“Maharaja, we’ve arranged a program for you at Yale University,” the brahmacaris, the monks, at the Bhakti Center in Manhattan, New York City, happily informed me. My heart went thud. I hadn’t been back to my alma mater since graduation, May ’72.

One month after that ceremony of cap and gown, I discovered Srila Prabhupada’s books, and after pouring over them four hours a day, through six continuous months, in December I made my first visit to the New York temple. I became a fulltime resident there in March of ’73.

What did Mother Yale, as its flock call the institution, mean to me? I remember the rooms of conservative, straight-laced students, their walls draped with huge school banners that said,” For God, For Country, For Yale.” I never hung out with those types.

The social activists and the fancy-free were my crowd. To me, then, Yale was four years of frustration in my search for the highest knowledge, and depressing disappointment with mundane political and economic solutions to the world’s problems.

It also meant the lifestyle of a Kali-yuga student. Upon coming to Krishna consciousness, I so regretted the deep and vile ignorance of my previous years that I never wanted to see the distinctive architecture of the Yale campus again.

Now, thirty seven years later, devotees are asking me to go there, to tactfully present Lord Chaitanya’s mercy. They don’t know that to do so, I have to confront a vast lagoon of deeply buried emotional intensity: “My wasted life--why did I willfully forget Krishna and toil uselessly in material existence!”

Since beginning my bhakti endeavor, I’ve always blamed Mother Yale for the regretful nondevotee years spent on her lap and for all the illusions fed me. She certainly can obscure real knowledge and drown her nescient children in pools of sophisticated decadence. On the other hand, I do now agree that her tabernacles and citadels have the potential for truly higher education, leading to significant individual and societal transformation.

The night of the outreach program, the Manhattan devotees gleefully drove me around the campus. “Maharaja, do you remember? What dormitory did you live in? How has the campus changed?”

Yes, Mother is guilty as charged, but that night, as I reconnected, for Krishna’s service, I fully faced up to my own foul play: I had sought to enjoy and control, voluntarily embracing the endless network of maya.

Let the next chapter begin: the King of all knowledge and confidential wisdom marries Mum. Or at least they can date.

Videos of Devamrita Swami giving talks in New York City and Washington D.C. during April 2009 are available for download here:

• [369 MB] 4th of April - New York 1st Avenue Center - Hankering and Lamenting have their Place in Krishna consciousness
• [340 MB] 8th of April - Washington D.C. - Prisoner of Love
• [442 MB] 9th of April - Caitanya Caritamrita Adi-Lila 10.85 - How could anyone make-up false accusations against devotees? (with Radhanatha Swami)

(audio-only versions of these talks are also available in the "Lectures" section of this website)

Visiting Hartford during my travels in the USA, I witnessed the amazing devotional determination and steadfastness of my Godbrother Pyari Mohan and his wife, Jivanausadhi. He started his preaching in Hartford while a brahmacari in 1981, and then a year or so later decided the grhastha ashram was most appropriate for his bhakti endeavors. The couple have staffed the Hartford center since that time, in the same building, serving the people, year after year, decade after decade. Pyari and Jiva, as they are known, push on, soon to complete their third decade as the Hartford preaching team. Meanwhile, their family has proliferated into its third generation,

The center they've maintained all this time is a large house, with a temple area, kitchen, public bathroom, and lounge on the ground floor. Upstairs, in a few small rooms, is where Pyari Mohan and his wife live, and where they have raised two children in Krishna consciousness. The daughter now has her own family and abode; the son is away at university. Simultaneously, grandfather Pyari and grandmother Jiva keep rolling on, with their selfless outreach service.

"We never took any money from temple donations for our maintenance," Pyari informed me. His wife and he were book distributors before marriage and continued that service after they became householders. When it became apparent that the proceeds from book distribution would not be enough to support a budding family, from out of the blue manifested another source of income. As a child Pyari was always interested in magic. Thinking to learn some tricks for his little daughter's birthday celebration, he sought out a magic shop. Emerging loaded with items, he wondered what had come over him--he had spent over $100.

After the birthday party, Pyari continued to develop his skills, gradually reached the level of a professional magician. "Say the magic word 'Radhe-Govinda'," he cues spellbound audiences at schools, private functions, and homes for the elderly. In the backyard behind the center, he keeps a dove and a rabbit, to aid his repertoire of tricks. His financial advice for grhastas wanting a missionary focus: "Stick to it, live simply. Krishna mysteriously arranges for your basic maintenance."

Jiva is a devastating cook--famous throughout ISKCON. Pyari humbly claims that people come to their center only because of her kitchen prowess. Praising her low-maintenance profile (and thanking Krishna for it), he told me how for their wedding anniversary he chivalrously drove her to Walmart (an American discount mega-store, equivalent down-under to Warehouse or Target)) and told her to pick out whatever she desired. Reciprocating with this gallant gesture, she replied that she wasn't interested in acquiring anything.

All glories to such a saintly and inspiring family.

Download video clips of kirtan at the Annual Ukraine Festival (2009) with 4000 devotees:

• Video 1 [23 MB]
• Video 2 [16 MB]
• Video 3 [28 MB]
• Video 4 [33 MB]
• Video 5 [176 MB]
• Video 6 [192 MB]
• Video 7 [50 MB]
• Video 8 [235 MB]
• Video 9 [355 MB]
• Video 10 [200 MB]

At the Krishna-Balaram Temple in Vrindavan, I had finished giving Bhagavatam class, when an elderly lady devotee handed me a gift box of maha-prasada with a signed card on top. "Thank you Devamrita Maharaja. You began the movement of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu in Bulgaria. Only one conversation and instruction to the first Bulgarian devotee, Radhavallabha das, trained him to be the first leader. Now the Krishna consciousness movement in Bulgaria is blossoming."

This unexpected consideration touched my heart while at the same time unsealed a flood of piercing memories, from dire and dangerous Iron Curtain days. In the summer of 1978 , way out on a limb, seeking Prabhupada's mercy, another devotee and I made our first foray into Soviet shackled Bulgaria. Freshly arrived in Europe a few months earlier, I was on a determined personal quest to catch Prabhupada's attention, eight months after his departure from this world. At that time, the ISKCON temple near Frankfurt, Germany, was the base for clandestine communist country preaching. The handful of devotees in that special program would disappear from the temple for weeks at a time, our itinerary kept secret--for our own safety and for the protection of the fledgling devotees in those imprisoned countries.

Pressed to arrive in Europe from Los Angeles before summer, I had schemed how to obtain my driver's license though I was still struggling at the wheel. Especially, learning on a manual gear shift put me in fits. Automatic transmissions, though common in the USA, were rare in Europe back then, so for Krishna's service I had to persevere. Because I had never driven before, my Godbrother Yadubhara das, ISKCON's famous film-maker, kindly gave me a few crash driving lessons. But the date for my departure loomed before my driving abilities had sufficiently bloomed. To quickly dispose of the road test, I had a great idea: Yadubhara would drive me to the test center, and we would follow behind the cars of people undergoing the test. Upon my repeatedly observing the test routine, I would then just practice and master only the route and maneuvers the road test specifically entailed. It worked--I got my license and flew overseas. Of course, though officially certified, my actual driving abilities were primitive, especially for changing gears. Yet, the communist bloc preaching, demanding massive long-distance driving, couldn't wait.

The ISKCON leader at the time, Harikesa Swami, resolved the dilemma. He took me out in his car on the autobahn--no speed limits--put me in the driver seat, and told me to go for it. As Mercedes and BMWs thundered by at 200 km (125 miles) per hour, I quickly got over my road fear. Gear shifting, however, still eluded me. Though not crucial on the autobahn, it was completely necessary on ordinary roads. Never mind--the time for a mission to Bulgaria was upon us. A 24-hour drive from Germany to Bulgaria would surely cure my ailing manual shifting. Off we went, my Godbrother Rama Sraddha--who couldn't drive at all--at my side, and yours truly at the wheel.

Noisily grinding the gear box all the 24 hours to Sofia, Bulgaria, I then lurched our car 7 more hours through the country to a secret program arranged at some unknown contact's house at Varna, on the Black Sea. There we celebrated Janmastami and Prabhupada's Vyasa Puja, aided by a translator, surrounded by 15 total strangers, all eager for something beyond the bleak life in Soviet Bulgaria. After two days the mini-festival ended, and the group dispersed. Fed by an informant at the gathering, the KGB roared into action, grilling all who had attended. Ram Sraddha and I had departed only hours before the raid. Regardless of the brutal Soviet regime, though, Krishna's nectarean poison was already at work. One of the people I had spoken to and instructed later emerged as Radhavallabha das, a fearless, empowered leader and organizer on behalf of Lord Chaitanya.

To be precise, there were already three or four Bulgarian devotees in Sofia, far inland to the west, but they were quite timid about preaching and just mixed bhakti into their private family lives, rarely venturing outside their tiny closed circle. Anyone knowing the ferocity of the Bulgarian KGB could hardly blame them. Radhavallabha's divine, bold service, however, decisively broke open the dam that had blocked the floodwaters of love of God there. Bulgarian devotees now refer to him as the original devotee, because it was he who first came out of the closet, to actually launch the active Krishna consciousness mission in that nation. He was certainly the original leader.

Radhavallabha turned out to be too good and effective at his precious devotional service. The KGB took note and let him know about it. Still he fearlessly pushed on, throughout Bulgaria. The Russian KGB, as you may have read in Salted Bread, were more subtle than their Bulgarian brethren. The Russian secret police would snatch devotees and then, after a mock trial, dispatch them to forced labor camps in Siberia, for gradually destroying their body and mind. The Bulgarians lacked such patience and finesse.

One day Radhavallabha was walking alongside a road, when out of nowhere appeared a speeding car. Veering off the road, it rammed him, and raced away--a trademark KGB killing.

Those were the days. We thought they'd never end.

I offer my most respectful obeisances to the departed bhakti hero Radhavallabha das, who, as a daring servant of Lord Chaitanya, is surely situated in the spiritual world.

Krishna in the Gita certifies the status of the devotee dedicated to spreading His glories: "Pure devotional service is guaranteed, and at the end he will come back to Me. There is no servant in this world more dear to Me than he, nor will there ever be one more dear."