Very bad (Conversations)

Expressions researched:
"very bad" |"very, bad"

1968 Conversations and Morning Walks

Talk Before Class -- November 29, 1968, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: So we have to take care. What can be done? Now you should be very careful, and somebody must remain there always.

Govinda: We live in a very good quarter though. They live by Watts and that's the... They live by Watts district, and Watts district is very notorious. There were seven-day riots of shooting and Negro revolts there about two years ago, three years ago. We live in a very nice quarter, but where they're living is in a very bad place.

Prabhupāda: So you will continue to live there?

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Yes, it's in La Palma. It's not directly in the worst area. It's not in Watts county. It's in a different area, but still... Where you live is very good though. I don't think there would be any theft. More safe.

Prabhupāda: Yes. It appears very respectable quarter. All right. Read. (end)

1969 Conversations and Morning Walks

Lord Caitanya Play Told to Tamala Krsna -- August 4, 1969, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: That's all right.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: He will play the Kazi 'cause he is very... You see? So... So now, in the introduction it says Lord Caitanya was realizing how this sectarianism amongst all the religions was very bad, and so He decided to do away with all material... Well, He could not be... He was not material, but He decided to take sannyāsa at this time.

Prabhupāda: Sannyāsī... Sannyāsa reason was different. There was some misunderstanding between His students and... They were of same age. Because Nimāi Paṇḍita was very intelligent boy, so He was teaching other boys practically of the same age. So there was some misunderstanding and the students wanted to retaliate. He went to strike them with a stick, Caitanya Mahāprabhu. And because they're of the same age they made a conference, "Oh, this Nimāi Paṇḍita has become very big man. He wants to strike us. Next time if He does so, then we shall also strike Him." Then He thought that "In this householder's position I cannot preach. I must take sannyāsa. Otherwise they will not respect Me." That is the system in India. A sannyāsī in this dress, whatever rascal he may be, he is offered immediately all respect. That is the system in India. So therefore He took sannyāsa early age, 24 years, 24 years of age.

1970 Conversations and Morning Walks

Room Conversation -- December 21, 1970, Surat:

Revatinandana: Yes, (indistinct)

Prabhupāda: That means the social structure is very bad. Otherwise, natural procedure is that everyone should be self-independent. But why state has to give them help? That's not good. You may be... Just like a son may be very rich man's son, but if the father provides him only, then he's a useless son. Is it not? If the father has to provide him money for his maintenance, then that son is useless son. That is not a good certificate. Although you may be very much proud that "I am maintaining my so many sons," why you should maintain? Let them be self-supported.

Yadubara: But what can the state do? Should the state just leave the people alone?

Prabhupāda: No. They should make the citizens so nicely developed in their Kṛṣṇa consciousness that they should be self-dependent, self-satisfied. That is the ideal of civilization.

1971 Conversations and Morning Walks

Room Conversation -- June 29, 1971, Los Angeles:

Karandhara: No. That's all that came, Prabhupāda. There were some more checks. I sent some to London. I sent two packages to London, two, two things to London. (break)

Prabhupāda: So anyway, I was very much anxious to hear about Chidananda. So he has written me. He is not very bad.

Karandhara: Well, he was in the hospital, and he got into a fight with the guard, I guess, and they arrested him for fighting and put him in jail for six months.

Prabhupāda: Fighting?

Karandhara: Yes.

Prabhupāda: But he is weak. With whom he'll fight?

Karandhara: Yes. It was actually very... We have a lawyer working on it to get a suspended sentence. We've got a lawyer who is trying to get him a suspended sentence because he was sick and he..., they had him taking drugs and he was weak and he had been in the hospital for four months. Why they should put him in jail? He just got a little irritable.

Śyāmasundara: They mocked him. I think they mocked him for having this and finally he couldn't take any more, and he probably hit the guard, so they threw him in jail for six months.

Karandhara: And in jail they won't give him anything to eat except... They won't give him a special diet, so all he can eat is just a little bit of vegetable. They have... On a plate they give him mostly meat and a little vegetable. They won't give him any extra vegetables.

Prabhupāda: Yes? Where the jail is?

Room Conversation -- August 15, 1971, London:

Śyāmasundara: So they are not spoiled.

Prabhupāda: No. And the psychology is the girl, after first menstruation, she enjoys sex life with a boy, she will never forget that boy. Her love for that boy is fixed up for good. This is woman's psychology. And she is allowed to have many, oh, she will never be chaste woman. These are the psychology. So these rascals, Westerners, they do not know and they are becoming philosopher, scientist, and politician, and spoiling the whole world. They can be saved only by this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement. There is no other way. Otherwise they will lick up their skyscraper building and everything will go to hell. We have seen in New York, so many houses fall down. In New York. Yes. So many. Simply garbage. I have studied. Simply full of garbage. Nobody is going to take care. And the boys and girls loitering in the street as hippies. This is a very, very, bad sign. You see? No home, home neglected, no regular life. The whole nation will be spoiled. It is already spoiled. The poison is already there. Fire. Now it is increasing. Just like you set fire, it increases. So that fire is already there.

Room Conversation with Dr. Weir of the Mensa Society -- September 5, 1971, London:

Dr. Weir: Well, if you're silent you can hear things, but if you're making noise, you know, the message doesn't come through, and if somebody else is making a noise you've got an excuse for not getting the message. I think a lot of people again are afraid of getting the message. So with the noise they can say, "Of course I didn't hear it so you mustn't blame me." Now that sort of cheating, I think, is a very bad one. That's not what I call positive cheating. That cheating yourself which is even more dangerous than, if you cheat the other chap, if he's clever enough he can avoid the effect of it, but if you cheat yourself, you know you might try and boost yourself up by your own bootstraps. (indistinct) you can't get out of it.

Śyāmasundara: ...spread this philosophy as much as possible in this age because it's been lost by so much noise (indistinct) our message is getting through though.

Dr. Weir: The fact that it can be heard sometime even above the noise...

Prabhupāda: One noise makes liberation. One noise makes bondage. Noise must be there.

1972 Conversations and Morning Walks

Room Conversation Including Discussion on SB 4.13.48 to SB 4.14.11 -- January 18, 1972, Jaipur:

Prabhupāda: Somebody must be there. So monkeys, they are now taking advantage, that these people have got some eatables. Therefore, Darwin's theory is from monkey. That's a fact. From the monkey, cow, and lion, the next birth is human life. So vimṛśya loka-vyasanaṁ kṛpaya ucuḥ sma satriṇaḥ, they began to discuss how to mitigate the troubles of the people. They began to discuss that aho ubhayataḥ prāptaṁ lokasya vyasanaṁ mahat. People, they are now disturbed both ways. One way, the king is a rascal. Another way is that taking advantage of the bad king, the thieves and rogues, they are also very powerful. So just see how the saintly persons became compassionate to the people that they are both ways. Actually at the present moment, people are disturbed by unnecessary taxes, at the same time bad elements. So without proper king, without nice state, everyone is unhappy. And that is going on nowadays. In the Kali-yuga, it will go on continual, and more and more people will be unhappy.

arājaka-bhayād eṣa

kṛto rājātad-arhaṇaḥ

tato 'py āsīd bhayaṁ tv adya

kathaṁ syāt svasti dehinām

(SB 4.14.9)

If people are disturbed in this way, both ways, from the state side and from the rogue side, then how they will live peacefully? Just like we sometimes say that if the politicians and the statesmen they are so irresponsible, fighting amongst themselves to capture the power, where is the time for them to think of people's welfare? They cannot. It is not possible. The same thing happened there. Tato api āsīd bhayaṁ tu adya kathaṁ syāt svasti dehinām. Svasti means peacefulness, dehinām, of the embodied living entities, dehinām.

aher iva payaḥ-poṣaḥ

poṣakasyāpy anartha-bhṛt

venaḥ prakṛtyaiva khalaḥ

sunīthā-garbha-sambhavaḥ

(SB 4.14.10)

Nirūpitaḥ prajā-pālaḥ sa jighāṁsati vai prajāḥ. So Vena, here it is mentioned, sunīthā-garbha-sambhavaḥ. His mother's name was Sunīthā. She was also daughter of a very bad king, and she inherited the father's quality. And the son also inherited the mother's quality. This is also true. The son inherits mother's quality, and the daughter inherits father's quality. So because the grandfather of Vena Maharaja was a bad man, his daughter means Sunīthā, the mother of Vena, she became bad. And naturally her son, Vena, she (he) became bad. The father was very nice, good king. But because the mother was not good, the son became bad. Here is the evidence. Sunīthā-garbha-sambhavaḥ. Sunīthā, his mother's name was Sunīthā. Because he was born in the womb of Sunīthā, a bad woman, therefore, he... Nirūpitaḥ prajā-pālaḥ sa jighāṁsati vai prajāḥ. He has been elected as the king to protect the citizens. Instead of protecting, he is disturbing.

Room Conversation -- February 15, 1972, Madras:

Prabhupāda: ...have no attachment. These are all nonsense. You cannot be (indistinct). A living being, to become desireless, how you can? I am living. I am not a dead body. Desire should be to satisfy Kṛṣṇa. Attachment should be for Him. That's all. You have to change. That is Kṛṣṇa consciousness. You have now attachment for sense gratification, desire for sense gratification. This has to be changed. Purification of desire, purification of attachment. Tat paratvena nirmalam (CC Madhya 19.170). Eyes, because it is diseased, you don't pluck out. This is nonsense. Cure the eyes of the disease, then you will see things right. The Māyāvādī philosophy is pluck out the eyes. Buddha philosophy is make it zero. That is also same thing, plucking out. Our philosophy is "No. Cure it." That is the difference. It is very simple. Which one is better? Just like a man is suffering from disease, fever, and doctor gives him medicine. He dies. Then the patient's guardian says, "Sir, he is dead now. You have given some medicine, he is dead." "That's all right, fever is gone. Fever is gone. Never mind he is dead." (laughter) These rascal philosophy statement is like that. Make zero. Make imperson. Then the difficulties of personality... Because they have got very bad experience of personality here. He had to become minister, he has become king and this and that, householder, all botheration. So make imperson. That's all.

Garden Conversation -- June 14, 1972, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: Unnecessary pride is very bad. "Oh, I have become very advanced in Kṛṣṇa consciousness." That we should never think.

Devotee (1): "We are simply Your maidservants and slaves. Please, therefore, accept us by showing us Your lotuslike beautiful face. Dear Kṛṣṇa, actually we have become very lusty, having been touched by Your lotus feet. Your lotus feet certainly kill all kinds of sinful activities of devotees who have taken shelter there. You are so kind that even the ordinary animals take shelter under Your lotus feet. Your lotus feet are also the residence of the goddess of fortune, yet You dance on the head of the Kāliya serpent with them. Now we are requesting You to kindly place Your lotus feet on our breasts and pacify our lusty desires to touch You. O Lord, Your attractive eyes, like the lotus, are so nice and pleasing. Your sweet words are so fascinating that they please even the greatest scholars, who also become attracted to You. We are also attracted by Your speaking and by the beauty of Your face and eyes. Please, therefore, satisfy us by Your nectarean kisses. Dear Lord, words spoken by You or words describing Your activities are full of nectar, and simply by speaking or hearing Your words one can be saved from the blazing fire of material existence. Great demigods like Lord Brahma and Lord Siva are always engaged in chanting the glories of Your words. (devotees continue reading for several pages) Great yogis like Lord Siva, Lord Brahma or even Lord Śeṣa and others always try to fix their attention upon Kṛṣṇa in their heart, but here the gopīs actually saw Kṛṣṇa seated before them on their cloths."

Prabhupāda: This is yoga. This is yoga system, to see Kṛṣṇa within your heart. That is real.

Devotee (2): (continues reading until end of chapter) (end)

Room Conversation -- July 5, 1972, London:

Prabhupāda: Oh yes, he was a (indistinct)

Sumati Morarjee: I know, and he was a communist member before.

Prabhupāda: Yes, yes.

Sumati Morarjee: Home (rule) and all that. He was the man. So I knew him some many years. So he came to see me, and I talked to him, at that time, you know, his position had become very bad. so he said that I started talking to him English, he said why do you talk to me in English? You talk to me in Kachi. We have common language. I thought you forgotten. He said (indistinct) at that time (Śrīla Prabhupāda laughs). And after that, you know, he, this movement of Pakistan, and India became very strong and he went away.

Prabhupāda: He was, he was paid for that running on the League of...

Sumati Morarjee: Ah, I know.

Prabhupāda: Was the Muslim League.

Sumati Morarjee: I know.

Prabhupāda: This all Englishmen subscribes.

1973 Conversations and Morning Walks

Morning Walk -- April 26, 1973, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: Mmm?

Brahmānanda: The future is very bad because of their military burden. Atomic bombs. This is what the scientists have created. They're thinking a bright future, but actually the future is...

Prabhupāda: Very dark.

Brahmānanda: ...seems very dark.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Idle brain is a devil's workshop. If they're not directed, then think like devil. We are thinking rightly because we are taking direction from Kṛṣṇa, the most perfect. Therefore our thinking has meaning. And what is the value of their thinking? It has no value. Now we are thinking... Just like, take the first instruction, that within this body there is the proprietor of the body. You can go on thinking: "Then am I this body?" So you can think on your finger. "I am this finger?" The answer from the within will come: "No, you are not finger. It is your finger. It is your finger. You are not finger." If I am finger, then if I cut my finger, why shall I not die? If I am finger? Therefore it is my finger. Just like I'll never think that I am this stick. It is my stick. That is thinking. That is thinking. If I wrongly think that I am this body, then your whole thinking process is wrong and they are thinking like that, that we are this body.

Morning Walk -- December 17, 1973, Los Angeles:

Prajāpati: But sometimes they might hit their thumb with a hammer or something and they will start swearing, calling on God's name, but in a very bad way.

Prabhupāda: That's all right. God's name. God's... In every respect, these materialists, they want to use God for their sense gratification. That is the prime fact. Our philosophy is that "God is not agent for your sense gratification, but you are agent for God's satisfaction." That is our philosophy, just the opposite. Even so-called religionists, they also take God as the agent of their sense gratification. They go to church to order God, "Supply our bread." Actually, He is doing. God is supplying bread. But they go for ordering, that "Give us our..." The rascal does not know, God is already supplying. Why should we go to church for ordering Him to supply bread? He is already supplying, even to the cats and dogs. They do not now what is the purpose of going to the church. That is going on. That is the disease, material disease. "I want to satisfy my senses, and anyone who will help me in my sense gratification, I shall worship him. If he does not, then I shall not." Everywhere. This Nixon became president because he promised that "I shall satisfy your senses." Now he is not doing so, so "Get out." This is the whole formula, material world." You satisfy my senses, you are my friend. And as soon as stop, then you are not my friend." That's it. (break) ...are considered the most authoritative because they give sense gratification. "You are sick. Now you are unable to gratify your senses. I give you some medicine so you become strong and go on your sense gratification." Therefore doctor is very good man.

1974 Conversations and Morning Walks

Morning Walk -- January 3, 1974, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: I think in the Indian astronomical calendar there must be mention.

Nara-nārāyaṇa: (break) ...effect of comet?

Prabhupāda: No, generally we know when there is comet, there is very bad effect.

Prajāpati: The comet doesn't really bring the bad effect. It simply is a symptom. Is that it?

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Prajāpati: The comet doesn't bring the bad effect, it is a symptom.

Prabhupāda: No, yes, bring, bring.

Prajāpati: It does bring it.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Prajāpati: Does such a comet affect consciousness as well as matter?

Prabhupāda: Eh? Comet is just like a planet. It is a vehicle carrying so many conscious beings. It is just like if some policeman all of a sudden comes before us, it is to be supposed that someone is criminal, he's searching. Like that. (end)

Morning Walk -- January 9, 1974, Los Angeles:

Bahulāśva: How is bad and good the same thing, Śrīla Prabhupāda?

Prabhupāda: Just like we are walking on this street. Sometimes we say, "This is very good." And sometimes, "It is very bad." But the street is the same. So how it is good and bad? This is simply mental speculation.

Bahulāśva: Sense perception?

Prabhupāda: Eh? Mental speculation. When it is dry... So dryness also, sometimes it is, "Oh, it is very dry, bad." And again, say dry, we shall say, "Oh, today is very good." It is simply mental speculation.

Devotee: It is like wet stool and dry stool. It is still stool.

Prabhupāda: Eh? Yes. (Chuckles) Yes, that is the example. The dry part of the stool, they say, "Oh, this part is very nice." He forgets that, after all, it is stool. So what is the dry or moist? Just like they are making scientific advancement. But the death is there. So what is the use of your advancement or no advancement? One who has not advanced in science, he'll also die. And you'll also die, advanced. Then what is the good? You cannot protect yourself from death. Then what is the meaning of this "good"? "This is good. This is advancement, and this is not advancement."

Morning Walk -- March 5, 1974, Mayapura:

Prabhupāda: Na gṛhaṁ gṛham ity āhur gṛhiṇī gṛham ucyate. The gṛham, house, is not actually gṛha. Gṛha means the wife. Gṛhiṇī gṛham ucyate na gṛhaṁ gṛham ity āhuḥ. Gṛhiṇī gṛham ucyate. So to become householder means one must have a wife. So actually round the wife. Gṛhamedhī. Round the wife. And what is wife means, everyone knows. It means round that thing. Is that good analysis?

Devotees: Jaya.

Prabhupāda: Na gṛhaṁ gṛham ucyate. (break) ...explain. It is not my manufacture. What is said? Yan maithunādi-gṛhamedhi, yan maithunādi-gṛhamedhi, yan maithunādi-gṛhamedhi... (break) ...tuccham. The gṛhamedhī's happiness, what is that happiness? Maithunādi. Sex. Yan maithunādi-gṛhamedhi-sukham. Gṛhamedhi-sukham (SB 7.9.45). Those who are gṛhamedhīs", what is their happiness? Sex. That's all. Yan maithunādi-gṛhamedhi-sukham. And what is that sex? Kaṇḍūyanena karayor iva duḥkha-duḥkham. It is itching between the two hands. Kaṇḍūyanena kara. But the, after that itching, there is very bad effect. Kaṇḍūyanena karayor iva duḥkha-duḥkham. That is unhappiness. Therefore tṛpyanti neha kṛpaṇā bahu-duḥkha-bhājaḥ (SB 7.9.45). Those who are kṛpaṇāḥ, they are not satisfied. They want to do it... (end of recording)

Morning Walk -- March 6, 1974, Mayapura:

Prabhupāda: And in Burma, my Guru Mahārāja opened a branch. So when they were frying puri, the, nice ghee, all the tenants, "Oh! What you are...!?" (laughter) They cannot tolerate. But in Burma, there is a preparation which is called nafi. The nafi means that a, a big jar will be kept on the door, and whatever animals, insect, cockroaches will die, they'll put in that. And during rainy season, it will be filled with water. And it will be kept for years. Then... And the bad smell was so terrible that if somebody would open the lid, it will immediately create very bad smell. So after some years, they will strain the water and keep in bottle. And when there is festival, they'll supply it in small... That is called nafi. And they'll take it very pleasantly. And when they were frying ghee, "Oh! What you are doing, this?!" Therefore Narottama dāsa Ṭhākura says that

nānā yoni sadā phire, kadarya bhakṣaṇa kare,

tāra janma adhah-pate yāya,

karma-kāṇḍa jñāna-kāṇḍa, kevala viṣera bhāṇḍa,

amṛta baliyā yebā khāya

Karma-kāṇḍa. There are three kāṇḍas: karma-kāṇḍa, jñāna-kāṇḍa and upāsanā-kāṇḍa. So upāsanā-kāṇḍa is bhakti. So instead of accepting this upāsanā-kāṇḍa, worshiping the Supreme, sarva-dharmān parityajya (BG 18.66), if one takes to the other processes, karma-kāṇḍa, jñāna-kāṇḍa, they are viṣera bhāṇḍa, they're all poison pots.

Morning Walk -- April 29, 1974, Hyderabad:

Prabhupāda: Well, we can get paper from foreign countries. That will be not difficult.

Mahāṁsa: Oh. If we can get paper from foreign countries, then the printing results can be very good, because the printing is not bad. It's the paper which is very bad.

Tejiyas: Still, at the same, time everybody buys Gita Press books, even though the quality is bad.

Prabhupāda: The quality is third-class.

Tejiyas: Everyone is buying all over India Gita Press.

Prabhupāda: Because the supply is cheap.

Gargamuni: Well, it's in Hindi also. We have to print in Hindi.

Prabhupāda: Well, first of all supply the English then, we... (break) ...tried to sell her place for fifty lakhs of rupees. She thinks that I am so rich man.

Room Conversation with Irish Poet, Desmond O'Grady -- May 23, 1974, Rome:

Prabhupāda: But you Irish people, you are never tired to fight. (laughter)

O'Grady: No. We've been fighting for three thousand years now.

Prabhupāda: I think the fighting is going on still.

O'Grady: Very much so. Very badly, very bad now, very bad. What do you do about that? And that's a serious question. Is it morally correct to be sitting here, for me to be sitting here...

Prabhupāda: You see, so long people will remain under the bodily concept of life, that "I am this body," "I am Irish," "I am English," "I am American," "I am Italian," so long this misconception will go on, fight will go on. You see? Yasyātmā-buddhiḥ kuṇape tri-dhātu... There is a verse in Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam. Just like you cannot stop fighting between the dogs and cats. Why there is fighting? Because the dog is thinking, "I am dog." The cat is thinking, "I am cat." Similarly, if I think as Irishman, "I am Englishman," it is the same thing. As the dog is thinking, "I am dog," so if I think, "I am Irishman," "I am Englishman," I am no better than the dog. So as we cannot stop the fighting between dogs, similarly, so long people will remain in bodily concept of life, the fighting cannot be stopped.

Morning Walk at Marina del Rey -- July 14, 1974, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: No. That is rajasic.

Bali Mardana: Rajasic.

Prabhupāda: Especially for devotee, too much eating is very, very bad. Atyāhāraḥ prayāsaś ca prajalpo niyamāgrahaḥ (NOI 2). Too much eating is very bad.

Bali Mardana: They should only take what is necessary.

Prabhupāda: And too much collecting money also. That is also not good.

Kṛṣṇa-kānti: Too much what?

Prabhupāda: Collecting money. (pause)

Svarūpa Dāmodara: We were discussing that in all the living bodies, we have these innumerable cells, living cells. And in these cells... We were just discussing whether the Paramātmā and the jīvātmā is still there even in the living cells.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Yes.

1975 Conversations and Morning Walks

Morning Walk -- February 4, 1975, Hawaii:

Prabhupāda: I remember those days immediately when I see the sea.

Haṁsadūta: You were getting seasick?

Prabhupāda: No, I liked it. Although I was sick, still, I liked it. Day and night, for thirty-five days.

Haṁsadūta: I came to America in the same way, but I was always sick. I didn't like it.

Prabhupāda: The sea journey is very good provided there is no sea-sickness. Otherwise very bad. Hare Kṛṣṇa Hare Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Hare Hare Hare Rāma... (break) ...all of our books in different languages. At least all the European languages. America is one language.

Guru-kṛpa: South America.

Prabhupāda: South America, different languages. Spanish.

Guru-kṛpa: Spanish, Portuguese.

Prabhupāda: Hare Rāma Hare... What about that Japanese translation? Something is done or not?

Guru-kṛpa: Just a magazine.

Prabhupāda: No. His wife was translating Japanese?

Bali Mardana: It has to be checked over.

Room Conversation with Canadian Ambassador to Iran -- March 13, 1975, Iran:

Ambassador: ...they wouldn't have left easily.

Prabhupāda: Yes. No, there was no need. Every country requires good government. So if somebody gives good government and keeps the people nice, happy, and people hasn't got any interest that the... Now they have made like that. Formerly, at least in India, they didn't care whether it is being ruled by the Mohammedans or by the Englishmen or foreign... They wanted peaceful life, that's all. So the Mohammedans, they made their home in India, the Moguls. They were not exploiting India and taking the money outside. Although the Moguls were very luxurious, but they were spending money in India, India's money in India. And, of course, they accuse, the Mohammedan government was very bad. But I think if it was so bad, how they could rule over India for eight hundred years? And in those days Indians were in their own culture. They did not lose their culture, Hindu culture. The Britishers peacefully killed the Hindu culture, Vedic culture, yes.

Morning Walk -- April 7, 1975, Mayapur:

Prabhupāda: What is that pleasure? (laughter)

Brahmānanda: Well, some people like to... They get pleasure from intoxication, they get pleasure from...

Prabhupāda: Yes. And therefore they suffer aftereffect. That is ignorance, that immediately you get some sense pleasure, but the result is very bad. And that is sinful.

Rāmeśvara: You wrote in the Fourth Canto that if we have too much sense pleasure when we are young, then we have corresponding disease when we are older.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Here material life means as soon as you violate the rules and regulation, you suffer. Therefore varṇāśrama-dharma is the beginning of perfection in material life. It is the beginning. Cātur-varṇyaṁ mayā sṛṣṭam (BG 4.13). God has created this. If you adopt this institution of varṇāśrama-dharma, then your perfection of life begins.

Morning Walk -- May 15, 1975, Perth:

Prabhupāda: Your preaching is all right, so, provided you preach something good. But when everything is good, then where is the, your preaching required? You preach something. Just like we are preaching. We are preaching. This is actually good for, that he must know what he is and what is the ultimate goal of life. This is required. Material preaching has no value. That is stated in the Caitanya-caritāmṛta. Ei bhāla ei manda, saba manodharma: " 'This is good; this is bad,' this is all mental concoction." Actually. But real good is: "He has forgotten God. Revive his consciousness." That is real good. Then he'll saved from the so-called good and bad and everything. That is wanted. Materially, everything is one man's food, another man's poison. Therefore there is no distinction—"This is good; this is bad." The stool is very bad, bad smell for you, but it is food for the pig. This is proof—"One man's food, another's poison." So this is only mental concoction, "This is good; this is bad."

Morning Walk -- May 16, 1975, Perth:

rify the Lord.

Paramahaṁsa: For fishing.

Amogha: Not any more. Now the post office is closed on Saturday and open all day on Sunday in Perth.

Prabhupāda: They have changed?

Amogha: Yes. They are open on the Sabbath.

Prabhupāda: My point is: if the moon is the first planet nearer, why they did not start Monday? If the sun is after, then Sunday. This is the proof that first sun, then moon, not that first moon and then sun. Hm? That is the description in the Bhāgavatam. One after another, one after another. Sixteen thousand, sixteen hundred thousand miles apart. First of all sun, then moon, then, what is called? Mars. You have seen it.

Morning Walk -- May 16, 1975, Perth:

Devotee (1): On top of a mountain.

Prabhupāda: Yes, he was driven away from Vṛndāvana. (pause) They are all going to the downtown?

Devotee (1): Yes. To the factory areas also, in Fremantle.

Prabhupāda: Oh. Where is the factory area?

Devotee (1): About ten miles down the coast. They have very big factories, very bad pollution. Big factories down south, in one place called Fremantle. It's a little way down.

Prabhupāda: Three miles?

Devotee (1): Ten.

Prabhupāda: Ten miles. How long it will take to go and come?

Amogha: To the factory?

Prabhupāda: No, that area.

Devotee (1): It takes about one hour to go down there. Three quarters of an hour.

Prabhupāda: One hour? For ten miles?

Devotee (1): It's a lot of traffic.

Morning Walk -- May 23, 1975, Melbourne:

Prabhupāda: Yes, they will be punished. (pause) (break) ...so many motor accidents. And there will be war. Then wholesale punishment. Then killing, being killed within the womb of the mother. They are being punished. Nowadays these things have been introduced. Now this child which is being killed by the mother, they are all these sinful men. They cannot come out even, out of the womb of the mother. There they are killed. Nature's law is very strict.

Australian devotee 3: In the western society, Śrīla Prabhupāda, people who are displaying a very bad sinful reaction in their birth are put away in institutions so they cannot be seen by the general mass of people.

Prabhupāda: Hmm? What is that?

Śrutakīrti: He's saying people that are suffering very greatly in this life—they have so many mental disorders or physical disorders—they put them in institutions so that no one can see them.

Prabhupāda: No one can see them. That means they are not suffering? (laughter) Just see how foolish persons.

Morning Walk -- June 10, 1975, Honolulu:

Prabhupāda: To that standard.

Siddha-svarūpa: Yeah, if we're up to that standard of perfection of the Buddhist monks or the Zen monks or transcendental meditators or whatever. So I think it's a very bad thing to take part in that thing.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Siddha-svarūpa: Because they'll simply try to... Anyway, it's... (break) Sometimes because these people have big titles like psychologist or professor and they have many machines and authoritative looking instruments, we become deceived into thinking that they are authorities of some sort, and we let them dictate to us. (break)

Prabhupāda: ...do not study that why these devotees have given up intoxication, which the government failed to stop?

Siddha-svarūpa: Yes.

Prabhupāda: It is practical.

Garden Conversation with Dr. Gerson and devotees -- June 22, 1975, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: Then he is very nice. Then you are friend.

Dr. Gerson: Another thing I would like to do is go to Gurukula and test the children and show what NBC did was very false and unfair.

Jayatīrtha: On television they did a very bad story on Gurukula.

Prabhupāda: Yes, they're, they cheater. He wants to cheat and get some money. That's all. Because the whole so-called human society is combination of cheater and cheated. So anyone who is acting without Kṛṣṇa consciousness, he is a cheater. And anyone who is thinking himself advanced without Kṛṣṇa consciousness, he is cheated. This is the basic principle. I mean Kṛṣṇa consciousness, God consciousness, so when we speak of Kṛṣṇa-God. Without God consciousness, everyone is cheated. And because everyone is cheated, there must be cheater. This is correlative term. If I say, "I am cheated," that means there is a cheater. And if there is a cheater there must be cheated. This is relative term.

Dr. Gerson: NBC did an unfair story on Gurukula. They cheated. And I would like to undo that. I would like to go and show that the school is very good.

Prabhupāda: Yes. This is very kind of you, but there have been so many attempts to cut down this movement, but they are cheated. They could not do so.

Garden Conversation with Dr. Gerson and devotees -- June 22, 1975, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: That's all right. But these general, the students... You are going to study our students, but you see they are not smoking. Why don't you see...? (break)

Dharmādhyakṣa: ...making other people starve by eating so much meat so in the future the other countries might force us to stop eating meat so that we can use the grain to feed people. So actually materially, economically, socially, in every way it is very bad. They are realizing now.

Prabhupāda: And they will say that because they are not eating meat, they are weak in health.

Dharmādhyakṣa: But their children are not chanting and dancing. You see? In their schools... When people come here and they see the young children chanting and dancing and so energetic, they say, "Where are these children getting their energy?"

Prabhupāda: That is real study.

Dharmādhyakṣa: So actually their children are being repressed. Their children are being enslaved. Their children are very unhappy. The karmī children, they are unhappy. They are not so lively. They don't talk as much. They don't shout and scream, "Haribol! Haribol!" Their parents always make them be quiet, be quiet, be quiet. So actually our children are free.

Morning Walk -- July 1, 1975, Denver:

Prabhupāda: And if our... Pushed on our men... The thing is they supply more spices, and especially that mustard. This is not good. This is prohibited.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: It should be mild, prasādam.

Prabhupāda: Practically no spices. Simply little cumin. And this turmeric. Turmeric you get from India, whole turmeric. This powdered turmeric is very, very bad.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Unhealthy.

Harikeśa: They put sawdust in it.

Prabhupāda: That's all.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: It's very unhealthy.

Prabhupāda: It is very cheating. Any powdered spice is not good.

Harikeśa: Asafoetida also.

Prabhupāda: Everything. As soon as it is powder, they will mix with all rubbish things. And it is very easy to cheat you. You are susceptible for being cheated. So they take advantage and cheat you. So best thing is to import spices from India whole and either get it powdered or during time of cooking you make them paste. That is first class.

Morning Walk -- July 1, 1975, Denver:

Prabhupāda: Yes. Guide them. (break) ...here the main business is slaughterhouse.

Brahmānanda: In this state.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Cow country, it's called. They call it that. On the highway you see that, "Cow country."

Prabhupāda: Chicago is also this...

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Oh, very bad. That is very bad.

Brahmānanda: There's one area of the town that there's a bad odor.

Prabhupāda: Here also they say. Just like in Bombay, the Bandra(?).

Harikeśa: Ah, terrible.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: What's Viṣṇujana doing? (break) ...Deity, I've never seen it. He gets up early in the morning, wakes Him up, cooks for Him, then we offer ārati, then bathing and dressing the Deity, sings for Him all day. He's so devoted to Rādhā-Dāmodara.

Prabhupāda: Svarūpa-siddhi, arcana-siddhi. By simply worshiping Deity one can become perfect. Arcana-siddhi.

Room Conversation -- August 21, 1975, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: I don't allow them to sit down.

Lalitā: At other āśramas you go and see. I go every āśramas. So I reported that now you catch all the sādhus. I'm giving a secret letter that, "All the black marketeers with them, sitting, chatting and patting, and you catch them. Then all the smugglers you will get. Sai Baba... (Bengali) He will throw you out. And he is exploiting that girl, and I have got a picture, very bad picture, with me. (Bengali) "Bhagavān Satya Sai Baba." So she hates him. And (Bengali) I have seen Satya Sai Baba. I know he is, what type of man he is. (Bengali) Government letter, certified. Prabhupāda: (Bengali) Kṛṣṇa consciousness to the foreign countries. Lalitā: (Bengali) ...what personality you are. Prabhupāda: Thousands of Americans will do that. Thousands. Lalitā: (Bengali) Māyāpur, Vṛndāvana. (Bengali) You just sit and write. Prabhupāda: If you take my guidance I'll stay. Our guidance means on the basis of Bhagavad-gītā. I don't manufacture.

Morning Walk -- September 29, 1975, Ahmedabad:

Prabhupāda: Take as many bricks as you like. And we have got one address. You have taken, Agra, they will supply this lime. (break) (Hindi) ...rich men. Still, they are adulterating cement. (Hindi) (break) I heard it from very reliable source, my teacher. He was second teacher in my school, graduate, very good gentleman. He said that Edward VIII, er, VII, he was stealing jewels. You see?

Indian man (3): A very bad habit.

Prabhupāda: Emperor of British Empire, and he was a thief. Just see.

Brahmānanda: You've said that a fly sitting on a throne is still a fly.

Prabhupāda: Yes. (break) ...one gentleman, young man, he was very rich man's son. He would come in the evening in the Howrah station nicely dressed and would approach any gentleman, "Sir, I am very sorry. I have lost my purse. Can you give me? Otherwise I cannot return." So he will collect five, ten rupees and go to a restaurant and eat and go home. (break) It is the second nature. Now the door is open? We can go?

Kartikeya: Yes. (break)

Prabhupāda: ...enter. Not the cows.

Morning Walk -- October 6, 1975, Durban:

Prabhupāda: They committed so many sinful activities, yes, for maintaining their empire. To sell their Manchester-made cloth they ruined the cloth industry of India and cut this finger.

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Cut the thumb off.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Thumbs of the weavers so that they cannot manufacture anymore.

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Very bad.

Prabhupāda: There are so many other things.

Harikeśa: They cut the thumbs of the weavers?

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Yes. They were making finer cloth by hand than the British were making by machines. So in order to discourage, they would cut off the thumb so they couldn't weave.

Prabhupāda: So many things. And to make a show, the Lord Hasting was impeached in the Parliament. Here the black men, they are Africans.

Morning Walk -- October 10, 1975, Durban:

Prabhupāda: You are scientist? Ask them. Don't come here. What is the use of scientist? Hm? If they cannot stop. Not only stopping, if the sea likes, it can overflow the whole thing.

Devotee: Haribol.

Prahupada: It came up to here. Like this or...

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: No. It is very bad weather last few days. A storm must be in the neighborhood.

Dhīrāṅga: There was one powerful king of England, he felt that just by his command he could hold back the tide. So he went and sat on the beach on his throne and he commanded the sea not to come in. But of course the sea came in and washed him away, he was very embarrassed. King Canute. He became so puffed-up.

Devotee: There's some steps here, Śrīla Prabhupāda. It might be very soft.

Prabhupāda: What is this adventure?

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: This is an ice cream advertisement. (break) Very respected person. Unkulunkul means the most respected amongst all respected persons. This is how they address God.

Prabhupāda: Ah. (end)

Morning Walk -- November 8, 1975, Bombay:

Bhāgavata: Eskimos.

Prabhupāda: I have got practical experience. In my childhood I used to go with my father for some purchasing some bhauma(?) flour in the interior districts. So there was one servant engaged. One day he did not come. So my father asked me, "He is living in there, in that cottage. You can go and ask him." So I went to his cottage. Practically there was no roof, and rain was dropping. So I saw him in a very bad condition. Then I asked him, "Why don't you come to Calcutta with us?" So he replied, "No sir, we cannot go, leaving home. (laughter) This is home." I have got practical experience. "Home sweet home." Janani janma-bhumiś ca svargād api gariyasi: Everyone is thinking that his birthplace and his mother is better than the heaven. That is the psychology. So everyone, however abominable... Everyone is living in abominable condition. That's a fact. But everyone is thinking that "Who is happier than me?" Everyone. This is called māyā. Unless he thinks, he cannot live.

Devotee (1): What is the throwing potency of māyā?

Prabhupāda: Hm?

Devotee (1): It is described that there are two potencies of māyā.

Morning Walk -- November 10, 1975, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: Everything is exalted. Therefore there are nine processes. śravaṇam kīrtanaṁ viṣṇoḥ smaraṇaṁ pāda-sevanam, arcanaṁ vandanaṁ dāsyam (SB 7.5.23), so many. They are all exalted.

Yaśomatīnandana: So why is it recommended, chanting in this age particularly?

Prabhupāda: Suppose if you have no temple, so you cannot perform arcana. So this is common, greatest common. It is not that because you have no temple, therefore your devotional service is stopped. There are other processes. You can do. Hare Kṛṣṇa. Jaya.

Lokanātha: Prabhupāda? If we chant more than sixteen rounds, so how can we know whether we are imitating Haridāsa Ṭhākura or following his footsteps?

Prabhupāda: Imitation is also good. If you imitate Haridāsa Ṭhākura, that is also your great fortune, even if you imitate. (break) imitating, it does not mean you are condemned. Even if you imitate, that is also good. (break) If you have some other business and if you say, "Now I am imitating Haridāsa Ṭhākura, I cannot do it," that is very bad. "I am busy in imitating Haridāsa Ṭhākura." That is not good. That is very bad. (break)

Brahmānanda: If the devotees are asked for service they say, "Oh, I have to chant."

Prabhupāda: "I am imitating." Yes. "I am imitating Haridāsa. This is my first business." That is very bad. (end)

Morning Walk -- December 3, 1975, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: That I am speaking, that sa yadi krīyate rāja.

Akṣayānanda: Due to habit.

Prabhupāda: Sakrn nasnuta pahanam (?) That is the difficulty. It will be very bad example. People will think... They already thinking that "These are all hippies." That will minimize the prestige of the temple. (break) Jaipuria House they do not allow any hippies. You know that?

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: Jaipuria does not allow any foreigners at all. They don't allow any foreigners at all, even if somebody is decently dressed.

Akṣayānanda: One boy came a couple of weeks ago. He had long hair. But the next day he came back and shaved up. He's a devotee now. He's doing nicely.

Prabhupāda: That's nice.

Akṣayānanda: So they will still come. They can become devotees. It's all right then.

Prabhupāda: Hare Kṛṣṇa.

Morning Walk -- December 14, 1975, New Delhi:

Prabhupāda: No. Unless they take to Kṛṣṇa consciousness, there is no hope, that's a fact. There will be more chaotic condition and everyone will suffer and perish. Āchinna-dāra-draviṇā gacchanti giri-kānanam. This is already predcited. I am not painting. It is already there, I am simply repeating. That's all. I am not speculator.

Hari-śauri: Actually most of them are aware that they're in a very bad position. Everybody is expecting another war.

Prabhupāda: Yes, just see. This is capitol of India. This is the position. We can know, understand.

Harikeśa: The problem is in America, it all looks so nice.

Prabhupāda: That means they are not yet so poverty-stricken.

Harikeśa: You ask anyone, tell anyone this in America, they'll go, "Oh well we've had difficult times in the past, but we've always pulled out of it." Like the Depression. They always quote the Depression of the thirties. The Depression and they say then there was the war and everything became better.

Prabhupāda: Then what is the academy? Nonsense. They are spending so much money in this kala-kendra, academy, this, that. And no place for Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Just see. Such a cultural book of knowledge. There is no such institution, Gītā instruction, institute. No. This kala bhavan, this kendra bhavan this... They have got so many dance bhavan, and when Kṛṣṇa dances with the gopīs, "Ah, that is bad!" The rascals, they do not understand where you have got this tendency for dancing. Because it is there in Kṛṣṇa. That they do not understand. Kṛṣṇa dancing is bad, and my dancing is very good. They will put so many questions, "Why Kṛṣṇa dance with others' wives." "And why your are dancing with others wife, fall-down." Just see. Kṛṣṇa's dancing is mythology and his dancing is fact. Although His life is mythology (indistinct). (laughter) (indistinct) Rabindra Bhavan. What they are doing? Such a big house.

1976 Conversations and Morning Walks

Morning Walk -- January 17, 1976, Mayapur:

Prabhupāda: On the other side you have got some land?

Jayapatāka: Yes. We plan to put irrigation there. I have two diesel five-horsepower, seven-horsepower engine. One I put over there and they are irrigating. We have fourteen bīghās of wheat, very good wheat. And here in the back we've also purchased here another set and we're irrigating that, this unirrigated land, and it only gets some chick pea and things, very bad crop, minimum crop. So now we've got the irrigation, we're getting many more crops. (break)

Prabhupāda: That I want, that it must be properly utilized. Otherwise you purchase and there is no utility.

Jayapatāka: But Tapomaya, he says that we need more land to be able to feed all the devotees. And every time we're building more buildings, we're just losing land but we're not gaining so much agricultural land.

Prabhupāda: No, no. We can purchase. First of all think that whether we can utilize.

Jayapatāka: Land is all being utilized. We need more land for grazing the cows also.

Bhavānanda: Definitely the land can be utilized.

Prabhupāda: That's all. Then purchase.

Morning Walk -- January 19, 1976, Mayapur:

Prabhupāda: Everywhere that was the system. That is called.... What is called?

Harikesa: Feudalism?

Prabhupāda: Feudalism, yes. What is this nonsense, maintaining so many idle men without any profit? Very, very bad system. And nowadays especially, when there is atomic energy, what is the value of the soldiers?

Harikesa: We need the soldiers to start.

Prabhupāda: Huh?

Harikesa: The soldiers, they start the war. One stands on one side, the other stands on the other side, and there's one shot, one shot, ten shots, ten shots, then mortars, then tanks, then atom bombs.

Prabhupāda: No, why this is? If you have improved scientifically, let two, three scientists keep flying and the handy atom bomb. As soon as war starts, "plum," finished.

Harikesa: They have that also.

Prabhupāda: Then.... Why also? That should be the only. It is waste of time. What kind of scientists they are? If you have actually improved in science for killing others by atom bomb, so keep one atom bomb very carefully. Fly in the sky. And as soon as the war-world, "plum." Finished.

Room Conversation -- January 19, 1976, Mayapur:

Prabhupāda: So those who are not accepting him, so they are all fools.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: This is very bad, Prabhupāda. It says he wanted to be... He almost became counterpart. That means he is trying to become equal or superior to guru.

Prabhupāda: Superior.

Bhavānanda: In this first sentence, superior, that Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī, his whole mission was dependent upon this great personality, Tīrtha Mahārāja. Not that Bhaktisiddhānta was a great personality, but that the great personality is Tīrtha Mahārāja.

Prabhupāda: He has written like that?

Bhavānanda: He said, "In proper time he got a great personality who readily shouldered the burden of the mighty mission of Sarasvatī Ṭhākura." That's implying that he is the one responsible.

Prabhupāda: He says... his impression is like that. Then?

Bhavānanda: "In all preaching work, everybody felt the sober but encouraging hand of Śrīla Bhaktivilāsa Tīrtha Gosvāmī Mahārāja. Śrīla Prabhupāda never did anything without consulting him first or without his consent. So all the desires for future work of Prabhupāda Śrīla Sarasvatī..."

Prabhupāda: He does not mention his name. He says... All right, go. His sannyāsī name is... All right.

Morning Walk -- February 10, 1976, Mayapura:

Prabhupāda: Yes. Gāñjā smoking is not taken as bad in India, by the sādhus, not ordinary men.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Right. He told me, Mr. Das, that it increased his meditation and ecstasy.

Prabhupāda: Whatever it may be, gāñjā smoking by the sādhus, sannyāsīs, is not taken very bad serious. The hippies learned from them. Allen Ginsberg introduced... "Yes. Gāñjā smoking is very good by the saintly person."

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: I think your Guru Mahārāja spoke strongly against such persons.

Prabhupāda: Oh, yes. And from him we learned that intoxication, any kind of intoxication, is bad.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura also was...

Prabhupāda: He was also not very serious, but Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura was very serious, and we learned from him. No, it is śāstrīya. No intoxication is good.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: How is it that Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura was not so strict in that regard, yet his son, who learned from him, became very strict, like a rod?

Prabhupāda: (chuckles) Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura was so strict (laughs) that because he married twice, he used to say, "strī-saṅgī, attached to woman," even his father. (laughter) He was very strict. Sometimes when he would be angry, he'd, "You strī-saṅgī." And don't discuss this thing. (laughs) He was very strict. No excuse, no compromise.

Morning Walk -- February 12, 1976, Mayapura:

Dayānanda: Isn't laziness one of the demonic qualities, Śrīla Prabhupāda?

Prabhupāda: It is less than demonic. Demonic qualities, they have some activity and laziness is ignorance, darkness. Therefore too much sleeping is very, very bad. That is another part of laziness. Nidrāhāra-vihārakādi-vijitau **, one has to conquer over this sleeping and laziness. Eating, nidrā, ahāra, vihāra, sense gratification, vihāra means sense gratification. One has to minimize these things up to the point of nil, that is perfect. When there is no more sleeping, no more eating, no more mating, and no more fearing, that is perfection of spiritual life. And that is not possible, but as much as possible. (break) ...they cannot sleep more that the culture (?) is very great gain, profit.

Hṛdayānanda: Consider a rich man. A rich man can sleep, a poor man must work.

Prabhupāda: Oh.

Room Conversation -- April 22, 1976, Melbourne:

Brian Singer: And you avoid disappointment.

Prabhupāda: Yes. There will be no disappointment. And as, if you make your plan, it will be baffled and you'll be disappointed. That is going on.

Brian Singer: But sometimes in the past, I have noticed from very bad disappointment that I have learnt very much.

Prabhupāda: Well, you were lucky. You are sometimes not disappointed. But generally you are disappointed. So we are teaching that "You take Kṛṣṇa's plan. You'll be happy. Don't make your own plan. You'll never be happy." This is Kṛṣṇa consciousness.

Brian Singer: Is Kṛṣṇa cons..., the Kṛṣṇa movement, is it still growing?

Prabhupāda: Hm?

Devotee (2): Is the Kṛṣṇa movement still growing?

Prabhupāda: What do you think?

Brian Singer: In numbers. Yeah. I think yes, but I don't know.

Prabhupāda: Yes. It must grow. If it is good, there must be customer. And if it is bad—it is cheating—there may be some customer for some time, then it will be finished. That is the test of reality and false thing. You can cheat persons with false things for some time, but if your commodity is right, the customer will increase. That's a fact. The more people will appreciate, "Oh, here is nice commodity.

Morning Walk -- June 3, 1976, Los Angeles:

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: So someone who is in knowledge and commits sinful activity...

Prabhupāda: Then he's...

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: ...his position is very bad...

Prabhupāda: Oh, yes, yes.

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: ...compared to the innocent person, ignorant person.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Daivī hy eṣā guṇa-mayī mama māyā duratyayā (BG 7.14).

Rāmeśvara: But then again he argues like this, he says, "The living entity cannot do anything without the sanction of God. So I am desiring certain sinful activities, but why is Kṛṣṇa sanctioning it?"

Prabhupāda: Kṛṣṇa does not sanction.

Rāmeśvara: Then how is it going on?

Prabhupāda: But you insist, so Kṛṣṇa, in disgust, says, "All right, do at your own risk. You rascal. You will not hear Me." That's all. I have given this example many times, that my son wanted to touch the table fan. Did I say it?

Rāmeśvara: I never heard it.

Garden Conversation -- June 8, 1976, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: You wanted this body. Therefore you have got this body. You wanted. Just like a child asks the father, "Give me this dress." Father gives him, "All right, take this dress." You wanted a certain type of body. Just like the surfers. They want a body like fish. Therefore they are so much anxious to swim. So father will give him next body a fish.

Rāmeśvara: He was saying that some people criticize us that we are saying this is God's creation, yet we are always speaking of it in a very bad way.

Prabhupāda: Very bad way?

Trivikrama: The bad way is also the mercy of the Lord to help us realize that...

Prabhupāda: No, no. Bad way, good way, man proposes, God disposes. You want something, bad or good.... Actually, everything is bad. This body or the fish's body or the dog's body, that is all material body. So everything is bad. But I prefer to get the body of a human being or a dog or a fish or a bird. That is my choice. So God gives you that body. Everywhere God's mercy is there, because whatever you want, ye yathā māṁ prapadyante tāṁs tathaiva bhajāmy aham (BG 4.11). In the material world, you have come to enjoy. You cannot enjoy. You are thinking.... Just like child. He's playing with something for sometime, again taking another thing, again taking another thing, childish. So similarly we want to enjoy this material world. Sometimes I am thinking it will be convenient if I get a man's body, it will be convenient if I get a tiger's body, it will be convenient if I get a fish's body.

Morning Walk -- June 10, 1976, Los Angeles:

Devotee: Kill it with X-ray.

Rādhāvallabha: Yeah. They also try to bombard it with radiation, and that has its very bad effects. Their hair falls out. They get burns, sick.

Hṛdayānanda: Miserable condition.

Rādhāvallabha: Yes.

Rāmeśvara: Many modern sociologists, they are predicting that in twenty or thirty years the population will increase so much on this planet that the cities will be very, very crowded, and there will be many, many new problems: no room for so many cars and not enough food, not enough housing. They predict very, very.... And then the result will be rioting. So many people will not have enough food and good places to live that they will...

Prabhupāda: So why don't you go back to home, back to Godhead? (laughs) We are trying to save them. Why you are rotting in this problem? (out of car) That reporter?

Rāmeśvara: "No obstacle."

Hari-śauri: "Death is not a problem."

Prabhupāda: They are predicting so many problems, and still the rascals will say there is no problem. Padaṁ yad vipadām. The material world is so made that in every step there is problems. (break) ...na teṣām.

Rāmeśvara: They say that as the population increases in the cities, there must be rioting and fighting. There will be so many people without the minimum necessities of life, so much exploitation of the rich upper class.

Prabhupāda: Why not go to New Vrindaban? That they will not do.

Garden Conversation -- June 14, 1976, Detroit:

Prabhupāda: New Vrindaban climatic condition is not so good. Here the climatic condition is good. Four months this climate is very good. It is in the central part of America?

Mādhavānanda: Little north.

Prabhupāda: North. So north is supposed to be cooler.

Hari-śauri: In the winter it's not so good. Winter's very bad.

Prabhupāda: Winter eight months? No. In winter this water becomes solid. You know that?

Satsvarūpa: Sometimes in Detroit there's three foot of snow, and the winter is, it's a very deep winter here, but the summer is nice.

Prabhupāda: You convince your countrymen that "It is a great sinful activity that you are killing your mother. You stop this. If you want to eat meat, you can eat some other, nonimportant animals. There are so many." The Chinese they are eating rats also. Cats, rats, everything.

Devotee: Monkeys.

Prabhupāda: Monkeys also. So monkey's the forefather of Darwin. Better kill them so that there is no opportunity of criticism that "You are coming from monkey." You extinct this species. It is rather insulting. If I say that you are descendant of monkey, then it is insult. So extinct this monkey. I don't think there is monkey here. Africa there is monkey. You have been in Africa? There are monkey-eating birds. Top of the tree, monkey, they catch up on the head and drop it from high. And then they take it. (pause) There was a boat which belonged to this house. I think he has sold it.

Garden Conversation -- June 14, 1976, Detroit:

Prabhupāda: They simply eat meat, that's all. And some milk preparation.

Hari-śauri: They can't even do that now. Someone was saying that they restrict them now. One day a week they have to eat fish because there is not enough meat.

Prabhupāda: Oh.

Hari-śauri: So they force them to eat fish now. (laughs) It's very bad.

Mādhavānanda: They are breeding.... In the airport we met one man; he is working on breeding a large bull, cattle. They breed cows for slaughter. So they are breeding now a very large cattle. They grow very, very.... it's called, instead of buffalo, they've named it beefalo.

Jayādvaita: They crossed buffalo.

Mādhavānanda: Crossbreed. And it is very huge bull. They raise it only for slaughtering, for getting a large quantity of meat. One bull, one buffalo, weighs hundreds and hundreds of pounds. And they sell it for half million dollars for one, so that they can breed it with others and make many. In the airports, when we are distributing books, we meet many farmers who have slaughter ranches. Whenever they say "farmer," usually it's for slaughtering. (break)

Jayādvaita: ...in Wisconsin we saw that there are many dairy cows. They are raising them especially for milk. It's called America's dairyland. And they have many, many big dairy cows. And they are getting so much milk. We were preaching that "If you take up Kṛṣṇa consciousness, then you'll have the richest state, because you have so many cows, and we are preaching that people should drink milk and chant Hare Kṛṣṇa. So your state will be the richest."

Prabhupāda: No. We can.... From milk, we can make so many nice foods. You take ghee, and from ghee, from grains, from fruits, you make so many varieties. Just like dahl, pulses, soak it in the water and then fry in the ghee and put masalā, and it is so nice salty preparation, dahl mutta. Then make samosā. You introduce these things, dahl mut(?), samosā, jalebīs, they will like. They have never tasted all these. Sandeśa, rasagullā, pantoa,(?) so many varieties from milk, only milk.

Room Conversation -- July 6, 1976, Washington, D.C.:

Prabhupāda: In India we have been offered so many land. But we have no men (indistinct).

Svarūpa Dāmodara: I also got a letter from Manipur, that Life Member, Kulavida Singh, he was concerned that the young people are now giving up the religious thought, so he wanted to establish some sort of school...

Prabhupāda: That (indistinct) is made by Vivekananda, yato mata tato patha, (?) very bad.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Yeah. So as soon as... They wanted to start an ISKCON branch, and he was a...

Prabhupāda: I think it will not be difficult. Manipur is...

Svarūpa Dāmodara: It will be very easy, because...

Prabhupāda: ...Vaiṣṇava. So if they understand, that will be very nice.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: All the, even the government participates so they wrote me a letter saying that they can give us nice land, plot, and...

Prabhupāda: Oh yes. Now that Govindajī's temple?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Govindajī's temple is taken over by the government, so I talked to, I wrote a letter...

Prabhupāda: Government, they cannot manage.

Evening Darsana -- July 11, 1976, New York:

Devotee (1): So many intelligent people, they are going to Transcendental Meditation simply because it's costing money. They want to pay. My sister, her husband, they are intelligent people, but they are simply...

Prabhupāda: So intelligent that they cannot understand Bhagavad-gītā. What kind of intelligence is that, the plain thing in the Bhagavad-gītā, they cannot...

Devotee (1): Very bad intelligence.

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Māyayāpahṛta-jñānāḥ (BG 7.15).

Prabhupāda: Yes. So-called intelligent, they are not intelligent. They have lost their sense by the influence of māyā. Even big, big men, they say that Kṛṣṇa, this Kṛṣṇa is not God. "The God Kṛṣṇa is different" and so on, so on. Do they not say like that?

Indian man (3): I wanted to ask you a question. While talking to some of the European people, when we say that Kṛṣṇa says in the Bhagavad-gītā that asked him to fight, kill his own relatives and friends and not to bother about the consequences of the action. Now this statement sometimes is difficult for people of the West to understand, where they say before you do any action you should know the consequences and then only take action...

Prabhupāda: That is the only statement in the Bhagavad-gītā? There is no other statement?

Evening Darsana -- July 11, 1976, New York:

Prabhupāda: He is coming from spiritual planets. He is authorized representative of Kṛṣṇa, we accept him as śaktyāveśa-avatāra. So I was invited in some priestly meeting in Melbourne, they asked me the question, "What is your opinion of Christ?" So I said "He's our guru." (laughter) Actually, we accept him as our guru. He's preaching God's message; he's Vaiṣṇava. Anyone who accepts God, he's Vaiṣṇava. He was explaining kingdom of God, God. So according to time, circumstances, audience... Now we can just imagine what kind of people he had to deal with, that his commandment is "Thou shall not kill." Then understand how much they were accustomed to killing. So what kind of men they were? And not only that, in spite of hearing his instruction "Thou shall not kill," they killed him first. So what kind of men they were, just imagine. He said, "Thou shall not kill," and they decided, "We shall kill you first." So this class of men he had to deal with.

Guest (1): What would happen to the people that killed Christ on the cross? Very bad, it seems.

Prabhupāda: Christ cannot be killed, but they killed themselves.

Devotee (3): So we read that Christ said "I and my father are one," so they say therefore Christ is Kṛṣṇa, so therefore Kṛṣṇa can't be God.

Prabhupāda: "One" means in quality. And in the Vedic literature we say ahaṁ brahmāsmi. That means we are one in quality. Brahma-bhūtaḥ prasannātmā. So now we are material-bhūtaḥ, jīva-bhūtaḥ. When we realize that "I am not this body. I am spirit soul, I am part and parcel of God," that is brahma-bhūtaḥ. Then bhakti begins.

Morning Walk -- July 12, 1976, New York:

Rūpānuga: That's amazing. How long were you there, Śrīla Prabhupāda?

Prabhupāda: Here? About six months. Then when my things were stolen, then one boy was coming, his name was Paul Murray, he invited me that "You come to my loft." He took me to Bowery Street.

Devotee (1): I met that boy in Amherst. He has a boutique; he sells clothing.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: You must have felt very bad when your things were stolen.

Prabhupāda: Yes, I felt little disappointed. But some friends, they offered me, "Never mind, you take my typewriter," somebody, "You take my tape recorder."

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Oh. Things were very easy here.

Hari-śauri: Not easy.

Rādhāvallabha: Kṛṣṇa always provides facilities.

Prabhupāda: So there was no difficulty. I got from other friends.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: So when you moved down to the loft...

Prabhupāda: That boy, I gave him, Haridāsa, who was in San Francisco?

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Yes.

Morning Walk -- July 13, 1976, New York:

Hari-śauri: That was when he died? He died then?

Prabhupāda: He was so much insulted. Because every European countries were harassed, they had very bad idea about this Napoleon. Unnecessarily expanding the interest of France. "France and Napoleon, one." Now where is that rascal? France is there. This is going on. British Empire means bring money, hook or crook, in London, and you get the title, "lord," "baron," this... This was their policy. "Sir." All hooligans, thieves, rogues, they were made big, big respectable people. A deposit in the government, this lord family means they have to deposit, say, ten million pounds, like that, and the government takes that money as fixed deposit, and the interest the family will maintain the aristocracy. This is the lord's family. Some way or other you deposit ten million pounds and your family becomes lord's family. So people become mad after money, somehow or other bring money. There was no other culture. In order to introduce their Manchester cloth, how they killed the home industry of India, cloth merchant, this weaver... Just like we are trying. It is very long time, this, the handloom. They cut the finger.

Room Conversation -- July 26, 1976, London:

Jayatīrtha: Nothing should be wasted.

Prabhupāda: Kṛṣṇa has sent you His grain. You cannot waste it. This is Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Live that way. And Kṛṣṇa is providing so much facilities for becoming Kṛṣṇa conscious, and why should we deviate and spoil this life, take the risk of again going into the cycle of birth and death? Commonsense affair. We have got the good, greatest opportunity to solve this problem of repetition of birth. Tyaktvā dehaṁ punar janma naiti mām eti (BG 4.9). And only for little sense gratification we are going to sacrifice so great opportunity of life? This much education is wanted. Na sadhu manye yata ātmano 'yam. Eh? Find out the verse, Fifth Canto. Fifth Canto, Fifth Chapter. Na sadhu manye yata atmano 'yam asann api kleśada āsa dehaḥ. Nūnaṁ pramattaḥ kurute vikarma yad indriya-prītaya āpṛṇoti (SB 5.5.4). Very bad civilization. Mad civilization, pramattaḥ. Simply for little sense gratification they are prepared to take so much risk. Next life you may become cat, dog or a small grass or a tree by laws of nature. So nūnaṁ pramattaḥ. Is it Fifth Canto?

Bhagavān: Ṛṣabhadeva.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Room Conversation -- August 3, 1976, New Mayapur (French farm):

Prabhupāda: This is the trap of māyā, to keep them captivated by sex attraction. All these living entities who are in this material world, beginning from the higher planetary system down to the ants and germs and flies. This is the primary enjoyment, sex. The central attraction is sex. Yan maithunādi-gṛhamedhi-sukhaṁ hi tuccham (SB 7.9.45). The human being, the same sex desire, they decorate it in a different way. But the central point is the same. "So all right, why? It is enjoyment, why you are forbidding?" Saintly persons say, yan maithunādi-gṛhamedhi-sukhaṁ hi tucchaṁ kaṇḍūyanena karayor iva duḥkha-duḥkham. It is a pleasure of itching sensation. Itching sensation, when you itch, it is very pleasing. But bahu-duḥkha-bhājaḥ (SB 7.9.45). Aftereffect is very bad, suffering. Itching, if you itch more, it aggravates, sometimes causes so many other by-products and so on, so on. That is fact. But everyone knows it, that "I may enjoy sex pleasure now; the aftereffect will be very bad." Bahu-duḥkha-bhājaḥ. But why people do it again and again? Tṛpyanti neha kṛpaṇā bahu-duḥkha-bhājaḥ. Those who are kṛpaṇa-kṛpaṇa means not brāhmaṇa—those who are not trained up as a brāhmaṇa, they cannot tolerate this itching sensation. They become victimized and the aftereffect is very, very bad. So either illicit or not illicit... They know it. The modern civilization, they have adopted the means of killing. First of all, they try to stop pregnancy by contraceptive method, and still if it is not stopped, then kill. And if he's still born, then again they put up in a box and go away. You know this?

Harikeśa: Yes, the baby, they put it in a closet and lock the door and walk out.

Hari-śauri: Oh, in Japan.

Prabhupāda: Yes, that is happening in Japan and other places. They put, and when the obnoxious smell comes, they open it and they find. Mother has become so kind. They put in a box and lock it up.

Room Conversation -- August 3, 1976, New Mayapur (French farm):

Prabhupāda: Yes, that is happening in Japan and other places. They put, and when the obnoxious smell comes, they open it and they find. Mother has become so kind. They put in a box and lock it up.

Hari-śauri: Airport lockers.

Prabhupāda: These are happening. But when you talk of that "You learn how to become brahmacārī," that they will refuse. This is the position. The aftereffect is very, very bad, either you get legally or illegally. Legally, we have to raise the children very nicely. Otherwise, they will, unwanted children, create so much trouble. You have to take care for their proper education, of their clothes.(?) We say, "Never mind, you have got children, give them proper education, make them devotees, make their life successful." We cannot say that "You kill them." That we cannot say. That is not possible. Neither we can pack them in the, what is that box?

Hari-śauri: Lockers.

Prabhupāda: Yes. This is not possible for us. We welcome. But we must be well organized to utilize these poor souls for becoming first-class devotees. That should be done. Otherwise, sex life and the by-product, that is always troublesome, either you take this way or that way, it is troublesome. If it is not troublesome, why they are killing their own children? To avoid trouble. This is psychology. They want to avoid trouble. But our process is, if you want to avoid trouble, then don't marry, remain brahmacārī. If you cannot, then, all right, have legal wife, get children and raise them very nicely, make them Vaiṣṇavas, take the responsibility. So we are organizing this society, we welcome. Some way or other we shall arrange for shelter. But to take care of the children, to educate them, that will depend on their parents. Now our Pradyumna was complaining that in the Gurukula, his child was not educated to count one, two, three, four. So I have told him that "You educate your child. Let the mother educate in English, and you educate him in Sanskrit." Who can take care? So similarly every father, mother should take care that in future they may not be a batch of unwanted children.

Evening Darsan -- August 10, 1976, Tehran:

Prabhupāda: I used to sit down there. There was no mṛdaṅga. A small dundubi. And I was chanting three hours—Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa. And people used to come.

Nava-yauvana: In a very bad neighborhood. Very low-class neighborhood.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Low-class, high-class, we don't mind. We chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, that's all. That 26 Second Avenue also not very good neighborhood.

Jñānagamya: It's the worst place in the country. (laughter)

Prabhupāda: But I did not know. Mukunda suggested this is good place, all right, live here. And actually happened to be good place. Gradually, all my disciples came. So I had no disturbance. I was living in the Bowery Street, and on my door these bums were lying with urine and wine bottles and everything. Still, they were so respectful. When I'll come, "Yes, you can enter. Please." (laughter) I had no quarrel with them. They were very kind. They welcomed me, they opened the door, "Please go." They also knew that "He's a harmless..." So, platform, if you remain on the spiritual platform, this material condition cannot hamper you. Ahaituky apratihatā. Then yenātmā suprasīdati, in that condition you can execute. First of all, we have to ascertain on which platform we shall stand. And if you want to stand on the spiritual platform, nothing can check it. That is not conditioned. So why not stand directly to the spiritual platform and make you life successful? That is our preaching. People in general, they do not know the importance of the spiritual platform. Therefore they prefer to stay in the material platform. They have no sufficient education.

Room Conversation -- August 10, 1976, Tehran:

Prabhupāda: That is... How they can change?

Jñānagamya: Great books have done this. Uncle Tom's Cabin started a whole war against slavery in the United states. Books and films are very potent. They can make public opinion.

Prabhupāda: Books are different thing, we are publishing.

Jñānagamya: In America the Negro situation was very bad, and they made many films showing heroic Negroes and now the situation is much better. The people are not so much agitated by seeing Negroes. They think "Oh, now a Negro has some good qualities." Because of these films they have come to appreciate. So like that, if a devotee is a hero they will also appreciate.

Prabhupāda: Do they? I don't appreciate. I don't think the Negro question is solved.

Jñānagamya: No, it's not, but it is making steps to that end.

Prabhupāda: The whites, they do not like the Negroes still. Wherever there are Negroes, in that quarter the whites do not go in. So is it not? They do not go. Although they have been given equal right, but at heart the whites, they do not like it. Is there any improvement? I don't think. Officially, "Yes, yes, you are good, I am good."

Room Conversation -- August 14, 1976, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: He sādhavaḥ sakalam eva vihāya, "Whatever nonsense you have learned-forget." Then what to do? Kāku-śataṁ bravīmi sakalam eva vihāya dūrād gaurāṅga-candra-caraṇe kurutānurāgam. "You just become devotee of Lord Caitanya. I am flattering you, I am falling down on your feet"—this is preaching. And what is Caitanya Mahāprabhu? Yāre dekha tāre kaha kṛṣṇa-upadeśa (CC Madhya 7.128). And if you do that, then what is the result? Na ca tasmān manuṣyeṣu kaścin me priya-kṛttamaḥ (BG 18.69). If one is doing like that, Kṛṣṇa immediately recognizes, "Oh, you are the best friend of Mine." So if you are recognized by Kṛṣṇa, then what you want more? You are undergoing so much austerities and... To be recognized by God. And God says that "Immediately I recognize you." Whom? One who is doing this. Ya idaṁ paramaṁ guhyaṁ mad-bhakteṣv abhidhāsyati (Bg 18.68). Na ca tasmān manuṣyeṣu kaścin me priya-kṛttamaḥ (BG 18.69). Immediately. You may be a fool, you may be rascal, you may be illiterate. But if you do this, immediately Kṛṣṇa recognizes. Kṛṣṇa never said that unless one is a big grammarian, big scientist, big politician, big engineer, big doctor, then I can do it. No. Simply one who does this. Ya idaṁ paramaṁ guhyam (Bg 18.68). What is that paramaṁ guhyam? Sarva-dharmān parityajya (BG 18.66). "Give up all nonsense. Surrender to Me." This is paramaṁ guhyam. And they are simply manufacturing nonsense. So the time is very bad, but nature's law is very strict. We may defy it, "There is no God, there is no next birth, there is no nothing." We may say like that, but when death will come, you cannot say anything. Mṛtyuḥ sarva-haraś cāham (BG 10.34). Bas, all your talkings, all your intelligence taken away. Tathā dehāntara-prāptiḥ (BG 2.13). Immediately transferred to another body. Daiva-netreṇa. Karmaṇā daiva-netreṇa jantur dehopapattaye (SB 3.31.1). Kāraṇaṁ guṇa-saṅgo 'sya sad-asad-janma-yoniṣu (BG 13.22). "No, no, I am Prime Minister!" "No, you must become a dog." Immediately. How can you protest? You cannot protest. You have acted like dog, just become a dog. Kāraṇaṁ guṇa-saṅgo 'sya. Just like your medical science, you have infected the disease, you must suffer disease. Kāraṇaṁ guṇa-saṅgaḥ, guṇa-saṅgaḥ. There's infection.

Room Conversation About Mayapura Construction -- August 19, 1976, Hyderabad:

Prabhupāda: As they doing (?).

Jayapatākā: This food distribution has been very important.

Prabhupāda: Oh, yes.

Jayapatākā: Now the price of rice has gone up by about eighty paisa. From two rupees to two-eighty. So the poor class of people, they are in a very bad situation. So now our attendance has gone up from twelve hundred to two thousand on that Saturday and Sunday, each day. So we have two shifts. So many people are coming that they come from ten o'clock in the morning and wait because otherwise they can't get a boat in time to cross the river. So then we were very surprised to read in a recent newsletter from LA that "They're going to restart the food relief." But we never knew it stopped. We never knew that they had stopped the food relief. We saw then that he said, "They're going to restart." But we never stopped, and we were very surprised to see that. And now they say...

Prabhupāda: Who said?

Jayapatākā: Rāmeśvara.

Gargamuni: To maintain this food relief from the centers only requires what? Fifteen hundred dollars a month. So little amount and so much service is done.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Room Conversation About Mayapura Construction -- August 19, 1976, Hyderabad:

Prabhupāda: And they are not giving citizenship?

Jayapatākā: Myself? What happened was I applied last September. So now it's nearly one year, so they had sent my application from Māyāpur to Calcutta, Writer's Building. Again back. Again Writer's Building, then to Delhi. Then Delhi sent again back. I went, and I asked the secretary, and I found out that they had sent again back from Delhi, again back to Māyāpur and then re-investigated me. At that time they brought in some local people, and one investigator, he said that "This Jayapatākā Swami, we have heard that he is a very bad person. He beats the people." They said, "No, We never heard such thing." "No, no. We have heard that he is very bad." In this way by negative they are testing. They came and told me that for two hours police is drilling three different people from Navadvīpa and Māyāpur. In this way no one said a bad...

Prabhupāda: No, if you are a famous man, then they'll do.

Gargamuni: Him and Bhavānanda.

Jayapatākā: Now Bhavānanda is more famous.

Prabhupāda: He is notorious.

Jayapatākā: But now he is in the papers.

Prabhupāda: (laughing) He... You are famous; he is notorious. It is very difficult to deal with these nonsense. They are devotees and either notorious or famous. Our Godbrothers, they do not like Bhavānanda. Eh?

Jayapatākā: No, they don't like me anymore either.

Room Conversation About Mayapura Construction -- August 19, 1976, Hyderabad:

Prabhupāda: They'll be satisfied.

Gargamuni: Presently the building they're in now is unbearable, as far as living

Prabhupāda: Why?

Gargamuni: Well, it is old building. Water supply is very bad.

Prabhupāda: So you cannot...

Gargamuni: It is a rotten building.

Prabhupāda: Rotten cannot be repaired?

Gargamuni: No. And the landlord won't allow him here.

Prabhupāda: Why?

Gargamuni: Because he wants to get us out...

Prabhupāda: That's all right, but he...

Gargamuni: But he won't allow any repair. You have to have his permission to get repair. If you don't get landlord's permission, then you cannot repair. You're forced to live in a slum.

Prabhupāda: No, no, you require permission of the landlord if he pays.

Morning Walk -- August 23, 1976, Hyderabad:

Indian man: Is that merger itself not ānanda?

Prabhupāda: No ānanda. It is eternity, but no ānanda. So eternally how you can remain without ānanda? So you have to come back again. Because here there is something ānanda although it is temporary. So unless you go to God and dance with Him, you'll have to back, come. So impersonalists, they cannot reconcile how God can be personal. Because you have got very bad experience of personal here, they think God is also a similar person. Avajānanti māṁ mūḍhā mānuṣīṁ tanum āśritam (BG 9.11). He thinks God is also a human being like me. Avajānanti. Mūḍhāḥ. They are mūḍhas. They are not intelligent.

Indian man: But what is the stage at which it is ātmā gets merged with Paramātmā? If ātmā would get merged with Paramātmā then...

Prabhupāda: That I have already explained. You cannot merge. You simply imagine. Merging means you merge in the spiritual atmosphere, but without ānanda you cannot stay there. Therefore you have to come back again to this material world. Suppose you are advocate and you are given some place without any practice. How long you will you remain there? If I say, "Please remain here happily without any practice." How long you'll remain? We want some activities. That is our nature, for ānanda. But here we are trying to get that ānanda, but that is temporary. That is not satisfying us. Therefore being disgusted we want to stop it and merge. But there is also temporary. Unless you go back to home back to Godhead, there is no complete life. Therefore Kṛṣṇa comes and shows by His spiritual activities. He's playing with the boys, He's dancing with the girls, He's killing the demons, and so many activities. This is ānanda. Sac-cid-ānanda-vigrahaḥ (Bs. 5.1). They are all spiritual. You have read our Kṛṣṇa Book? Yes. There is everything. So as far as possible we are trying to give people the real knowledge from the śāstra. Now it is up to them to accept or take advantage of it.

Evening Darsana -- September 1, 1976, Delhi:

Indian man (1): Chandigarh. (indistinct) The route is almost the same distance from here to Vṛndāvana. 5 miles, 8 miles difference. Not much difference mileage-wise.

Prabhupāda: (Hindi)

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: No. The road is okay. You said we should go to Vṛndāvana via Aligarh?

Indian man (2): In my opinion you should. That road is very bad. Five or six kilometers they have raised the road by about six or seven feet and all this is all mud and muck and the car skids. In my opinion you go via Aligarh.

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: Or we can come to Aligarh from Vṛndāvana.

Indian man (2): Suggest to go back to Vṛndāvana and then come. (Hindi) (Gopāla Kṛṣṇa converses with Indians about which road to take)

Pradyumna: Purport: Samādhi means "fixed mind." The Vedic dictionary, the Nirukti, says, samyag ādhīyate 'sminn ātmatattva-yāthātmyam: "When the mind is fixed for understanding the self, it is called samādhi. "Samādhi is never possible for persons interested in material sense enjoyment, nor for those who are bewildered by such temporary things. They are more or less condemned by the process of material energy.

Garden Conversation -- September 6, 1976, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: Who?

Akṣayānanda: That boy Richard in Rādhā-kuṇḍa.

Prabhupāda: Rascal. That is his bad association. Therefore I say don't follow these so-called Rādhā-kuṇḍa bābājīs. Nara-kuṇḍa bābājī. And they smoke biḍi. I have seen. Richard is still there?

Akṣayānanda: Yes. He's in very bad health.

Prabhupāda: But he has got money. Spending money there?

Akṣayānanda: I haven't been there for a long time, but I just heard about.

Prabhupāda: No, he has got money. How he is spending?

Harikeśa: He has hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Prabhupāda: Where it is?

Harikeśa: Probably in New York.

Prabhupāda: So he does not bring that?

Harikeśa: Yes, he has money all the time.

Room Conversation -- September 6, 1976, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: Berkeley, yes.

Hari-śauri: Everywhere. Sydney has bridges like that. These big towers like Eiffel Tower in Paris, they have big fences along the top so that no one can...

Prabhupāda: This practice is there in Vedic system. Not Vedic system, (indistinct), fall down. There is technical name. Fall down from the mountain. This is easier than other type of suicide. Because you simply once jump, but as soon as you fall, you forget everything. Suicide itself is very bad. This fall down, serotan (?) it is called.

Akṣayānanda: So one question I wanted to ask you in this connection, is that this Vinobha, fasting until death, until cow slaughter is stopped. So if he dies then he is guilty of murder. Is it correct. And if he's a brāhmaṇa, he is guilty of brahma-hatya. So by this fasting he is committing a greater sin than the actual killing of the cows.

Prabhupāda: You are right.

Akṣayānanda: And what is the gain?

Prabhupāda: And what he'll get it? Does he think that by his dying of starvation this cow-killing will be stopped? That is his foolishness.

Room Conversation -- September 7, 1976, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: But not that willfully do something wrong. There is punishment. If one unconsciously, without any knowledge, does something wrong, that is excused. But they do willfully. They know it is wrong, still they do it. That is punished. Knowingly. Caitanya Mahāprabhu personally said, asat eka strī-saṅgī. Those who are habituated to illicit sex are punishable. Asat. It is very, very bad. And still if somebody does like that, he is punished. This is going on. "All right." Here illicit sex... The bābājīs, I heard, they say, "What is the wrong there? It is love." They say like that. They take it as love. "Gopī's love," they say. "Gopī's used to do that, used to have illicit mixing, intermingling with Kṛṣṇa. What is wrong?" They'll say. They get support from Kṛṣṇa līlā. Such rogues they are. Sahajiyās. There are many so-called gentlemen, they write books on Kṛṣṇa līlā, paint picture." This is very nice. Kṛṣṇa is advocating illicit intermingling." They take it as support of their sinful activities. I have seen personally. Anyone who is a woman-hunter, he's being addressed by his friend, "Oh, you are like Kṛṣṇa." They take Kṛṣṇa as a man. How they will take instruction of Kṛṣṇa? Avajānanti māṁ mūḍhāḥ (BG 9.11). Paraṁ bhāvam ajānantaḥ. We are teaching people to become Kṛṣṇa conscious, to become servant of Kṛṣṇa, and the so-called gentlemen, enlightened gentlemen, take Kṛṣṇa as a debauch. Black debauch. (break) ...Vaiṣṇava religion is sex. (break) There are aborigines in India. Santal, (?) they are called santal. Black men, live in the forest like the African aborigines. So I asked him that "You, jungle, do you meet the tigers?" "Oh, yes, yes. Why not?" "So how do you save yourself?" So he had a small axe in his hand. So he showed me that "So long I have got this axe, even the tiger will not dare to attack me." (Bengali or Hindi) After all, tiger is afraid of the axe. They are afraid of even stick. That immediately they understand, "He's superior." Actually man is superior with some weapon. I have got personal experience. He said, "He's a big tiger. But we treat them like dogs." One axe. They keep always. Just like we keep a stick, they keep one axe.

Room Conversation -- September 11, 1976, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Harikeśa: Nitāi had them bathe the big Deities here, Rādhā and Kṛṣṇa, on Janmāṣṭamī.

Dhanañjaya: And on Balarāma's appearance day, the big Deities were bathed. Kṛṣṇa-Balarāma.

Harikeśa: Terrible speculation.

Dhanañjaya: Actually Janmāṣṭamī celebrations were very bad and it's very...

Prabhupāda: Therefore the color has faded? He is a rascal.

Harikeśa: I remember that when these Deities... They're never to be washed. Never water was to touch. Supposed to put a plastic bag over the Deity. That was... If you have to use the big Deities, you're supposed to cover them with plastic.

Prabhupāda: Why did you allow? Just see, this is the disease. Rascals they do not know. And although I was...

Dhanañjaya: No, but everyone was listening to him. He was posing himself as the most learned in Deity worship.

Prabhupāda: That he's fond of.

Room Conversation -- September 11, 1976, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: So, you just officially receive them. He's got M.A. Ph.D. Good man. This is etiquette.

Dhanañjaya: So, what I wanted to know was that ah...

Prabhupāda: No, no. Develop that business and give engagement. The women can live here for sewing. They must be comfortably situated. If they are feeling, women, they cannot feel very bad and stay. We do not want that. So they can live here in a room and work sewing. And our women who have learned, they can teach. Very simple. And men must be engaged there for finishing. And if at Aligarh they are casting, then there is no difference. And there is no difficulty.

Dhanañjaya: So the Deity should be cast in Aligarh and then finished here.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Dhanañjaya: Just like we are doing.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Aligarh is 45 miles away. You can go and bring them, and Surendranath will help you. If there are expert men in Aligarh, that will be very nice. A different size Deity, you get there.

Press Interview -- October 16, 1976, Chandigarh:

Prabhupāda: So how everyone can become a spiritual master? To become a spiritual master is not easy job. One must be very learned scholar and must have full realization of the self and everything. But Caitanya Mahāprabhu has given us a little formula, that if you strictly follow the teachings of Bhagavad-gītā and if you preach the purpose of Bhagavad-gītā, then you become guru. The exact words used in Bengali, it is said, yāre dekha, tāre kaha 'kṛṣṇa'-upadeśa (CC Madhya 7.128). To become guru is very difficult job, but if you simply carry the message of Bhagavad-gītā and try to convince anyone you meet, then you become a guru. So our, this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is meant for this purpose. We are presenting Bhagavad-gītā as it is without any malinterpretation. If we interpret Bhagavad-gītā in our own way that is not very good. If you have got a different opinion, you can preach your philosophy. Everyone is free. But one should not take Bhagavad-gītā and through Bhagavad-gītā one will try to preach his own philosophy. That is very bad. You should not do that. Then the authority of Bhagavad-gītā is lost. If everyone can interpret in his own way, then where is the authority of the Bhagavad-gītā? Just like in the Vedas... We take Vedas as the authority. But if you interpret in your own way and squeeze out some meaning in your own way, then where is authority of the Vedas? So our special stress on this point is that don't squeeze out some meaning of Bhagavad-gītā for your own convenience. Present Bhagavad-gītā as it is, and people will be benefited. And that is being practically seen. We are preaching Bhagavad-gītā as it is. You have seen our book?

Room Conversation -- October 31, 1976, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: They have proposed it. That Houston politician, "It is spreading like epidemic." Hm? Come. "It is spreading like epidemic. Something must be done." Otherwise one day they'll capture our government." That's a fact. If so many young men join this movement, they will vote. Because your country is democratic. (conchshell blows) Do this what I suggested.

Haṁsadūta: Yeah. You see them...

Prabhupāda: (indistinct) (break) "What is this pressure?" "Sir is Kṛṣṇa consciousness. (laughter) And very bad." Some day somebody says, "No it is good." (laughter) But Kṛṣṇa pressure.

Haṁsadūta: That pressure is being felt.

Prabhupāda: (Bengali) Otherwise who cares for whom? There are so many things. Here also, they are feeling the pressure, the so-called swamis, yogis, Gosvāmīs, religious groups, Māyāvādīs...

Hari-śauri: Communists.

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Hari-śauri: Communists, too.

Prabhupāda: Communists. That is our success. Everyone is now feeling the pressure. (Bengali) and they are talking (Bengali). In such a short time, so much money, so much expansion, so many devotees, what is this? That is Kṛṣṇa.

Room Conversation on New York court case -- November 2, 1976, Vrindaban:

Prabhupāda: You should go to see Visvambhara Gosvāmī also. (Hindi) This is fortunate that you have come in this moment. So I'll give you this inspiration, now combine together all Vṛndāvana gosvāmīs. Kṛṣṇa cult is for everyone, either Gauḍīya or Rāmānuja or everyone. Now all of you should come forward. That you do. Admitting (Hindi conversation). They are concerned with the Kṛṣṇa cult. Kṛṣṇa cult means all the ācāryas, all the ācāryas, either Rāmānujācārya, Madhvācārya, Nimbārka or anyone, they should combine together. (Hindi) (aside:) Why you are talking? It is not very important. It is for him. It is a very bad habit. (aside ends) So we should be very alert in this point. All the Vaiṣṇavas of different sampradāyas, especially Gauḍīya sampradāya, you should come forward to fight this. They are gathering their strength. We should gather our strength. Fight, Kṛṣṇa never said that "Don't fight." (He) never said (to) Arjuna that "You are My devotee, you don't fight. You are very good gentleman, nonviolent, and I shall do everything for you." (He) never said that. (indistinct) Kutas tvā kaśmalam idaṁ viṣame samu.... viṣame samupasthitam. "Now there is a great dangerous fight, why you are saying like a nonsense," anārya-juṣṭam, like non-Aryan. (Hindi conversation) This fight is another good news that they are feeling the strength. Otherwise they would not have prepared to fight. Formerly they were thinking that so many swamis and yogis come, come and go. But now they are feeling the strength, they (are) charging that their young men are being kidnapped. It is strong party. And these boys, they have taken to Vaiṣṇava principles, their parents have tried to take them back and induce them to eat meat and according.... They deny. This is also tried. I have got many disciples, they are coming out very rich family, rich father. So one of the fathers called his son that "I am old man, the business is dwindling, you come and take..." So I told him that "You go. Why not take your father's business and use it for Kṛṣṇa?" So he went, on my order.

Room Conversation -- November 3, 1976, Vrndavana:

Haṁsadūta: Pigeonhole, really pigeonhole.

Prabhupāda: So why this is?

Haṁsadūta: Only one room. Because there is no, economically they're...

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Haṁsadūta: Not making progress. The situation is very bad. And all the buildings if you noticed, they were very old.

Prabhupāda: Yes I have already told...

Haṁsadūta: Did you notice? They were built in the time of Stalin.

Prabhupāda: Hm. Not Stalin.

Haṁsadūta: Or in the years before, sorry.

Prabhupāda: That is during the Czar. They could not build any.

Haṁsadūta: That university, very old, that university and all the big buildings, very old. And like you say there is no taxi.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Room Conversation -- November 3, 1976, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: There is no taxi. You cannot get taxi on call. And the taxi drivers, they want something more.

Haṁsadūta: Yes, they...

Prabhupāda: Hm?

Haṁsadūta: They do that.

Prabhupāda: Very bad country, the communist country.

Haṁsadūta: I was asking this boy, that was here a few days ago from South India, from Kerala, he was in Russia. I asked him. "What did you eat there?" What did you, you stayed for one year?

Prabhupāda: He must be eating meat.

Haṁsadūta: No, he said, "I was able to get frozen vegetables from the south of Russia. They freeze it and then they sell it," he said, "but it is very expensive, very costly." He was getting frozen.

Prabhupāda: That is also nasty. Frozen means nasty. I never take frozen. In the beginning I thought, "Oh, it is very nice, you can get fresh vegetable." But they are not at all fresh.

Haṁsadūta: No.

Room Conversation About Gurukula -- November 5, 1976, Vrndavana:

Yaśodānandana: Personally I had that boy with me for two months when I went to South India, preaching, and I thought it would be an asset to have a young boy, but he was so misbehaved that it was too much problem. And the same things that he was doing, in the beginning with me, telling lies and misbehaving, he is still doing now and he does not correct himself never. He has no effort to better his behavior or his conduct. He does not chant his rounds. He rarely comes to the kīrtana, or else when he comes to the kīrtana, he does not chant. He simply plays and makes fun. And it's very... He has a very bad influence on the other boys.

Prabhupāda: No, then he should be sent back. Or he can be sent to Bombay to work ordinarily. Or Hyderabad farm. Like that. Let him work on the ground.

Yaśodānandana: He speaks Bengali. That boy was in Bengal before and he picked up Bengali.

Prabhupāda: So he can go.

Pradyumna: He's very intelligent, but he's just had a bad...

Prabhupāda: So he was in Māyāpur?

Yaśodānandana: Yes, he was in Māyāpur before. He knows Bengali. He can speak Bengali.

Prabhupāda: So he can go with the Māyāpur preaching party as well.

Room Conversation with Life Member, Mr. Malhotra -- December 22, 1976, Poona:

Mr. Malhotra: Gold, I think I am also gold.

Prabhupāda: No, gold that is accepted, quality. That if you say, this is explanation. You must have brain to understand. That a small particle of gold and a big gold, they are gold in quality but the big gold is millions of dollars and a small particle is few dollars. Just see this is accepted. This Māyāvāda theory has made people atheists, that "I am God, I am equal to God." Very bad theory.

Mr. Malhotra: From where these things also come? From where it comes?

Prabhupāda: From the Vedas. Vedas says, na tasya kāryaṁ karaṇaṁ ca vidyate, Upaniṣads. Na tat-samaś cābhyadhikaś ca dṛśyate, parāsya śaktir vividhaiva śrūyate svā-bhāvikī jñāna-bala-kriyā ca (Cc. Madhya 13.65, purport).

Mr. Malhotra: Who gives this asura-buddhi? From where this filth grows?

Prabhupāda: Asura-buddhi and sura-buddhi. Due to our little independence. Just like we are talking. So we do not agree. Therefore we are talking. So one of us may be asura and one may be sura. Therefore we do not agree. Otherwise, there is no use of talking. So that is natural. That is the conditioned stage. Because we are conditioned by the material nature, some of us are asuras and some of them suras. Dvau bhūta-sargau loke 'smin daiva āsura eva ca (BG 16.6). There are two kinds of men. Daiva, devatā and asura. Viṣṇu-bhaktaḥ smṛto daiva āsuras tad-viparyayaḥ. Those who are devotees of the Lord, they are devatā, and just opposite number is asura. Who does not recognize the authority of God, he is asura. He himself becomes God foolishly. That is not God. Yasyājñayā bhramati saṁbhṛta-kāla-cakraḥ. Yac-cakṣur eṣa savitā. This, about the sun, description in the Brahma-saṁhitā. Yac-cakṣur eṣa savitā sakala-grahāṇāṁ rājā samasta-sura-mūrtir aśeṣa-tejāḥ. Aśeṣa-tejāḥ, unlimited potency, energy, heating energy.

Morning Walk and Room Conversation -- December 26, 1976, Bombay:

Dr.Patel: You are firing everyone, so they run away. (laughter)

Prabhupāda: What can be done? This is real position.

Dr. Patel: Only I am a fool, not running away. (laughter) He says, Prabhupāda, "You rascals..."

Prabhupāda: Everyone may be a fool, but if he continues to remain a fool, that is very bad. (laughter)

Dr. Patel: A fool is a fool always. He cannot change his...

Prabhupāda: More or less everyone of us, we are fool, mūḍha. Kṛṣṇa has stated mūḍha, mūḍha. Na māṁ duṣkṛtino mūḍhāḥ prapadyante narādhamāḥ (BG 7.15). He has chastised like anything. Tān ahaṁ dviṣataḥ krūrān kṣipāmy ajasram aśubhān (BG 16.19). So anyone who's not taking to Kṛṣṇa consciousness, he is within these categories: duṣkṛtina, narādhama, mūḍha, māyayāpahṛta-jñāna, āsuraṁ bhāvam āśritaḥ. This Kṛṣṇa consciousness is Indian movement, but na māṁ duṣkṛtino mūḍhāḥ prapadyante narādhamāḥ. They are not taking seriously. That is the position. It is our movement. Kṛṣṇa came in India and because India is so glorified place, puṇya-bhūmi, even the demigods they desire. Not India, this planet, Bhāratavarṣa. Formerly, the whole Bhāratavarṣa means whole planet. Anyway, for the time it is now minimized. So it is not ordinary land. So our men, they are not interested in such great movement. How much regrettable it is. And who are they? Kṛṣṇa says, na māṁ prapadyante mūḍhāḥ duṣkṛtino narādhamāḥ (BG 7.15). If you speak the truth, then you take the quotation of Kṛṣṇa. Now every Indian should take part in this great movement. Every Indian. That is the Caitanya Mahāprabhu's order.

Room Conversation -- December 29, 1976, Bombay:

Guest (3): Do you believe that the Gītā should be followed as it is or interpretation...

Prabhupāda: Yes, yes. If you read somebody's book, you must read the author's version. Why should you bring interpretation? This is... You have no business. If you want to say something of your philosophy, you can say, but why do you take Bhagavad-gītā and give your own interpretation? That is very bad.

Guest (3): But can you not apply your own philos...

Prabhupāda: Why? Why should you? If you take Bhagavad-gītā, you should speak what Bhagavad-gītā is saying. And interpretation is required when the thing is not understood clearly. There you get interpretation. Unnecessarily, why should you interpret Bhagavad-gītā? You have no right. Dharma-kṣetre kuru-kṣetre samavetā yuyutsavaḥ (BG 1.1). So anyone can understand there is a place Kurukṣetra still. Why should you interpret, "Kurukṣetra means this body and this and that," why? What is the necessity? Do you think there is necessity?

Guest (3): But just as...

Prabhupāda: No, no. First of all let us settle, that Bhagavad-gītā begins

dharma-kṣetre kuru-kṣetre

samavetā yuyutsavaḥ

māmakāḥ pāṇḍavāś caiva

kim akurvata sañjaya

(BG 1.1)

So Mahābhārata is the history and there was Battle of Kurukṣetra. And that Kurukṣetra is mentioned there in the Bhagavad-gītā, and it is dharma-kṣetra since Vedic age. So the word used, dharma-kṣetre and kuru-kṣetre, it is completely understood. Why should you interpret unless you have got a motive. And why a sane man accepts that interpretation? If you have got a different philosophy you can write your own book. Why should you cheat others, taking Bhagavad-gītā and interpreting in your own way? This has spoiled the whole thing. And Kṛṣṇa says that as soon as you deviate from the disciplic succession system then it will be lost. So what is the use of reading something which is already lost? If I want to supply you something food, it must be fresh and palatable. Then you'll enjoy. But if it is rotten, decomposed, and if we supply you that foodstuff, what you will enjoy and what you will get benefit out of it?

Room Conversation -- December 31, 1976, Bombay:

Hari-śauri: When we go out and preach and we just repeat or try to repeat whatever we've heard from the spiritual master, but we may not have fully realized what we're speaking about, does that somehow or another reduce the potency of the Gītā or the Bhāgavatam or...

Prabhupāda: Yes, realization takes time. Therefore there is no question of realization. Caitanya Mahāprabhu says you simply repeat as Kṛṣṇa says. That will save you. The so-called political leaders, they have no realization, but they manufacture their ideas. That is dangerous. Mislead themselves and others. In Bhagavad-gītā it is clearly said, ācāryopāsanam. Amānitvam adambhitvam. This is the process of knowledge. These so-called scholars and politicians, they have no ācārya. Instead of being amānitvam, they're mani... "I have become a leader, so whatever I shall say, it will be accepted." This is going on. Very bad. It is clearly said, as soon as you give up the ācārya system it is rotten. Sa kāleneha yogo naṣṭaḥ parantapa. So things which is rotten, what you'll get benefit? That is going on. Therefore in spite of so many Gītā commentators, big, big leaders, scholars, not a single person is converted into a devotee. Not a single person amongst their followers. It's useless talking. Therefore it is forbidden. Avaiṣṇava-mukhodgīrṇaṁ pūtam... Because they are not Vaiṣṇava, politicians and—reject them immediately. Immediately. That is the injunction. I wrote Mahatma Gandhi that "You are so respectful. People have got... Now you have got your svarāja. Please take Bhagavad-gītā seriously and let us preach."

1977 Conversations and Morning Walks

Room Conversation -- January 7, 1977, Bombay:

Dr. Patel: The śūdras are ruling the world over, not only in India. Because Nixon was less than a śūdra, they way he carried out himself, the highest authority of the most advanced state materialistically.

Prabhupāda: Now they are going to take care of it, these brāhmaṇas.

Dr. Patel: But he made a very bad show. The place where a man like...

Prabhupāda: Washington.

Dr. Patel: Washington and people like Jefferson. He has polluted that seat. They must change that seat. Change the White House wholesale. The greatest curr on this most, I mean, enlightened people. Americans are very enlightened because their forefathers were enlightened and they came there as pilgrims. Those, what do they call them? Puritans, you see. They are most different from Aussies. The Australians who are criminals of England.

Prabhupāda: If Nixon is a Jew?

Dr. Patel: No, no. He's a Christian. No Jew can be, serve as the president of that country. Not only Jew but not only Catholic.

Trivikrama: Well, some Catholics. Kennedy was...

Dr. Patel: Only Kennedy was the first Catholic to be. Otherwise till Kennedy came, there was no Catholic ever elected. (break) Methodist. Even in material world, he was a fool the way he carried out... (laughing) But sir, one thing: about the freedom of America. I have my hat off that that man could be knocked off by ordinary paper reporter. That would not happen in any other country.

Prabhupāda: Therefore I asked to take the government.

Room Conversation -- January 7, 1977, Bombay:

Trivikrama: Yes, because the atmosphere changes.

Dr. Patel: But pressurized plane, no. On nonpressurized plane, not.

Trivikrama: He is the knower of his body.

Dr. Patel: All right. I had gone to Allahabad by train. (laughs) I had a very bad experience myself.

Prabhupāda: No, first-class is... We reserved whole room, so no outsider there; will be very comfortable. We'll leave at...

Dr. Patel: First-class have got now berths.

Prabhupāda: Four, we reserve four whenever... So two upper berths, two lower berths—we sleep very comfortably-lock the door. And first-class...

Dr. Patel: You'll be coming back after how many days?

Prabhupāda: Maybe by March

Dr. Patel: More. Fifteen days, no?

Prabhupāda: No. More than that.

Room Conversation -- January 7, 1977, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: It is very precarious condition. So we want to give them, all of them, "Come and live." But when you come here, if you get husband we have no objection. But don't canvass. That is not good. And that is making our sannyāsīs fall down. Of course, it is difficult, that young men, young women living, intermingling. But it is... Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is to reform everything. Even there there is such desire it should be checked. And that can be checked if one is strictly Kṛṣṇa conscious. Otherwise not possible. So these things should be... Because the Kali-yuga, the more it advances, people will be suffering in so many ways. And the only solace is Kṛṣṇa consciousness, only solution. If one becomes Kṛṣṇa conscious, then he (she) doesn't require husband. He (she) does not require. He... She knows that "Kṛṣṇa is my protector. Why shall I artificially seek after father or...?" And what protection, for a few days either the father or the son or the husband may give? Real protection is Kṛṣṇa. This is temporary, but because we have got this material body we require some. In this way... And this kind of hypocrisy—they have taken sannyāsa and mixing with woman. This is not to be allowed. If you want woman you get yourself married, live respectfully. We have no objection. But this hypocrisy should be stopped. There have been so many fallen down. First of all there will be no sannyāsī anymore. I have got very bad experience. And at least, we are not going to create new sannyāsīs. And those who have fallen down, let them marry, live like respectable gentlemen. I have no objection. After all, young man, fallen down—that's all right. It is by nature's way. But marry that girl. That I am insisting from the very beginning, that no friendly liaison. If you want, get one nice... They are, all of them qualified.

Room Conversation -- January 8, 1977, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: And Lalitā says that "I know Swamiji is very exalted. I am simply afraid... He has so many American disciples. If some of them do something wrong, that will be very bad thing for him." Lalitā was telling me. What can I do? Come anyone. Who is bad, who is good I do not know. But I know even bad man comes, he becomes a good man. That I know. So who will come? How can I discriminate who is bad or who is good?

Girirāja: Lord Caitanya also welcomed everyone.

Prabhupāda: Hm. Caitanya's movement is pāpī tāpī yata chilo hari-nāme uddharilo. All sinful men, all suffering humanity, simply by chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa, they were. Pāpī tāpī yata chilo hari-nāme uddharilo. How it is possible? Tāra sākṣī jagāi mādhāi. You see the Jagāi-Mādhāi, how they became Vaiṣṇava. This is Narottama dāsa Ṭhākura's song. So you have to ask anything?

Morning Discussion about Kumbhamela -- January 8, 1977, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: (Hindi)

Dr. Patel: (Hindi)

Prabhupāda: You go and eat there. (laughter)

Dr. Patel: But I don't go there to eat it. These government regulations are very bad. I don't think they would be able to...

Gurudāsa: It's your own right to...

Dr. Patel: He thought that India is spoiled by American policy, Mr. Dulles's. And he spoiled the pitch, this Mr. Nehru, Nehru, being a flamboyant, highly arrogant man... And then they supported Pakistan, and Americans lost lot of money on these small wars. Instead of that, much money was given away to a poor country. it was Dulles who got United States to this present condition. We should have insulated this country after svaraj, not selling anything, not taking anything. Produce yourself or starve and die. People don't work when they get food like that.

Prabhupāda: I am simply surprised when I compare British days and nowadays. My practical experience—one of my maternal uncles, he's a very big, rich man. He was; he is not existing. So he was doing business, rice exporting. So in Calcutta, Chetra side, he had big, big godown full of rice. Not only he, other merchants also. But now they are empty. Similarly, from Bombay the oil seeds are being exported.

Morning Walk -- January 9, 1977, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: The more they create turmoil, the more we become famous.

Haṁsadūta: They say mind control and brainwashing, Śrīla Prabhupāda, but actually that is what you are doing. You are cleaning our brain and teaching us how to control our minds.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Our method is ceto-darpaṇa-mārjanam (CC Antya 20.12). Yes, actually it is washing.

Dr. Patel: Brainwashing is very bad in India, not only in America but the whole world over.

Prabhupāda: I condemn everyone, that "You are all dogs and hogs." And United Nations a pack of dogs barking. That's a fact. And in Chicago I said, all women, "You cannot have freedom. You have got only thirty-four-ounce brain, and man has got sixty-four-ounce." I told them. So I became a subject of very great criticism.

Trivikrama: Women's liberation.

Prabhupāda: I denied, "No, you cannot have." I told them. One girl in the airship, she was seeing like (makes some gesture-laughter). I asked her, "Give me 7-Up." "It is locked now." So I frankly said that "No, no. You cannot have equal rights because your brain is thirty-four ounce." Actually that's a fact. Where is woman philosopher, mathematician, scientist? Not a single.

Conversation on Train to Allahabad -- January 11, 1977, India:

Prabhupāda: If they have no conception, we should give them conception that the body is dead, decomposed, then where is the sex? Where is the inclination? Similarly, the soul originally... As it is said in the Vedānta-sūtra, that "Everything is coming from Brahman." Athāto brahma jijñāsā: "Now let us talk about Brahman." This is the meaning of athāto brahma-jijñāsāh. Then next verse is..., sūtra, code-janmādy asya yataḥ (SB 1.1.1). And Kṛṣṇa says in the Bhagavad-gītā, ahaṁ sarvasya prabhavo (BG 10.8). So unless sex comes from God... It may be perverted in the material world. That is another thing. But originally, pure sex must be there in God. Otherwise how it comes? Everything is emanating from the Supreme. Janmādy asya yataḥ (SB 1.1.1). So how you can say there is no sex? Viśvanātha Cakravartī Ṭhākura explains that janmādy asya, ādi-rasa. Ādi. Ādi-rasa means sex enjoyment. So he has explained that sex has come from... Because we have used perverted sex, we have got a very bad idea. But actually sex is there in the original. Otherwise there is no question of mādhurya-rasa. Hlādinī-śakti. There is no question of sex. You do not understand Absolute. The opposition party will inquire you, but sex is originally from Brahman.

Room Conversation -- January 15, 1977, Allahabad:

Rāmeśvara: All over the world.

Prabhupāda: Yes. That Hitler also did. Phāṇsa lāge dubudh bage: "If five men combine together, even the ghost will go away." (laughs) So everyone was against the Britishers. How they can keep their...? And nature's law also. They exploited the whole world for the benefit of few persons in London, and that is very bad.

Gurudāsa: You told me they wanted to be paid in gold by the Home Bill just to deplete the economy.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Yes. Home Bill. Because I was student of economics. So Home Bill. Home Bill means all the Englishmen were engaged in India, either government, railway, industry, factory, and so on, so on, so on. Whatever... They have got some charges. So all the bills were sent to London, and they made a Home Bill. Their home is in England, so they won't take payment here. They'll take payment at home. And the government there, they'll present the whole bill to India and debit India's account in gold. That means, other words, all the payments which were to be made to the Englishmen in India, they were paid at home in gold.

Room Conversation on 1976 Book Scores -- January 16, 1977, Calcutta:

Rāmeśvara: This is a very bad picture. It makes the devotees look very strange. And they have this elaborate ghee holder.

Prabhupāda: This is our men?

Rāmeśvara: Yes. This is at an ārati. You can see the donations that people have put on the tray. But it makes it look very strange, this picture with the lighting. They have deliberately selected this.

Prabhupāda: Very big article.

Rāmeśvara: Yes. I have just been reading it.

Hari-śauri: What newspaper is that?

Rāmeśvara: It's a very small-time newspaper called the Soho Weekly News.

Prabhupāda: And bad propaganda is going on.

Gargamuni: Some good, some bad.

Prabhupāda: Yes. There are two. Any movement will have such.

Gargamuni: So I mentioned this morning about Sumati Satetur(?), Mr. Hoksa Buddhi,(?) that he was considering becoming a devotee. So I told him you were here, so he immediately came tonight. He's waiting now.

Prabhupāda: Oh. So then bring him. That's all right.

Room Conversation -- January 19, 1977, Bhuvanesvara:

Prabhupāda: Then what is the news of Germany?

Rāmeśvara: The news from Germany? I have not heard any change—except that Satsvarūpa's men, they began... Just before Christmas the schools close. They began to go to Germany to take standing orders, and it was the most difficult country, they said, very difficult. And because... One of the reasons is they have such a very bad opinion of us. The church is against us. But still, they managed to get a few standing orders, and then the schools closed for Christmas.

Hari-śauri: Any reviews?

Rāmeśvara: Not yet. They just began. Now they are spending this month, January and February, in Germany. This will be very valuable for our case there, if the scholars begin appreciating us from a different angle. But meanwhile, book distribution is bigger than ever in Germany.

Prabhupāda: That is the proof we are gaining ground.

Room Conversation -- January 21, 1977, Bhuvanesvara:

Prabhupāda: Oh, begged from some house.

Hari-śauri: That's what I made out from him. But this boy should be back very soon. The boy that went out to do the shopping should be back very soon. They took a van.

Rāmeśvara: There was one question I had, Śrīla Prabhupāda. You have written in the Third Volume of the First Canto different instructions for the age of Kali, how there'll be compulsory marriage and so on and so on. And you mentioned about the gold standard, that this is very bad, this artificial standard of monetary exchange.

Prabhupāda: Oh, yes. It is very bad.

Rāmeśvara: In the future this is something that we should try to correct.

Prabhupāda: You should introduce coin, real money.

Hari-śauri: Real gold coins. No paper.

Prabhupāda: Anyone has got money... It is fact. And what is this nonsense, keeping some paper and thinking he has got money? How cheating it is going on, from government's side. And therefore artificial inflation. You can print, so the price is increased. Because you haven't got to pay him real money, you print and pay him, and he will ask, "Give me this money. Then I'll supply." "All right, take." You print and pay.

Room Conversation -- January 22, 1977, Bhuvanesvara:

Prabhupāda: Such a rascal. They are thrown away from the established condition; so now he wants them back. In one sense it is right, that these rascals may not imitate him.

Brahmānanda: Yes. That's one thing. Like Kenya, they are more sensible. They see what happened in Uganda. Uganda's economy is very bad.

Prabhupāda: Finished.

Brahmānanda: So they will not do the same thing.

Prabhupāda: They must be intelligent persons. Otherwise how he can... The Britishers, they took away these Indians to organize Africa. Otherwise, they conquered, but the Indians organized.

Brahmānanda: They were all the administrators.

Prabhupāda: Yes. After all, Kṛṣṇa is there. He'll look after. So so far we are concerned, there is no disturbance.

Brahmānanda: Oh, no. No.

Prabhupāda: That's all right. Then develop. We are getting good place without any monetary difficulty.

Room Conversation -- January 24, 1977, Bhuvanesvara:

Prabhupāda: Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura, he said that "When our men will be sahajiyā, oh, they'll be more dangerous." So our men are becoming, some of them, sahajiyās. This very word he said, that "When our men will be sahajiyās he'll be more dangerous."

Hari-śauri: Without any proper realization, on the basis of being able to read Sanskrit, they delve into all kinds of books, and then they pick fault—"Oh, this rule is not being followed. This is wrong. This is wrong."

Satsvarūpa: "We don't chant sixty-four rounds, so that is very bad. We'll never make any progress."

Prabhupāda: Sahajiyā.

Hari-śauri: No faith in the spiritual master.

Satsvarūpa: So far, though, we have not learned a way to sell standing orders to the common man.

Prabhupāda: Hm?

Satsvarūpa: You say now the standing orders, the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, Caitanya-caritāmṛta, after the universities, should be sold in every home. So far, no one has learned how to do that.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Room Conversation -- January 24, 1977, Bhuvanesvara:

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Gargamuni: I told him this. He was interested. He was. But he told me, "Under the present..." The CIA used to give money to certain groups to stop Communism, he said, but recently they have been under investigation for this, so he said it would be very dangerous for them to do such a thing now. But he said he would talk it over. Since then, though, I have not met him. This was at the time when we were called CIA in Calcutta, when it came in the papers. I went to them for advice because they also became very much upset because just before that, the Consulate with his wife came to Māyāpur and saw all of our activities. They were very impressed. And they printed this in the newspaper, trying to show that the Consulate General was also an agent along with Bhavānanda. So he became very angry. He became very angry that they should try to make this up. He said, "Actually I had personally... My wife wanted to come, but I was not so much interested. But because my wife came, I came also. But I don't see why they are trying to link me along with your society as CIA." He said, "This is very bad." And from what I know, they made a formal complaint to the Home Minister of West Bengal, the Home Secretary.

Prabhupāda: That is good.

Gargamuni: 'Cause his assistant, Mr. O'Neil, told me that they received a telex from Washington saying that formal protest should be made that ISKCON is not part of the CIA and also they are not funded by the government of the United States.

Prabhupāda: People can say anything. But if there is officially protest, that is...

Gargamuni: Yes. He said. (break) ...there at Purī, yes. In our sampradāya these—Māyāpur, Purī, and Vṛndāvana—are most important.

Prabhupāda: Hm. Now if we revive, just like Pānihāṭi...

Gargamuni: Yes, and Pānihāṭi also.

Prabhupāda: Haridāsa Ṭhākura had part. Here, at Siddha-bokula. Siddha-bokula, Gambhīrā—if you try, you can get.

Morning Walk -- January 25, 1977, Puri:

Prabhupāda: Two.

Hari-śauri: Oh. And then one when you go to...

Prabhupāda: New York. Third one, paralyzed.

Hari-śauri: Very bad one.

Prabhupāda: Left side paralyzed. I do not how it is saved.

Hari-śauri: By Kṛṣṇa.

Prabhupāda: And one has... One girl, that captain's wife, she studied astrology. She said, "Swamiji, if you can survive your seventieth year, then you'll live for one hundred years." So some way or other I survived my seventieth year. And I do not know whether I shall live for hundred years. But the seventieth year was severe, three heart attacks and paralysis.

Hari-śauri: All in the same year.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Without any help. At that time none of you were with me. I was alone. I was completely depending on anyone.

Evening Conversation -- January 25, 1977, Puri:

Prabhupāda: Two.

Hari-śauri: Oh. And then one when you got to...

Prabhupāda: New York. Third one paralyzed.

Hari-śauri: Very bad one.

Prabhupāda: Left side paralyzed. I do not know how we were saved.

Hari-śauri: Kṛṣṇa.

Prabhupāda: And one girl, that captain's wife, she studied astrology. She said, "Swami, if you can survive your seventieth year, then you'll live for one hundred years." (Hari-śauri laughs) So, somehow or other, I survived my seventieth year. I do not whether I shall live for hundred years, but seventieth year was severe-three heart attacks and paralysis.

Hari-śauri: All in the same year.

Prabhupāda: Then without any family. At that time none of you were with me. I was alone. I was completely dependent on anyone.

Room Conversation -- January 31, 1977, Bhuvanesvara:

Prabhupāda: On the plane?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: On the plane. When I went also, we were in the same plane, because he was making a bridge in Manipur. So he invited me to come to his place in Calcutta, in Balliganj. When also I came back we were in the same plane. It just happened. So he started talking to me that he lost about forty thousand rupees because bridge was broken, and so he said he was feeling very bad, very sad. He was telling me all stories about "Whether I should prepare my life for the future, or whether I should wind up, as he is. Then I started talking about that we always want to be happy, but somehow we misunderstand about our basic position, what position we shall take up, whether... He said he has great difficulty in making decisions, "Whether I shall decide this," so many problems, not knowing what to decide. So we started talking about the real nature of knowledge. The real knowledge is to understand the real difference between this life and matter, the fundamental principle of knowledge.

Prabhupāda: This is explained in the Bhagavad-gītā.

Conversation on Roof -- February 14, 1977, Mayapura:

Prabhupāda: Now what is the wrong there? Just like the Hawaii student. Wrong is there that you'll get a body and to get body means suffering, any body, whatever body you'll get. Yata ātmano 'yam asann api. Although you can say, "All right, suffering, it will end with the body." Just like modern science. "Everything will be ended with the body." But not... It will appear in different way. But at least so long you live, you have to suffer. Asann api. The body will not endure, but the suffering will continue. That they do not understand. This is called mode of ignorance, mūḍha. So we should not lose the chance of ending our suffering. We must know what is the suffering. Janma-mṛtyu-jarā-vyādhi-duḥkha (BG 13.9). Duḥkha means suffering. And the real suffering is to take birth and then again die. And between birth and death there is old age and disease. Who can deny it? Where is the scientist. "Yes, we shall end all this nonsense." (chuckling) Nobody can end it. It is not possible. But they are trying. Durāśaya. Hoping something which will never be fulfilled. Is it not? Their material adventure for mitigating suffering, will it be possible? (aside:) Bring some sugar cane, er, sugar candy. The mode of ignorance is very, very bad. Little more advance, mode of passion. Further advanced, mode of knowledge. Further advanced is spiritual position. Just see. This Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is trying to give the human society the best knowledge and they have combined together to oppose it. How mode of ignorance is prominent. The simple method is to hear about Kṛṣṇa. That's it. Kīrtanād eva kṛṣṇasya (SB 12.3.51). Simple. We have given so many books. Always we should hear about Kṛṣṇa, speak about Kṛṣṇa. Then this base quality, ignorance and passion, will go. Śravaṇaṁ kīrtanaṁ viṣṇoḥ (SB 7.5.23). So wherever you remain, you should continue this. Otherwise māyā will attack. Ceto-darpaṇa-mārjanam (CC Antya 20.12). Paraṁ vijayate śrī-kṛṣṇa-saṅkīrtanam. So we should hold classes very repeatedly and preach. What is the complaint of the opposing party?

Evening Darsana -- February 15, 1977, Mayapura:

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: They're more intelligent 'cause they know about the soul. They care about the person more.

Prabhupāda: Yes. I know. In England they like Indian doctors. And last time, when I was in London, the Civil Surgeon, he was a Bengali. This Aurobindo's father, he was a medical practitioner. Aurobindo was born in London. He was English-born, yes. His father, Dr. Monmohan Ghosh, he was medical man there. So although he was British-born, he became enemy of the British. (drinks medicine?) Very bad medicine. (laughs)

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: That means good. I know when I was going to get that operation I didn't want to go to America. I would rather have gotten it here, even though the machines may not have been so modern, the fact that the Indian doctors were here was more reassurance than the Americans. They are very...

Prabhupāda: Careless.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Oh, one girl now... There's a devotee named Madhusūdana. You may remember one of your disciples. His name is Madhusūdana. Anyway, his cousin has joined us in New York. So this boy, he's married to a girl who was the chief nurse for the biggest neurosurgeon in America, who operated on Kennedy, a very big man. So she told us something about the medical profession, some examples. She said the American doctors are extremely cruel.

Prabhupāda: Cruel they must be. They're eating meat, rākṣasas.

Evening Darsana -- February 15, 1977, Mayapura:

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Books were seized for twenty thousand dollars worth of books.

Brahmānanda: But there has been some reports in the newspapers that Argentina is now a military dictatorship, and it's very bad place. Many people are being taken and shot regularly.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Now... But also in Venezuela, there, now the government wants to audit the accounts. They are asking for a public auditing of our books.

Prabhupāda: Public property?

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Audit. Audit.

Prabhupāda: Oh.

Brahmānanda: They want to check our books, how we are, where we are collecting and how we are spending.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: We have to be very cautious in dealing in these countries. We talked with Hṛdayānanda Mahārāja, and he said that now they are changing their tactic a little bit. They are becoming more cautious, because before they were too bold. Just like Brahmānanda was describing, when he first went to Africa, they had the van...

Brahmānanda: With loudspeakers and... We were very ambitious. So the people, they'd never seen anything like this, and so they accepted it. But then after a while, they resented. If you become too much... Actually, the governments feel very threatened. That was one of the reasons why you were not permitted to land in Kenya, because it was so much advertised, they put banners across the main avenue and radio, TV announcement, posters. They saw this as a..., something that will eclipse their government, their own president. You were more famous. (Prabhupāda laughs) Therefore they tried to say, "No, I am more famous." So therefore they didn't want you to come.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: So it's better in some cases to be a little cautious, low key. Better to go slowly sometimes than very...

Prabhupāda: Yes. Not become aggressive.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: But then again, not too slowly.

Prabhupāda: So in our Argentina we are no longer...

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: No, no more.

Room Conversation -- February 16, 1977, Mayapura:

Pradyumna: You say that. You get so angry at seeing it, you...

Prabhupāda: (laughs) Krodha bhakta-dveṣi-jane. That is Narottama Ṭhākura's instruction. You must be very angry, those who are against God and devotee, very angry. Utilize your anger for them. Krodha bhakta-dveṣi-jane. That anger is service. Kṛṣṇa-sebā kāmārpaṇe. For Kṛṣṇa's service one should be mad. Kāma-krodha should be given up, but a bhakta does not give up. Utilize it. A bhakta should be very much for kamut(?) serving Kṛṣṇa. And he must utilize his anger for the bhakta-dveṣi, those who are not devotee. Kṛṣṇa-sebā kāmārpaṇe krodha bhakta-dveṣi-jane. We have nothing to give up like Māyāvādī. Kāma, krodha, lobha, moha, mātsarya. Mātsarya may... That has to be... A bhakta cannot be envious. If a bhakta is angry upon them, that is not envious. That is for good. A bhakta should not be envious. Otherwise how he can preach? He's merciful. Even if he's angry, it is mercy. Therefore this mātsarya has no use for bhakta. Other things, they have use, kāma, krodha, lobha, moha, not mātsarya. Mātsarya is very bad.

Satsvarūpa: Envy?

Prabhupāda: Envy, yes. So Panihati is hopeful, is not...

Jayapatākā: Yes. If this MLA actually pushes it through, then in one month...

Prabhupāda: In that MLA that gentleman is very intelligent.

Jayapatākā: Yes.

Prabhupāda: Young man.

Room Conversation -- February 18, 1977, Mayapura:

Prabhupāda: Yes. If he knows about, anything about Caitanya, why should he say like that? Bogus temple. By attempting to establish a temple like that, he has diminished his value. And therefore it is doubtful whether he actually obtained this. Now, our Bon Mahārāja also writes "Doctor."

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Purchased title. These deprogrammers are doing very active campaign work by getting entry into the schools, the public schools, to speak to the children in the age groups of twelve, between twelve and fifteen, junior high school, high school age. And they're making presentations to them about these different groups like ours, to beware of our groups. To beware of our groups. In other words, it's actually very bad because these children are innocent, and from a very young age now they're being told, "Watch out for the Hare Kṛṣṇas. They will brainwash you." Of course, that makes us even more appealing.

Prabhupāda: That is our advertisement.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Yes. Because when a young man, when a child is told by his... When a child is told by his parents, "Don't do something..."

Prabhupāda: They'll do it.

Room Conversation with Adi-kesava Swami -- February 19, 1977, Mayapura:

Prabhupāda: Give me.

Ādi-keśava: Sometimes... This is a book that is documenting all of their activity. One other thing is that sometimes when they are attacking us there is a good opportunity for us to differentiate ourselves, distinguish ourselves from other religions. For instance, this World Fellowship of Religions held a press conference at the United Nations. Now when they backed us, they would not back the Unification Church or the, you know, these Christians groups, because they don't like them. In general, the scholars, they favor our group. They don't favor the other groups. They don't like them. They think they are cheaters, and there has been some proof in the press. One problem is, for instance, this Mr. Moon, his...The tax commission in New York investigated him, and they took away his tax exempt status. And the Attorney General removed all of his privileges in the state of New York. So he has been made to look very bad. So rather than... There are some devotees who are saying we should stand together in an alliance with them. But every time I am asked in the press or anything, I say the same thing again, "No. We have nothing to do with them. We have nothing..." Because I am afraid that we will be dragged down with them.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Ādi-keśava: They are rascals, and eventually they are going to be exposed.

Prabhupāda: No.

Hari-śauri: They'll be finished for certain.

Prabhupāda: We want they should be finished. (laughs)

Room Conversation with Adi-kesava Swami -- February 19, 1977, Mayapura:

Ādi-keśava: Sometimes in their propaganda these deprogrammers they complain about our sannyāsīs the most. They say, "Because they are saying everything in the material world is evil, so therefore they are the worst."

Prabhupāda: Yes, it is worst. Because I am spirit soul, I am now imprisoned with this material body. It is my unnatural state, and I am eternal, and because I have accepted this material body I have to undergo birth, death, old age and disease. So that is my effort, how to get out of this material body and remain in my original spiritual identity. That is our whole propaganda. We think material atmosphere is our imprisonment, suffering. Material body means suffering. Otherwise I am eternal, blissful, full with knowledge. That is my position. But because I have been impact... (aside:) Again you have the same disease. Attention, you attend, draw there. Don't do that. Very bad habit. Immediately you sit down, you do it. You cannot check it. So actually this is our punishment. This is māyā. That example I have explained this morning, very nice verse, that the moon in the sky is reflected in the water, in hundreds of pots of water, and the wind is agitating the water, and the moon is also agitated—sometimes round, sometimes long, sometimes... The moon is fixed up, but the reflection in the pot making him different. Similarly, I am spirit soul, and I have been captured or I have voluntarily surrendered to this material world, and it is being agitated by the mind, so I am taking this shape, that shape, that shape, this shape, eight million four hundred... That is my trouble. My nature is to be fixed up, always illuminating, but circumstantially I am being agitated by mind, and working with my mind, I am accepting this body, that body, this body, that. So this is very troublesome. Those who have no knowledge, no brain, they are satisfied with this material condition, agitated condition, and driven by the thinking, feeling, willing of the mind. This is very dangerous. We want to get out. This is psychology.

Room Conversation With Artists and About BTG -- February 25, 1977, Mayapura:

Rāmeśvara: We were thinking that somehow this magazine...

Prabhupāda: No, another thing, it is aparādha... Nāmno balād yasya hi pāpa-buddhiḥ. Unless he is in the process he'll think, "I am chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa mantra, so whatever sinful activities I am..., it will be controlled."

Brahmānanda: That's the worst offense.

Prabhupāda: Yes. That is very bad offense.

Hari-śauri: So we're actually advertising the process of devotional service, not just simply haphazard chanting.

Prabhupāda: First of all we are chanting just to make him little attracted. Ādau śraddhā.

Rāmeśvara: Just to popularize it.

Prabhupāda: Yes, that's it. Then, if the heart is little cleansed, then they will understand. It will be effective, but when it is done properly it will give real effect. Outsider, those who are chanting, we don't discourage him.

Room Conversation -- February 27, 1977, Mayapura:

Prabhupāda: Nothing of the... This of should be strictly forbidden.

Rādhā-vallabha: So no corrections. That makes it simple.

Prabhupāda: They can divide the synonyms. That's all.

Rādhā-vallabha: Synonyms. So even...

Prabhupāda: That is his tendency, to correct. That's very bad. He should not do that.

Rādhā-vallabha: So I'll just forget this, then.

Prabhupāda: The system is: whatever authority has done, even there is mistake, it should be accepted.

Rādhā-vallabha: Oh.

Prabhupāda: Asa-prāya(?) That is ha... He should not become more learned than the authority. That is very bad habit.

Rādhā-vallabha: He was always wondering how he should think. So I'll tell him that. He thinks, "If I think I see a mistake, what should I think?" I'll tell him what you just said.

Prabhupāda: He cannot see mistake. He is mistake. (laughter) He should... That is being done by this rascal. I don't want. And the Hayagrīva has..., the Easy Journey, he has changed so many things. That... He is now bad character. You should not maintain him.

Room Conversation -- March 2, 1977, Mayapura:

Prabhupāda: But that you could not prove. You are under some control. Why don't you see to that? You may think you are independent, but you are under control. Nobody wants to die—you die. So what is the benefit of showing that "I am independent"? (pause) Any arrangement with any bank for our temple branch? (break) What is the situation of the tenants?

Girirāja: Um... Well, nobody is immediately planning to vacate, and the hopes of the cases is always delayed. Actually the lawyer says that the court is dealing with cases before 1973. Actually the judicial system is very bad.

Prabhupāda: Very bad.

Girirāja: They go on giving dates, but actually they have no intention of settling it. So he said that the only cases they are finalizing are in the year before or two years before when we filed our cases. So he thinks it will just go on until the cases of those years come up.

Prabhupāda: We have got only one case of Deva, Deva...

Girirāja: Devashan. Then actually there's one other which was carried over from Mrs. Nair. When she was the landlady one tenant left and put another person there. But, I mean, the tenants are... I mean they're gaining more and more respect for us.

Prabhupāda: After all, they are human being.

Morning Conversation -- April 11, 1977, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: Now so many charges are coming against her. (pause) Hm? She and her son are the destiny of India? A woman and a debauch? They can do whatever they like. It's a farce condition. That so-called democracy is nonsense demoncracy. And by this demoncracy, it can be done. A demon may be, if he can simply secure votes. What is the position? Without any training Formerly the destiny was by rājarṣi. Royal power, but ṛṣi, saintly person. See the character of Mahārāja Yudhiṣṭhira, Parīkṣit, Ambarīṣa. (aside:) At least, you cover some way or other with some cloth. Find out some cloth or towel, and cover it. Yes. All rogues, they are political leaders. Political leader means rogue. Nowadays, these... Here is so-called religious leader, Sai Baba, another rogue. This is Kali-yuga. (Hindi) There is no good man politician. Mandāḥ sumanda-matayo manda-bhāgyāḥ (SB 1.1.10). Sumanda-matayaḥ. They have got a conception which is very, very bad, conception of religion, social, political. All condemned.

Conversations -- April 19, 1977, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: And your name is simply, "Swami..." There is no other name behind this plan? As if you are doing everything. You are maybe architect, but is that your plan?

Surabhīr Abhipālayantam: Well, we had that... We had the interview in the... And I very clearly mentioned all these things.

Prabhupāda: There is no mention of any other name, even your guru's name. You are everything there. This is very bad. This is not at all my request(?). It is objectionable, very much objectionable. You have done a very wrong thing. Why did you not consult others before publishing?

Surabhīr Abhipālayantam: Well, we went with four devotees there, and I mentioned all these things, but I don't know why he didn't...

Prabhupāda: Where? There's no mention, as if you are doing everything.

Surabhīr Abhipālayantam: The first thing he...

Prabhupāda: This article shows that you are doing everything, and they are asking, "your city"? They have asked. Is that your city?

Conversation with disciples of Chinmayananda and Shivananda Ashram -- April 22, 1977, Bombay:

Indian man (3): But certain occupation...

Prabhupāda: No, no, I mean to say that you have to take work from the head and from the leg, but head and leg different. Sva-karmaṇā tam abhyarcya (BG 18.46). That is science. If you want to take the work of head from the leg, that is foolishness. Head must remain head, leg must remain leg, but you take the work of leg for walking; you take the work of the brain for thinking. That is wanted. Evasive is no good. So anyway, our mission is that Indians especially, they should take advantage of Bhagavad-gītā—not by distorting the meaning. As it is. You cannot distort the statement of Bhagavad-gītā. Then you defy the authority of Bhagavad-gītā. You manufacture your own way. That is very bad. Then there is no authority. Sarvam etad ṛtaṁ manye yad vadasi keśava (BG 10.14). As Arjuna... "Whatever You say, I have accepted." That is the need, not that "I am very learned scholar; I can change the meaning." That is not good. You are not greater authority than Kṛṣṇa. Thinking like that is foolishness. Kṛṣṇa is authority. All the ācāryas, Rāmānujācārya, Madhvācārya, Kṛṣṇa Caitanya Mahāprabhu, they have all accepted kṛṣṇas tu bhagavān svayam (SB 1.3.28). How you can speak something else what, against what, the instruction of Kṛṣṇa?

Conversation: Vairagya, Salaries, and Political Etiquette -- April 28, 1977, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: Vairāgya... Caitanya Mahāprabhu says clearly that niṣkiñcanasya bhagavad-bhajanonmukhasya. The bhagavad-bhajana, to become devotee of the Lord, means he's disgusted with this material world. For him, bhagavad-bhajana. Just like if I become disgusted with something, I require some change, similarly, bhagavad-bhajana is for him who is absolutely disgusted with this material world. And anyone who has got little interest in material enjoyment, he's not fit for bhagavad-bhajana. He'll have to accept again this material body, either he becomes Brahmā or becomes an ant in the stool, according to his karma. Karmaṇā daiva-netreṇa jantur deha-upapattaye (SB 3.31.1). He'll have to develop certain type of body according to his desire of enjoyment. This is nature's law. Then where is the question of going back to home, back to Godhead? Why so many varieties of life? There is Brahmā, and there is ant in the stool. So vairāgya-vidyā-nija... Vāsudeve bhagavati bhakti-yogaḥ prayojitaḥ (SB 1.2.7), janayaty āśu vairāgyam. And vairāgyam means jñānam ca. When one is in full knowledge that "To remain in this material world is useless for me"—jñānam—"I am simply wasting my time by repetition of birth and death," then he can have vairāgya. "Stop this!" If this sense is not awakened, there is no bhakti. It is not so easy. Brahma-bhūtaḥ prasannātmā na śocati na kāṅkṣati (BG 18.54). That is vairāgya. So vairāgya-vidyā... Otherwise why big, big persons, they renounced everything? Bharata Mahārāja, young man, the emperor of the whole world, gave up everything. Caitanya Mahāprabhu personally teaches, young man, good, beautiful wife, young wife, so affectionate mother, so much honor in the society, Nimāi Paṇḍita, so beautiful body... Tyaktvā sudustyaja-surepsita-rājya-lakṣmīm (SB 11.5.34). Surepsita. Caitanya Mahāprabhu's position was, even the demigods, they desired such family life. But He still gave up. That is teaching. Therefore Sarvabhauma Bhaṭṭācārya says, vairāgya-vidyā-nija-bhak..., śikṣārtham: "to teach others." He understood that in order to teach others vairāgya-vidyā... He is the Supreme Person. Vairāgya-vidyā-nija-bhakti-yoga-śikṣārtham ekaḥ purāṇa-puruṣaḥ: (CC Madhya 6.254) "That He was, Supreme Lord. Now He has appeared as Śrī Kṛṣṇa Caitanya."Śarīra-dhārī: "He has accepted one body as Śrī Kṛṣṇa Caitanya." So these things should be stopped, that they should live comfortably with husband and wife, children, and take salary from the... You decide. This is not to our... Besides that, in our BBT it is clearly written that "Fifty percent for printing book, and fifty percent for..." So you cannot violate this. Those who can give voluntary service, "Welcome." Otherwise we don't require. At least they should not be given any salary. That is very bad. This is against principle.

Morning Conversation -- April 29, 1977, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: No, no. That is mistake. They should be taught how to become obedient to the husband.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Yeah, you won't learn that in school.

Prabhupāda: Little education, they can...

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Yeah. That they can get at home also.

Prabhupāda: They should be stopped, this practice of prostitution. This is a very bad system in Europe and America. The boys and girls, they are educated-coeducation. From the very beginning of their life they become prostitutes. And they encourage.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Oh, yeah.

Prabhupāda: They distribute pills. I have seen the boys and girls dancing together, embracing, in the school film. That ruins the career. Both of them are ruined. That is very regrettable. Then you shall require this sterilization, pills, another big program. They are creating animal civilization, and when the animals are disturbing, they are trying to find out some other means. This is their program. First of all create animals. Then, when the animals behave like animals, then another program. Why do you create animal? Woman brahmacāriṇī, this is artificial.

Conversation Pieces -- May 27, 1977, Vrndavana:

aśomatīnandana: That is in First Canto, Part Two, which is not here.

Prabhupāda: This shelter made for keeping always reference book... There is no book. Vṛndāvana. Just see. See. The shelter kept there, reference book. It is not there. Just see. What for we have got shelter? Shelf is there for keeping reference book. Somebody has taken away. That's all. This is our management(?). Very bad management. What can I do? This is our movement. We have to select men from the worst class. Pāpī tāpī jata chilo. (laughs) Nobody will come here after passing M.A., Ph.D. The most fallen we have to select.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Lowest(?).

Prabhupāda: Pāpī tāpī jata chilo, hari-nāme uddhārilo. This is our position. We have to select our worker from the worst class of the society, pāpī and tāpī. But, we shall prove, by hari-nāma they become Kṛṣṇa conscious. That is the movement. You trace the history of everyone. All worst, third class. And they come here. And that is Kṛṣṇa conscious movement. How many Doctor Svarūpa has come? If we speak frankly, (laughter) all from the worst class. Those who were finished. And Kṛṣṇa... It is said, pāpī-tāpī jata chilo. Pāpī and tāpī, they are not first class. They are the tenth class. Pāpī-tāpī jata chilo hari-nāme uddhārilo. This is the test of Caitanya Mahāprabhu's movement, that how many pāpī-tāpīs have been picked up. Brajendra-nandana jei, śaci-suta hoilo sei, balarāma hoilo nitāi. This is Gaura-Nitāi. What is their business? Now, pāpī-tāpī jata chilo, hari-nāme uddhārilo. "Bas? This is their business?" Yes, to deliver all the pāpīs and tāpīs. "So how is that?" Tāra sākṣī jagāi and mādhāi. See Jagāi-Mādhāi. It is not imaginary. So we have to deliver all Jagāis and Mādhāis. This is our movement. That is the test of the, of us. It is not sorry for that, but still, they should act like good men.

Morning Conversation -- May 29, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: Ha. As soon as you rent out, then botheration.

Ādi-keśava: That... Śrīla Prabhupāda, that area has become a very, very bad neighborhood.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Very bad.

Ādi-keśava: Very, very bad. There's nothing but dacoits and drug addicts.

Prabhupāda: Yes, it was when I was there. (laughter)

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: That's what we were. (laughter)

Prabhupāda: I did not know. I occupied. Otherwise nobody was taking.

Ātreya Ṛṣi: We can make a library.

Prabhupāda: And library means these negroes will go to read? They'll go for drinking.

Room Conversation -- June 17, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: It was hint already, that "I want to go back."

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Actually at that time we were massaging your heart. It was such a shock to you. And I remember, the only medicine you want... We were massaging your heart and reading Kṛṣṇa book. And you developed a very bad cough.

Prabhupāda: I do not wish to recall that. It was intolerable. Then these things were now brought to... Otherwise I did not like to come back. I would have stayed.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Ahh. Wow.

Prabhupāda: I made my headquarter in Los Angeles. And they made a conspiracy against me. That's all.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: I never understood that.

Prabhupāda: Otherwise I made it my own story(?). (pause)

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Well, whatever the reason, by your coming here it was wonderful also.

Prabhupāda: That means Kṛṣṇa desired. Otherwise I had no plan to come back here.

Conversation: 'How to Secure Brahmacaris' -- June 24, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: Anywhere. There are lots and hundreds and thousands, but you have to collect them and give them proper education, vidvān, bhaktimān. Kāṇena cakṣuṣā kiṁvā cakṣuḥ pīḍaiva kevalam. So if you don't educate them as vidvān and bhaktimān, it is just like blind eye, kāṇa, with some disease, simply giving trouble. That's all. Pluck it out. The medical treatment is pluck it out. So what is the use of begetting cats and dogs? According to our Bhāgavata philosophy, if one is not able to beget nice children, then he should not become father-mother. That is real contraceptive. Gurur na sa syāt jananī na sā syāt, na mocayed yaḥ samupeta-mṛtyum. The father-mother's duty is to stop repetition of birth and death. That is real father-mother. Otherwise dog is also doing that. Dog is also begetting children. Man is also begetting. What is the difference? The difference is man should be responsible that "This child who has come to me, this is his last birth. No more birth again." Na mocayed yaḥ samupeta-mṛtyum. "I shall train him in such a way..." Tyaktvā dehaṁ punar janma naiti (BG 4.9). This is ideal. The means is already there. And Kṛṣṇa says, janma karma ca divyaṁ me yo jānāti tattvataḥ, tyaktvā dehaṁ punar janma naiti (BG 4.9). You can stop your birth and death, your son's birth and death. How? One who knows Kṛṣṇa. Janma karma ca divyaṁ me yo jānāti tattvataḥ. It is open to everyone. Simply one has to know. And where is the difficulty? Kṛṣṇa is explaining Himself. So know yourself, let your sons know, and you become free. Everything is there. So that ideal we want to give to the world. So throughout the whole world we cannot find out five hundred students? So what kind of manager? Hm? This is ideal civilization, that people are suffering mṛtyu-saṁsāra-vartmani (BG 9.3). The human life is meant for understanding Kṛṣṇa and stop this repetition of birth and death. That is ideal. Kṛṣṇa says plainly that "If you do not take advantage of My instruction, then mām aprāpya: you'll not get Me." "So what is the loss? I don't get You?" Now, nivartante mṛtyu-saṁsāra-vartmani. "Then you'll be again entangled in this birth and death." "What is the wrong there?" "Now, today, you are Prime Minister. Tomorrow you may be a dog. Do you like that?" But they have become so rascal that "Where is the wrong if I become a dog, that?" Here is your civilization. They say that "What is the wrong if I become a dog?" They don't mind even if they become a dog next life. Is it not? This is Western civilization. They say plainly, "What is wrong? I'll forget." Such degradation has taken place in the human society. We are trying a little bit to raise them. That is our humble attempt. Otherwise... Mandāḥ sumanda-matayo manda-bhāgyāḥ (SB 1.1.10). All unfortunate, everyone, all bad, manda. They have created their own manufactured ideas. Mandāḥ sumanda-matayaḥ. Manda-mata and sumanda-mata. Bad, very bad. Why? Manda-bhāgyāḥ, unfortunate. They got this human form of life after so many births, and they do not take advantage.

Conversation: 'How to Secure Brahmacaris' -- June 24, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: Just... That is a psychology. I am not going out. But if I am ordered that "You cannot go out," then I become mad. I am not going out of this house, but if I have to maintain this idea that "I cannot go out," then I'll become mad. I know that I can go out whenever I like, but due to my diseased condition, I cannot go. That is another thing. But if I am able to go out and I am ordered not to go out, then I will become mad. This is psychology. So this is the position of the society, very, very bad. And our mission is para-upakāra, Caitanya Mahāprabhu's mission. So if we actually want... This is very good opportunity to train up from the very beginning to create vidvān, bhaktimān, jñānavān. Others also, they may be given opportunity. There is everything in the śāstra. We are presenting Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Kṛṣṇa has given all direction in every field of activity. So let us carry out the orders of Kṛṣṇa as it is, as far as possible. That is our duty. Now these, my programs, they're also taking the concentrating people in the village, government?

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: That's it.

Gurukula Inspection -- June 26, 1977, Vrndavana:

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Teachers should be so expert that they can deal with many students.

Prabhupāda: Now your business is bring students. That is first duty. Let people convinced. Before going to the foreign countries, I had a very bad experience. I asked so many men to give students, Vedic students. "Swamiji, (Hindi) We have to earn money." Nobody wants that the children should be honest, brāhmaṇa, brahmacārī. Nobody wants. He wants all thieves, rogues, cunning cheater. "So the money bring." That is the difficulty. So you have to face this difficulty. But try to. (Hindi) Loafer class, śūdra, they want. (Hindi) Still, keep an ideal institution. That experience I had. When, before going foreign countries, I tried, all friends: "Swamiji, (Hindi)"

Dr. Sharma: Indians also?

Prabhupāda: Indians? Foreigners, they were hippies; they come.

Akṣayānanda: Before he went to America.

Prabhupāda: Therefore, being disappointed here, I went to America.

Talk About Varnasrama, S.B. 2.1.1-5 -- June 28, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: As soon as they allow young girl to mix with young boys—finished.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: This coeducation is very bad.

Prabhupāda: And in the Western countries it is openly allowed, dating. "Please learn this art." (pause) And if you keep woman chaste, then nice children will come, no hippies.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Yeah, just like that boy, Dapni, Dapni's(?) grandson. Nice boy.

Prabhupāda: That's it. And if nice children are there in the society, they will become responsible men. Then there will be no disturbance in the society. Everything will go on smoothly. Brāhmaṇa is acting as brāhmaṇa; kṣatriya is acting as... They are both... No quarrel. No animosity. Everyone is cooperating with one another. The whole society becomes peaceful. Family becomes peaceful. The man personally becomes peaceful. Then he will be able to make progress. Kutaḥ śānti ayuktasya. If you are not peaceful, how you can attain? Or if you are not a devotee, you cannot be peaceful. Or if you are not peaceful, you cannot become devotee. But if you can become devotee, you become peaceful.

Room Conversation -- July 1, 1977, Vrndavana:

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: You're waiting for that.

Prabhupāda: Waiting for that.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: You're holding back a little bit because it's not sure that we can stay here now.

Prabhupāda: No, training men and they are forced to go away. Very bad government.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: For no reason. We're not in any way a threat. We're an asset.

Prabhupāda: And therefore I say, if the government considers this and do, then we can expect. Otherwise what is the use of meeting with...? Waste of time.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Yeah.

Prabhupāda: If they do not understand the importance of the movement...

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: I think they must.

Prabhupāda: If they are intelligent, they must. But they are all rascal, rogues, thieves and...

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Kṛṣṇa has given you all facilities, so why...? I'm sure He'll give this one also. I just got a notice from... The visa people gave me notice earlier that on such and such date I have to leave, and I have to think how to appeal. They're harassing everybody.

Prabhupāda: You can write that "Our permanent visa is being considered by the Central Government."

Conversation -- July 1, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: Every day is auspicious.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: (laughs) That's why you're able to spread Kṛṣṇa consciousness all over the world, Śrīla Prabhupāda.

Mr. Myer: In Madras we have got very particular people. This is ho-kalam(?). One and a half hour every day, nobody does any work. Monday, 7:30 to nine. It's some time every day they say very bad. People don't start anything new, not going... In the afternoon there is rama-dandana.(?) So it always means a way of postponing things, so, as Guru was saying the other day, somebody said, "It's not auspicious to sleep on the north side." So then he said, "I don't have a head, so it doesn't matter which way the..." Quite true, that is.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: So if tomorrow we could have this... Or day after tomorrow, perhaps. It will take a day to get the ingredients. Day after tomorrow is all right with you?

Mr. Myer: No, that's very good, yeah.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: No, today's Friday, so day after tomorrow will be Sunday. Sunday morning. Is that all right? Actually Mr. Myer came here to get initiated. He had no idea to come here to become a manager here. Originally, before he went back to Madras to get his wife, he just came here for this thing, because he heard that you were very ill, and he didn't know what your position would be, so he wanted... So he rushed here, stopping all his work, simply to take initiation.

Prabhupāda: That is Kṛṣṇa's inspiration.

Room Conversation with Devotees -- July 1, 1977, Vrndavana:

rabhupāda: Yes.

Bhakti-caitanya: From there we can see that result.

Prabhupāda: So if we mix with these politicians, very bad. Better not to mix. But sometimes this is very important thing, and we have already presented our case. Let us see how he does it. Everywhere you should be very careful about mixing with the politicians. What is that?

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: This is a bottle of rosewater. I asked him to get it from Seth Visanchand. I asked this man, "Seth Visanchand sent this?" The boy who brought it said, "I'll just make inquiry."

Prabhupāda: They are so careful.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: One boy brought it to another boy who brought it to another boy, and he brings it here. So I said, "Where is it from?" because if it's from Seth Visanchand we can take it that it's a good chance it's pure. So I want to know who has sent it originally.

Prabhupāda: That is the difficulty here. I say. You say. Another rascal, he says. Another rascal, another... Ultimately it is done by grace. Rather, what can I do? It is very difficult. He did not hear what I am saying. "Will o' the wisp." Without understanding, "garagara," run off. Bas. Foolishness. What is written there, in the bottle?

Room Conversation with Mr. Myer -- July 2, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: How much harassment.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: ...I still have to go...

Prabhupāda: The government is not helping me even in this way. What they'll do? And...

Mr. Myer: Because Indira Gandhi had very bad relations with America. This is the problem. And she was trying to make very bad propaganda about the ISKCON in India.

Prabhupāda: Ācchā?

Mr. Myer: Now she is gone, so everything is fine.

Prabhupāda: She was making propaganda? I...

Mr. Myer: She was trying to say that this ISKCON is cheat.

Prabhupāda: Oh, yes.

Mr. Myer: They said that "This is... CIA people are here and then is happening. That is happening." That is why some of the Indians, you know, in the beginning, nobody has gone deep. You see, nobody...

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Room Conversation with Mr. Myer -- July 2, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Mr. Myer: ...has tried to study the whole thing.

Prabhupāda: She was very...

Mr. Myer: That is why she has had a very bad time.

Prabhupāda: ...biased against the Americans.

Mr. Myer: She has got very bad time now. She has already paid for that. So she will be in jail very shortly, her son and both, her son and... Even her chief minister in Madras, all her people are going to go in jail now, all of them. All the... Everybody involved in her ministry.

Prabhupāda: His son should be hanged.

Mr. Myer: So many (indistinct). Morarji Desai was in jail for nineteen months.

Prabhupāda: Just see.

Room Conversation with Mr. Myer -- July 2, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: American is giving. I am permanent resident of America. If they are giving Indians permanent resident for some business, why not Americans?

Mr. Myer: Well, that is because Indira... She was prime minister, you see. She was very bad...

Prabhupāda: So that is gone.

Mr. Myer: They have all exploded that wall, you see. That's what, how the government... So people said that... They're giving money for vague and, which is, at the time, I think... Now I think they have met recently in England. So there is some programs in India. Even Terawal(?) now... Everywhere there is some... After Morarji Desai has taken over, our relations are improving with all the countries.

Prabhupāda: That is expected. He's a good man.

Room Conversation about Mayapura Attack Talk with Vrindavan De -- July 8, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: But everyone can be utilized if you organize it rightly. Three hundred dacoits there means government is very weak.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: That's just in one little area, Nadia District. Imagine how many dacoits are in all of Bengal now. It will get even worse than it was in 1971. I'm sure, as the Kali-yuga progresses, it will only get worse. And it was very bad. I remember when we were living in Bali Ganj. Every day there was march. People were marching, Communist slogans.

Prabhupāda: (indistinct)

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Yes. Bhakti-caru was saying that one of the reasons Bengali people are by nature... They're intelligent. They're always intelligent people, not so much physically hard working. So without so much physical work to do and without proper employment, this intelligence now has become misdirected. 'Cause nowhere else in India do the Communists have such a foothold as in Bengal.

Prabhupāda: Intelligent and lazy.

Room Conversation -- July 10, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: If they can find out the snake behind the earthworm, then they'll be finished. That there is. There is no case. Simply it is maneuver. Communist government wants to drive away the Americans. This is the plan. And the government is anxious to keep good relationship with America. And the Communist wants to drive them away.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Yeah. Now the American Consulate is also involved. That makes it very jeopardizing for the Communists. If they act the wrong way, then the Central Government will lose its position with the American Embassy. It will look very bad for the Central Government. They're not going to let the state act in any way that will jeopardize their position. The two acting together, the Central Government and the American Consulate...

Prabhupāda: It is very clear that it is a plan of the Communists.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Would you say that even, I mean, initially it was a plan in the sense of the cow going on the land and...

Prabhupāda: No, no. This is all plan to make a case.

Room Conversation about Grhasthas -- July 17, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: Multi-story building. Why people should pay? Now Bombay have got many multi-story building; therefore that demand is reduced. But still, you have to pay in important place, pagri or underhand. What is called?

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Bribe.

Prabhupāda: Bribe is very bad word. "Under table." (chuckling)

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Under the table. Unofficial.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Mean I am paying on the table hundred rupees and under table two hundred rupees.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Śrīla Prabhupāda, I think you know everything spiritual and material.

Prabhupāda: Hm? So my fear is that after training our men so much, if he's lost, that's a great loss. Then future of society becomes very hopeless.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: So the principle is that if a householder has outside employment and can pay, then he can live inside our temple buildings.

Prabhupāda: That's nice. What is the wrong?

Room Conversation -- July 19, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: Kṛṣṇa's grace is always there, but we spoil Kṛṣṇa's grace. That is our business. "But Kṛṣṇa is giving us so much grace. Let us spoil it." That is our proposal. If there was no Kṛṣṇa's grace, how this institution would have come into existence? It was not possible, such a big institution, all by one man's endeavor, starting with forty rupees. Simply Kṛṣṇa's grace. So don't spoil that. This... This... That's not good. Then Kṛṣṇa will not help. Just like the father gives you money. If you squander that, He'll be very sorry. Tat te 'nukampāṁ susamīkṣamāṇaḥ (SB 10.14.8). "Oh, Kṛṣṇa is so kind by giving me this opportunity." You should take things like that, not that "For nothing the father has given me so much money. Let me squander it." Have to work much for it. So anyway, Mr. Mani has said.

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: Yes.

Prabhupāda: That means your situation is not bad.

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: No, it's not very bad. (end)

Room Conversation -- October 2, 1977, Vrndavana:

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: But the planes were on strike. The planes were not going either. In Bombay no planes were leaving. We were lucky to get the first-class train.

Hari-śauri: The road is very bad though, anyway. It wouldn't have been passable, not for Śrīla Prabhupāda.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: It would have taken three to four hours to go by car from Delhi in this condition. And bumpy. The train journey was not so bad, I think, not so bad. The weather was nice.

Prabhupāda: (indistinct) (break) ...water for drinking?

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Yes. Upendra Prabhu? Is there a drink for Prabhupāda?

Hari-śauri: Mung jal is ready.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: It's ready. Yes, we prepared mung water. Praṇava's wife, she was cooking with Kulādri today. She prepared two things, mung jal and the water from spinach. So that's supposed to be very good also. Would you like to try? Praṇava said that the feature of the spinach water is that it's very good for strength and very easily digestible. That's what he said. You might like to try something of both.

Prabhupāda: There is fresh milk? Half water, half milk.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Right now would you like to have some mung water?

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Room Conversation -- October 3, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: No, he's coming. Ask him then. The best thing will be... Call him immediately.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Bhakti-caru. All right. I think so also. And he would want to be here. I have no... None of us have any problem working cooperatively. It's just that I don't want to see someone be given this responsibility who's not qualified, like Sac-cid-ānanda. I don't want to trust you to his care, Sac-cid-ānanda's care. That would be very bad on our part. And Bhagatji's just... I don't know how to explain it, but I'd rather it be Bhakti-caru.

Prabhupāda: No. All of them can cooperate. Anyway, call him.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: All right. What does the kavirāja say about your chances, Śrīla Prabhupāda? What does he say about your chances of surviving? (Prabhupāda coughs) How can you drink milk when the cough is like this? I cannot understand how they can recommend milk.

Prabhupāda: No, that counteracts any...

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Ādā?

Prabhupāda: He is giving medicine for that.

Room Conversation -- October 3, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Haṁsadūta: At least they talk like that. And so all the religious groups there, the Christians and others, they're phasing them out by taking away their resident visas.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: What about the Tamils?

Haṁsadūta: Well, the Tamils are in a very bad position. They've all fled to the Jafna area, the north area.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Why are they so against the Tamils?

Haṁsadūta: Well, the government, the politicians, they incite the people to create trouble, and in this way they try to assume office. They just take advantage of the people in this way, stir them up.

Prabhupāda: Tamils are poor men?

Haṁsadūta: Tamils? No, the Tamils were all the business centers.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: That's the reason.

Haṁsadūta: It was actually the Tamils who agitated for the British to get out, and once the British got out, then the Singhalese pushed out the Tamils because they're a minority. About three million Tamils to eleven million Singhalese. The economic and political situation is very, very deteriorated in that country.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: What kind of preaching can you do now?

Haṁsadūta: We can preach because we're not identified as Tamils or Hindus, because we are white, so that still attracts the people. We preach in public halls, rent hall...

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: So they lifted the curfew.

Haṁsadūta: The curfew's over now.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Do the Singhalese take interest as much as the Tamils?

Haṁsadūta: Yes, they do actually. Actually the Tamils in Śrī Lanka, they're all demigod worshipers. They worship Durgā and Gaṇeśa and Śiva. There's practically not a single Kṛṣṇa temple on the whole island. I was really surprised. Well, that's the situation. They're all demigod worshipers.

Prabhupāda: Demigod worship means followers of Vedas.

Room Conversation -- October 3, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: They're thinking like that. We cannot freely have our money.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Actually it's only with the greatest difficulty that you were able to transfer this fixed deposits. Four times they came to you, and for even a half hour to one hour at a time went on and on, explaining to Prabhupāda why he should not do this. Really the best thing is that, I mean, if I can give this humble advice, is that someone like Girirāja should deal with them instead of... Because I feel, Śrīla Prabhupāda, they take advantage of you when they talk with you, and that makes me feel very bad to see.

Prabhupāda: Then tell Girirāja. Ask Girirāja to take...

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Yes. Because they see that you're not that well, and they also know that you're so merciful. And you're also a local Brajabāsī in a way. Therefore they're always against any of us taking any participation. It's the funniest thing. I explained something to Girirāja. He's been dealing with so many legal things for so long that he's become like a lawyer, Śrīla Prabhupāda.

Prabhupāda: Central Bank is very straightforward.

Room Conversation -- October 8, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: Where is...

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Juice? They're just making it, Śrīla Prabhupāda. It says here that "The moon is in the eighth house, which is very bad. The patient may not recover." Then he gives various planets which are also not well aligned. He says the conjunction of another two planets is very bad. "Hospitalization and ill health are intensified in the present year. The days which are not good is when the moon passes in the 22nd to the 23rd of nakṣatra, which are 27th to the 28th of September," that's already passed, "The 24th to the 25th of October, then some days in November and December." He says, "Sūrya will apply for Rahu on Saturday, the 8th of October." That's today. This is very bad, this day. Today is Ekādaśī. "Sūrya will apply for Rahu. Brashna, Lagnesh, Mangal, in the eighth house. The medicine will not give any relief. The native will make a fight for life as Sūrya-Mangal are good friends, and Saturn, or Śani, and Śukra are enemies. There is no benefics in the nine, six, eleven and three. Mangal indicates the effects of Sakini. There is difficulty in recovery. The seventh daśa starts on the 13th of January, 1978." It says, "We have noticed that the periods are all negative until March-April 1978, and the main trouble was due to Śani. We suggested that blue sapphire be tried, and he should keep it on. Hospitalization and travels are indicated." Then he says the worst days of all for you are today and tomorrow. He says it is very negative, as well as the llth, which is mixed. But these are all very inauspicious days. The 4th, 5th, 8th, 9th, and 11th of October. He says "The only remedy in this case is to do mahā-mṛtyum-jaya japa and havana. Previously also, now also, we have recommended Śiva. Lord Śiva is the presiding Deity of Śani, and with this, the native will be able to overcome disease and life span increases."

Hari-śauri: That's the mantra he gave to me.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Astrologically it is up to the eighty-one years, four months, approximately. Says, "Japa and havana."

Prabhupāda: Chant Hare Kṛṣṇa. It is finished. So where is juice? You're asking him for juice.

Room Conversation -- October 8, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: So how many critical days he has...?

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: What, Śrīla Prabhupāda?

Prabhupāda: Critical days.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: How many critical days. Today, tomorrow, and then on the eleventh, three days from today. Today, tomorrow, then one day is not so bad, and then the next day after that becomes bad again.

Prabhupāda: In this way how long prolong?

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Well, those three days are the worst. Then the whole month is not very good. In fact, for another two or three months it's not very good. But these two or three days mentioned, they are very bad.

Prabhupāda: And then again...?

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Then there are some critical days in the following month. At the end of this month there's a couple of critical days, and then in the next month there's two or three, and in the following month there are some. The whole period is not very bright-looking.

Prabhupāda: Hm.

Room Conversation -- October 14, 1977, Vrndavana:

Pradyumna: Moon applies the first day... Moon applies to Mars on the second day, Moon applies to Śani... Moon applies to Śukra, mixed. He has asked... When someone asks a question, that is praśna. So when you ask a question, he will do a special chart and he will calculate to find just the answer to that question. So he has done this for some praśna, and he's saying that in this praśna question he has given the positions. And in the eighth house... The Moon and Jupiter and Mars are in the eighth house. He says in parenthesis, "Very bad. The patient may not recover." These planets are in the eighth house, so eighth house is... That is not a good house. "Śani, with Venus in kendra." That is also not good. Śani is bad, Venus is good, but Śani..., Saturn, is bad. "In varṣa-lagna." Then he has made another chart for varṣa-phala, to see what will happen this year, beginning of year, what happened. When the year began, he'll make another varṣa-phala.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: What is that? In the beginning of the coming year?

Pradyumna: Well, sometimes they make varṣa-phala for the birthday. Whatever Prabhupāda's birthday is, on that day this year they make one. On the day it was September 7, he'll make a chart exactly at that time, and then he'll see where the planets are. That will tell what will come till next birthday.

Room Conversation -- October 20, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: Now who is...?

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: This Trivedi. He is very bad also.

Devotee: He's worse than Gupta.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Yes, he's worse. I mean the whole group of them is worse. There's a whole clique of them. The real thing that was happening is that without the knowledge of the head office they were doing so many things here locally. When it became known to the head office, then the head office became very angry. I can now understand that they had a whole plan in mind. They had it very planned, what they were doing. The plan in my opinion was that they felt here is a sannyāsī, old sādhu, and he has many foreign disciples...

Prabhupāda: Hm?

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: They were planning, in my... I talked with Girirāja about this. They were thinking "Here is an old sannyāsī, Prabhupāda. He has many foreign disciples, he has money. Let us get the money in fixed deposit. Then if he should pass away, then somehow by trick the money will be kept here and we'll never let them take it out." That was their plan. Therefore whenever Prabhupāda suggested that Gurukṛpā would sign, co-sign, "No, no," they would never allow. Their plan is that Prabhupāda would pass away, and all the foreigners would be there, and they'd never let them take it. When I showed them this power of attorney, they had a great shock. They were shocked how this had happened to them. I think this was their plan. Very deceiving type of people. Because they are here in Vṛndāvana. All their money is from fixed deposits from āśramas. So they know how to do this business of keeping the money. Now everything is clear. The money is there in Delhi. The Delhi office is not like that. They're businesslike. And we can keep dealing them, but on regular accounts. None of these fixed deposits. Not now. They "Now you must gain their confidence again." We told them, "We have nothing against you. But you deal properly, then again we'll deposit. But deal properly in a businesslike way." We have nothing against them. Punjab Bank is a good bank. Anyway, it's settled now, Śrīla Prabhupāda. It's finished. I wanted you to know that it's been successfully completed due to Girirāja's good efforts. Girirāja went to Bombay. His parents went with him.

Prabhupāda: You said this Trivedi is worse than him?

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Yes.

Room Conversation -- October 28, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: Everything is theory.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Well, not really, Śrīla Prabhupāda. It's not all theory. We spoke with the man. He went out and got the kavirāja. When we again called Calcutta we were informed that they had left on the plane. I mean there's no reason to suspect that people are lying to us, our own Godbrothers are lying to us. I mean it's so close to the time when they should arrive that we shouldn't become discouraged. I mean right now we could send Śatadhanya Mahārāja to Calcutta, but it would be very bad to do that, because the kavirāja may be five miles out of Vṛndāvana right now. Or he may have just reached Delhi if he came on this propeller plane. We have every reason to believe that he'll be here at any moment. We have no reason to feel that he shouldn't come.

Bhavānanda: He's definitely in transit, Śrīla Prabhupāda.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: There's nothing at all to lead us to feel dismayed that they haven't..., he hasn't... For example... I mean we got the call through to Calcutta by 2:30, and they said that he got the kavirāja and they got on the plane and left. That's very, very positive information. I mean, imagine if someone had picked up the phone in Calcutta and said, "I don't know," or "He couldn't find the kavirāja." But they said, "He got the kavirāja and they got on the plane." That's very, very positive information. Maybe we should read a little bit. That will be a good diversion now.

Prabhupāda: What you'll read?

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Well, the other night... I mean we could read SB.. I'm always eager for you to hear Bhāgavatam. I mean, I wanted to call... I always like to call Pradyumna and Jayādvaita. Of course, that requires... If you wanted to translate, you could make the effort. Otherwise Jayādvaita could read some of the edited work.

Bhakti-caru: He went to Delhi.

Prabhupāda: Hm?

Room Conversation -- October 29, 1977, Vrndavana:

Bhavānanda: ...mantras nonstop, while he's preparing. (break)

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Where is Vrindavan? I spoke with him for about two hours this afternoon, going over all of the points again, and, er, I explained everything to him. He said that he personally has very bad luck, very unlucky person. He said, "My only possible hope is my father."

Prabhupāda: To guide him.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Yes. I told him, "You're right. Actually Prabhupāda is... All of us were in the same position. We're all unlucky. Our only hope is Śrīla Prabhupāda." I said, "As long as you keep remembering that, then you'll be all right." (break)

Prabhupāda: Hm. Submissive, we can guide him.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: He said he's very frightened of you. I told him that we also are. (laughter) I said, "Even though Prabhupāda is lying in bed ill, we are very frightened also."

Svarūpa Dāmodara: That's a fact. (break)

Prabhupāda: You are doing?

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Yes, Śrīla Prabhupāda. (break)

Pañca-draviḍa: We are very much fortunate that after so many millions of lifetimes in the material world we have finally met a qualified spiritual master.

Prabhupāda: For fifty years they could not construct a maṇḍapa in Gauḍa-maṇḍala.

Room Conversation -- November 2, 1977, Vrndavana:

Brahmānanda: Don't take Prabhupāda's name off.

Prabhupāda: "And in the absence, we shall select another."

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Yes. I felt very bad whenever they tell me to leave the room like that. I don't like to leave you alone. I get very disturbed. I was standing on the other side of the door. I could not... I didn't like it, to be leaving you alone like that. We're trained always to be with you.

Prabhupāda: Hm. Very carefully deal with them. They are trying to come into the institution to grasp the power gradually.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: That's the point. I can understand that.

Prabhupāda: How much urine I passed?

Bhakti-caru: Ninety, Śrīla Prabhupāda.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Prabhupāda has not drank that much yet. Did he have milk and barley water?

Bhakti-caru: Not today.(?) But he doesn't want to take barley and water. (Bengali)

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Śrīla Prabhupāda? I'm going to take a short little rest now. Taking a little rest, just short. Then I'll come back.

Prabhupāda: Very carefully deal with them. They want to enter into our management.

Room Conversation -- November 3, 1977, Vrndavana:

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: They arranged that special lift to take you out of the plane also. Remember when we went in the plane on British Airways from London? That way you don't have to get carried or bounced around, because it's a machine that goes up and down.

Prabhupāda: The difficulty is on the, this road.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Yes, it's very bad.

Prabhupāda: What is the condition?

Śatadhanya: I came by train just now.

Bhavānanda: Kavirāja said, Śrīla Prabhupāda, that under no condition should you go on that road.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: It's lucky that the car didn't arrive in time, Śrīla Prabhupāda. He said under no circumstances can you be taken over that road.

Śatadhanya: It must have been Kṛṣṇa's arrangement to protect Śrīla Prabhupāda.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Śrīla Prabhupāda knew it.

Śatadhanya: The weather in Bengal is very nice, very warm and very nice weather.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: You saw Mr. Shastri? Kavirāja?

Śatadhanya: No, I left that night he was to arrive.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Adri had gotten back?

Śatadhanya: Not when I left.

Bhavānanda: He left the night I left.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: How did he come? By plane?

Śatadhanya: The train for free. On Jayapatākā's India Rail pass. You go first class for free.

Bhavānanda: Last night I had a dream, Śrīla Prabhupāda. Everyone at Māyāpur, all the devotees, were rolling on the ground and flailing their fists on the ground and pulling their hair and weeping. They were all expecting Your Divine Grace to come.

Prabhupāda: Hm.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: I think you have to fulfill their prayer, Śrīla Prabhupāda.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Room Conversation -- November 4, 1977, Vrndavana:

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: It's not very painful to take the medicine, is it?

Bhakti-caru: Does it taste bad, Śrīla Prabhupāda, the medicine? Does it taste very bad?

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Bhakti-caru: But then it is very bitter or... Because medicine will be a little bad tasting. Very much bitter, no, Śrīla Prabhupāda?

Prabhupāda: Bitter.

Bhakti-caru: Yes. So should I mix it with some sweet? Like... I normally give the powder with glucose so that the glucose will give you some sweet taste. But distilled medicine, the water thin, watery medicine, that is tasteless. It tastes like water.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Let us follow this medicine until its prescribed time, Śrīla Prabhupāda.

Prabhupāda: Give me. (swallows medicine)

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: This kavirāja feels quite confident, Śrīla Prabhupāda. He is not a fool. He says there's reason to feel quite hopeful. Naturally you are feeling a little hopeless because you've been laying down for so long in bed. Would you like to hear a little bit of one of the books? We'll read some more of the Teachings of Lord Kapila that we were reading yesterday to you? In this way we can pass the time very nicely.

Prabhupāda: Who is...?

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: We're moving the light over to this side for reading.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: This book is wonderful, Prabhupāda, Kapila, Teachings of Lord Kapila. It is a beautiful cover. (Jayādvaita reads from Teachings of Lord Kapila) (end)

Room Conversation -- November 13, 1977, Vrndavana:

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Otherwise... Svarūpa Dāmodara was mentioning to me, Śrīla Prabhupāda, that if we were to take you in a bullock cart... What did you say Svarūpa Dāmodara? People would accuse us of being very negligent of you, Śrīla Prabhupāda, and it would look very bad upon our Society. They would accuse us, how we have taken our spiritual master...

Lokanātha: They wouldn't understand these transcendental activities of the Vaiṣṇavas.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: You've always preached that we should do things in a modern way, just appropriately.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: And use for Kṛṣṇa whatever available...

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: I think if we fix up vehicles very nicely, that will be nice. Will that be all right, Śrīla Prabhupāda? Is that all right?

Prabhupāda: Hm.

Lokanātha: And most of the holy places are connected with good roads. During our preaching we also visit holy places. When they're on the way, we pass through them. And if we travel not very fast, with good drivers, it won't be much...

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Bhakti-caitanya Swami is the fit driver for your vehicles, Śrīla Prabhupāda. Is that all right? I know he would want to come. Is that all right, Śrīla Prabhupāda?

Prabhupāda: Oh, yes.