When I met the devotees, they invited me to the Sunday feast in Sydney. I finally got around to it, and I saw the Deities, ate prasadam, and stayed there for at least a week. I thought, “I really should stay here,” and the devotees were encouraging me, “Ah, you should stay. You’re a devotee. You should stay.” So, I said, “Okay. I am going to go home, tell my parents, and then I’ll come back.” They said, “Oh no, you shouldn’t leave. You should stay.” [laughs] I said, “Look, I have to say goodbye to my mother because this is a long-term commitment.” My mother was a very strict Catholic as she would chant rosaries two hours a day and the same was true for my grandparents. I came from that sort of background, so she said, “Look, I want to read some of your books. I want to see what you’re actually doing.” I said, “Fine.” My father thought it was stupid, but my mother wanted to know what I was doing. I went back to the temple and posted her some books, which she read. She wrote me a letter in response to the books and said, “I’m very happy that you’re following religious principles. I hope and pray that one day you will come back to the Catholic Church.” [laughs] Anyway, I had my mother’s blessings. I joined the temple there, and Prabhupada came within a year, in 1971, to the Sydney temple in Glebe. We basically revamped the whole temple by repainting it and fixing odds and ends, but there was still some work to be done. The temple authorities asked me and two other devotees, “Can you please stay back and finish that off? We’re going to pick up Prabhupada.” I said, “Okay.” I was doing some touch-up painting in the front of the house, and to my surprise, Prabhupada came through the gate. I paid my obeisances immediately, but I was struck by how effulgent Prabhupada looked. He looked like there was a sun inside of him. I have never experienced that before, and when I first saw Prabhupada, it was like seeing my father, my grandfather, my king, my everything.
Prabhupada sat on the vyasasan where he gave a fairly basic lecture about Krishna consciousness. At that time, we were reading Prabhupada’s books and on almost every page Prabhupada bashed Mayavadis (impersonalists). We thought Mayavadis were stupid people and that they were a joke. This was the attitude that we developed at that time. One of the people that came that night wasn’t a devotee and it was the first time that we’d seen him at the temple. However, he did come to see Prabhupada. He talked to Prabhupada about his belief that “It’s all one.” He said basically we are all one, and he was trying to discredit the personal aspect that Prabhupada was presenting about God. We all burst out laughing, “Ah, a Mayavadi, a real live one right here.” Then Prabhupada told us, “No, no.” Prabhupada explained to him about the personal aspect of God and he was happy with that. And then one of my god-brothers ran into this fellow years ago although it was a long time after Prabhupada left. He told my god-brother what fond memories he had of Prabhupada and how Prabhupada was so affectionate in his dealings with him. He said he always remembers that Prabhupada melted his heart, even though he was a Mayavadi. [laughs]
Srila Prabhupada personally gave Harinam initiations in Sydney. We had our temple in a house that had a large backyard where the yajna took place. The women were on the left side of Prabhupada and the men were on the right side. At that time in Australia the temple president gave each person who came to the temple a pseudo spiritual name. Prabhupada had a list of all the birth names and the temple pseudo name of each devotee. When a devotee came up to get his or her initiation, Prabhupada would give each one the same spiritual name as their pseudo temple name. First, Prabhupada started calling all the men up, but he didn’t call my name. Then he called up all the women who were there for initiation, and at the end my name was still not called. I was thinking I must not be on the list. I thought, “Okay, I am going to have to take this into my own hands.” I decided that when the last woman went up for initiation, I would stand up and ask Prabhupada for initiation. When the last woman had received her beads and spiritual name, I stood up. Prabhupada looked at me, and as if he knew what happened and that I wanted initiation, he said, “Come.” Because my temple name was Sukadeva, Madhudvisa Maharaj, who was assisting Prabhupada, said, “This is Sukadeva.” Prabhupada said, “No. This is Sahadeva.” Even though I had accepted Prabhupada as my guru within my heart, it was quite a relief after experiencing anxiety as he called everyone’s name but mine, to finally receive that formal initiation, and it was an extremely happy moment in my life.
In Melbourne, when Prabhupada was there in 1973 or ’74, I used to go on the morning walks with Prabhupada. At that time I remember reading that when Caitanya Mahaprabhu would walk, he would leave huge holes in the ground where his foot would step, and the devotees would get the dust from Caitanya Mahaprabhu’s feet. I thought I should also try and get some dust from Prabhupada’s feet. The previous evening it had been drizzling, so the grass that we were walking on was a little moist. You could see the foot imprints of Deepak das and Madhudvisa Swami who were on both sides of Prabhupada as they were walking. I thought I would grab a handful of dirt from Prabhupada’s steps. However, as Prabhupada’s foot came up, there was no imprint. I thought, “What! No imprint?” All I could see were Deepak’s and Madhudvisa’s imprints very clearly in the mud. I thought, “Something is wrong here. I’ll try again.” Prabhupada’s foot lifted up and again there was no imprint. Prabhupada was not leaving an imprint, and I was looking step after step. Years later I read in Prabhupada’s Vyasa-puja book an offering by Yamuna dasi who mentioned a similar experience on a morning walk in long grass. She also did not see Prabhupada’s footprint on the grass. That confirmed for me that I wasn’t having a flashback on drugs and that it was real because initially I was confused.
One time I cooked for Prabhupada for an entire week. It was the same lunch every day. I was cooking dhal, rice and two subjis. On Ekadasi Prabhupada asked for something special. He wanted potato and tapioca rissoles. Srutakirti gave me the recipe. He said, “You boil potatoes and mash them while they are still hot. Then while they are still hot, you add tapioca seeds and mix them. That combination will swell and then you roll them into little patties and deep fry them.” That was one of the things that Prabhupada had for Ekadasi. I had been told that when Prabhupada was a child, he was called kacori-mukha because he loved kacoris. Kacoris are very difficult to digest, but Prabhupada could eat a lot of them. I remember looking at Prabhupada’s horoscope once, and I can’t remember what he had in the sixth house, but it indicated his digestion was very strong.
Another time in Melbourne Prabhupada held a darshan in his room with a lawyer and a couple of government officials along with Madhudvisa and me. At one point the conversation got around to the topic of how we obtained flowers for the Deities’ garlands. We weren’t growing flowers and we didn’t have a lot of money, so we used to go and steal flowers from the botanical gardens in Melbourne. We ended up getting caught, which also caught the media’s attention. The lawyer in the room, who actually worked for us, happened to bring up that topic. Prabhupada didn’t get angry, but he got very serious at that point. He then explained how everything belongs to Krishna and that a devotee who is serving Krishna is rightly situated. I can’t remember whether Prabhupada quoted the Bhagavad-gita verse that mentions that, but Prabhupada explained the purpose of life. He stressed that the goal of life is to develop Krishna prema, to become free from bodily identification, and everything else in this world was a waste of time. This was the general line of defense Prabhupada presented to the lawyer who was implying that the devotees did something wrong. Prabhupada loved the devotees so much that even if there was a little hint of criticism toward his devotees, Prabhupada became like a lion. The love he showed for his disciples was something that really impressed me about Prabhupada.
