Room Conversation in Hindi – August 14, 1976, Bombay

Prabhupada: [Transl. ...one black man is trying to kill cow? "Who are you? How dare you kill cow in my kingdom? I will immediately kill you." So he came to his senses. He fell down at the feet and prayed, "Maharaja, I am personified Kali and this is my job. So why are you interfering with my work? I am destined to do that." So he said, "You can do this outside my kingdom." The personified Kali replied, "Kindly tell me where your kingdom ends? You are the emperor of the whole world."

[Transl. Then he told him that you can live in these four places-illicit sex, prostitution, meat eating, gambling and intoxication. You can live where these four things are rampant. So he found these four things all over the world. Therefore he made a plot and killed Pariksit Maharaja. He thought, "So long Pariksit Maharaja is alive these four things cannot go on. There will be no place for Kali-yuga." The moment he departed from this world these four things began to flourish. This is Kali-yuga.]

Indian lady: [Transl. Now someone is introducing Casino in Juhu.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. What is that?]

Indian lady: [Transl. Casino. Casino is a machine to play gambling.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Really?]

Indian man: [Transl. It is in Juhu or elsewhere?]

Indian lady: [Transl. I heard it is in Santacruz. Santacruz. The place for gambling.]

Indian man: [Transl. Really? Lottery is also gambling.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Ofcourse. Lottery in the Church. Gambling in the Church. It is in all the Churches everywhere. This is the influence of Kali-yuga.]

Indian man: [Transl. Actually, we forgot the satras. We don't act according to the sastra.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. At least follow only one thing,

harer nama harer nama
harer namaiva kevalam
kalau nasty eva nasty eva
nasty eva gatir anyatha
[Brhan-naradiya Purana 38.126]

[Transl. This is a simple prescription of the sastra. Because, in Kali-yuga, reformation is no longer possible. Everything will be spoiled. But there is one remedy which is very simple. Harer nama harer nama harer namaiva kevalam. If you can simply chant the holy name of Hari… You arrange to perform Hari kirtana together all over India and you will see how successful you will become. Immediately there will be change of heart. India is not dead as yet. India is not dead yet, it still has life in it. Just give an injection and it will stand up.]

Indian man: [Transl. Yes, it is still alive.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. You have seen how we do here in Bombay, in Calcutta. We simply perform Hari-kirtana and speak from Bhagavad-gita and Srimad Bhagavatam. Thirty thousand, forty thousand people are coming. Calcutta… In Bombay, at cross maidan you have seen our program? So people are not dead.]

Indian man: [Transl. You are right. Still alive.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Life is there. So if it is again revived then India will be glorious. This is the goal of our preaching. Caitanya Mahaprabhu…Caitanya Mahaprabhu's mission is, He says that anyone who has taken birth in Bharata-varsa should make his life perfect and do paropakara: welfare for others. Bharata-bhūmite haila manusya-janma yara, you understand Bengali?]

Indian lady: [Transl. Yes, I do.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Bharata bhūmite, you also understand?]

Indian man: [Transl. Not him.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Bharata-bhūmite haila manusya-janma yara. It is not difficult to understand. One who has taken birth in India as human beings, not as dogs and sheeps, human beings, bharata-bhūmite haila manusya-janma yara janma sarthaka kari' kara para-upakara.]

Indian lady: [Transl. Do good to others.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. First of all make your own life perfect, because only in India can you make your life perfect. Not anywhere else. The instructions and processes of making life perfect are in India. Veda, Vedanta, Puranas.

sruti-smrti-puranadi-
pancaratra-vidhim vina
Brahma-yamala

[Transl. So not spoiling you life rather by perfecting your life and by understanding well the purpose of human life you should spread this mission for the benefit of others. Paropakara. They will also come to know. They don't know all this. At least make an attempt and see the result. You don't have to do anything else. No secrecy. Open secret. Let the Indian culture be spread as it is. It will work. It is working. You can see.]

Indian man: [Transl. Nowadays people are becoming more inclined towards spirituality. Espeacially the higher class and the lower class.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. No. If things are presented as it is and accepted as it is then it will work. You are all businessmen, you know, if things are managed properly the business will increase. These boys and girls have assisted me so much. Hence this movement spread somewhat. They got a new life. They became hopeless. Turned hippies.]

Indian man: [Transl. Were confused.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Nothing. Young boys! Simply drinking wine and do all nonsense day and night. Had no conscious. What is the use? So being fed up of all that, they have given up everything. Even the prists of the foreign countries are astonished. They say, "they are our boys, our children, some are Christian, some are Jews, they never even inquired what is God? What is Church? They never even visited Church. And now they are mad after God?" They are surprised. You give them crores of rupees and take them out of Krsna Consciousness. They will never go. Didn't they have enough money?]

Indian lady: [Transl. One young boy came to our house the day before yesterday. I asked him, wear this pant and shirt. This dhoti doesn't look good. Wear this. It is good. He said, no. no. I am very much comfortable in this. I don't want to put on anything else.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. You build a gurukula here to train boys to have good character. That is the real thing. Simply by speaking Sanskrit nothing special could be accomplished. But yes, that is also good. But the actual thing is character. Brahmacari guru-kule vasan danto guror hitam. [SB 7.12.1]

[Transl. That is wanted. Danta. How one can learn sense control. That is stressed. You will never find any instruction of Narada Muni when he is suggesting about opening gurukula. He never suggested that one must be a great grammarian, very good speaker. No. Character. Brahmacari guru-grhe vasan, by living in the gurukula, what should he learn? Danta. Self control. That is the first business. See, in the airport nowadays there is arrangement for security check. Security check. Just to make sure that nobody is carrying any weapons or anything. Everyone is checked.

[Transl. Sometimes, as a guest, they let me go without checking. But they check everybody. Doesn't that mean there is no honest person? This is the conclusion. Otherwise why checking? Despite the huge advancement of civilisation the criterian is that nobody is honest. That's all. That's why they are checking. Otherwise what is need for checking? The country also has no respect that this person is a sannyasi, this persons is a brahmana, why to check them? No. They are also right. In the dress of a sannyasi who knows what they do? This checking means it is to be concluded that everyone is dishonest. This is the result of advancement of knowledge.]

Indian man: [Transl. How to know? Just because one mahatma has done something wrong other mahatmas are being harassed.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. No. The net result is that it is to be concluded that everyone is dishonest. This is the advancement of education.]

Indian lady: [Transl. In the foreign countries you can go through the green line. They have this system. They allow you to go through the green line. Nobody checks.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. No, they check everyone. Their policy is that if you carry any object made of iron then they doubt.]

Indian lady: [Transl. Like that they ask everybody if they have gold or anything.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Oh, that is custom. I am talking about security check.]

Indian man: [Transl. They have metal detector machine and they check everything thoroughly. If there is anything suspicious it automatically starts to ring. They move that machine all over your body. I asked, "Sir, what are you checking? You are checking like a magnifying glass." "We get to know what you have," he replied.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. That kind of advancement they made a lot. But actually dishonest.]

Indian man: [Transl. Now they have gone to the Mars.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Whether they go to Mars or hell…]

Indian man: [Transl. Thousands of miles away they control from here.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. I don't believe it.]

Indian man: [Transl. Han? Hare Rama!]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Just consider. This moon, at night it's rays are so soothing and it's reflection is so brilliant, we are seeing the moon with our own eyes, so how I can believe that it is full of rocks and sand? Where from the rocks and sand such nice rays emanate and such soothing effect is there? Tell me mataji, am I right? I am seeing the moon directly and it is so soothing. You work hard whole day and at night you sit in the moon shine for a while, you will be refreshed. That's why God has created it. So much rays that it illuminates the whole world. And it is cooling. Not like the sun. Two things are created by the Supreme Personality of Godhead-heating during the day time and cooling at night time. As you like. This is coming from the moon. I see practically. So how can I believe that it is full of rocks and sand?

[Transl. This is one question from this common man. And another thing is that Ravi, Soma, Mahgal: the sun, the moon, the mars, the weekly days: Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, the sun comes first. And moon comes later. Then comes Mahgal. But they say that moon is first. If moon is first then why the whole world does't start counting days from Monday? Why start from Sunday? According to our sastra the moon is 1,600,000 miles above the sun planet. That means the moon planet is higher than the sun planet. Far. So the calculation of the sun planet is something like 93 millions of miles from the earth. So add another 1,600,000 and it is about 95 million miles. So if you have to cover 95 million miles at the speed of 18,000 thousand miles per hour it will take at least 7 months. How did they go to the moon in 4 days? I asked this to the big, big scientists, they couldn't answer me.]

Indian lady: [Transl. Another point is that the sun is so hot and they couldn't go there so how did they reach the moon which is further away from the sun?]

Prabhupada: [Transl. That is also a point.]

Indian lady: [Transl. so you are saying that moon is above the sun, so unless they surpass the sun how can they go to the moon?]

Prabhupada: [Transl. They can't go to the sun even.]

Indian lady: [Transl. Can't go to the sun at all. Then how they can go to the moon?]

Prabhupada: [Transl. How they can go to the moon? See, she is intelligent. This is common sense. Another thing is wherever they go they find rocks only. They are so unfortunate that they bump their heads to the rocks only. [laughs] Nothing else they find. No flowers or nice things, only rocks. This is another point. My experience in this world is there are rocks and there are flowers. But there, is only rock and nothing else. What happened to the flowers?]

Indian man: [Transl. "There is no life," they say.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Why not? This is the point. According to my experience in this planet there are rocks, sand, flowers, garden, river, everything is there. Where did these things go? The Supreme Lord created here all nice things and only rocks and sand there? Either God or anyone else, He used his brain brilliantly to create such a huge planet just to fill it up with rocks? Answer Mataji? You are intelligent.]

Indian lady: [Transl. They go there and come back. They say they have landed in the moon and did all this. Is it all false then?]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Let them say so. I also used my sense. I analysed with my own sense.]

Giriraja: Srila Prabhupada, prasada is there.

Prabhupada: [Transl. Let us go. Take little.]

[Guests talk among themselves throughout.]

Indian man: [Transl. I will take later.]

Gopala Krsna: We have separate plate for you.

Giriraja: We have a whole plate for you Mr. Shenoy.

Prabhupada: [Transl. Please sit and have little.]

Giriraja: Little.

Prabhupada: [Transl. Sit down. Let us go.]

Gopala Krsna: We have a thali for you.

Prabhupada: [Transl. Hare Krsna. We are fortunate that you people have come here.]

Indian lady: [Transl. Yesterday the program was very nice.]

Indian man: [Transl. I was benefitted.]

Indian lady: [Transl. You came, and so many questuins were asked and we could hear you. Otherwise we were sitting quietly. It was very nice.]

Indian man: [Transl. I already asked what I wanted to. Santibhai can ask more. He can ask good questions. All his mercy.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. …Vrndavana. This is Mayapur. You take also.]

Indian lady: [Transl. No. I can't eat this. Little I will take.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. No. No. You sit down.]

Indian lady: [Transl. I can't eat so much.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Rest we will eat. Did you wash your hands?]

Indian lady: [Transl. Yes, I washed.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Then sit down. Just take what you want. Rest, these boys will eat. What's the big deal? Please sit down. At least sit down with us. You also sit down.]

Indian man: [Transl. Did you take your meal?]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Yes. I eat simple food. No spices at all. [Prabhupada watches as guests take prasada.] You have taken prasadam? Not yet.]

Devotee: Yes.

Gopala Krsna: [Transl. They took prasadam in the morning with the devotees.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Take one puri.]

Indian man: [Transl. I can't take. I don't eat puri at home also.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. I too don't eat puri. I eat dry chapati. In this planetarium, we will display how the whole planetary system is hanging. urdhva-mūlam adhaḥ-sakham. [Bg 15.1] What they show the planetarium, in that the sun is fixed up and all the planets are rotating around it.]

Indian lady: [Transl. You will build here, Maharajaji?]

Prabhupada: [Transl. The sun is also moving. This is north, this is south.]

Indian man: [Transl. Somehow I have never made any program of going to that side.]

Indian lady: [Transl. Mayapur.]

Indian man: [Transl. Very big.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. They made an estimate three, how much is that?]

Gopala Krsna: Three hundred and eighty feet.

Prabhupada: Three hundred and eighty feet high.

Gopala Krsna: It is going to be the tallest temple in India.

Indian lady: [Transl. Where is it?]

Indian man: [Transl. Is it a temple or…]

Gopala Krsna: [Transl. Planetarium.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Planetorium and temple. Within the temple one can see the whole planetary system. It will hang like a tree from top.]

Indian lady: [Transl. Svamiji, the banyan tree has been referred to as ūrdhva-mūlam adhaḥ-sakham asvattham prahur [Bg 15.1] It refers to banyan tree, no?]

Prabhupada: [Transl. No. This material world is just like a banyan tree, but it's root upwards and branches downwards. The banyan tree we see, it's root is down under the ground. But Gita says that this banyan tree has it's root up and branches down. ūrdhva-mūlam adhaḥ-sakham. So you want to show the film?]

Gopala Krsna: Yes. After the prasadam. It's all ready. [Transl. After the prasada you will see the film of our New Vrndavana. It is very beautiful.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. One day we went to Mr. [indistinct] house and took prasada. You couldn't come there.]

Indian man: [Transl. I could not understand exactly that day. Some misunderstanding. Then I was late.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. No. That's all right.]

Indian man: [Transl. This is rice. Little. May we see the temple?]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Sure.]

Indian lady: [Transl. Very beautiful temple.]

Indian man: [Transl. Have you seen?]

Indian lady: [Transl. Yes. That's why I am saying.]

Prabhupada: Give them some puris, no?

Indian man: [Transl. When you come back, we will invite you for your darsana.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. I will go. Whenever you say I will come. Give. Give one more.]

Indian lady: [Transl. We have eaten so much.]

Indian man: [Transl. I eat only once a day. At about 4 pm. I start my work about 9 am and around 4 pm it is finished.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. In old age it is better to eat only one time.]

Indian man: [Transl. I don't eat any fried food since many years. Only when some guests come do I eat fried food in small quantity.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. How old are you now?]

Indian man: [Transl. I am running 75. You might be more than me.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. I am 81. All my contemporary persons have died.]

Indian man: [Transl. All my business associates have gone. None of them are alive. Only one may be there. All others have gone. I am the only one still surviving. It is God's mercy.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Yes. The Lord is engaging you so much.]

Indian man: [Transl. Often I think that none of my associates are alive and new people come but it does make a difference between new and old.]

Indian lady: [Transl. Until younger generation is trained up, one has to continue.]

Indian man: [Transl. I will tell him. He came yesterday. I said I will surely go and have his darsana...]

Prabhupada: [Transl. How many children does he have?]

Indian man: [Transl. He has one son and one daughter.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. They are grown up?]

Indian man: [Transl. No. The son is younger. He is about eight years old. And the girl is older. She is twelve years old.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Your son is twenty-five or thirty?]

Indian man: [Transl. No. No. More. He is about forty eight.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Looks young.]

Indian man: [Transl. Nowadays young people keep themselves so fit that you cannot make out how old they are.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. They don't have to work so hard. You built it up for them. They get it readymade.]

Indian man: [Transl. But I have so much mental tension since my marriage. So much. Every day a new one.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Me too.]

Indian man: [Transl. I don't know what's and where is my fault?]

Devotee: Anything else you like, sir.

Prabhupada: [Transl. He hardly ate anything.]

Indian man: [Transl. I took. Prasada. Prasada I took. Prasada little is okay. Today is Sunday. So children are waiting for us at home.]

Indian lady: [Transl. Now it's only 2:30 pm.]

Indian man: [Transl. Little more time left. Then the darsana will open.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Yuktahara-viharasya yoga bhavati siddhaya. [Bg 6.17] One shouldn't eat too much or too little. You eat as much as you can digest.]

Indian man: [Transl. Maintain the body nicely. That's all.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Yuktahara. In the Bhagavad-gita each and every word is spoken with profound meaning. The Supreme Lord Himself is speaking. There is no room for interpretation. Brijratanji was supposed to come. He didn't come?]

Indian man: [Transl. He went to Delhi.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Delhi.]

Indian lady: [Transl. He will go to Vrndavana for Janmastami.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Give, give. Where is your residence?]

Indian man: [Transl. Carmichael Road. Above Peddar Road. Near Mahalaksmi temple.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Carmichael Road. I went there.]

Indian man: [Transl. You had been to my place.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Giriraja took me there. Carmichael Road I know. Very famous.]

Indian man: [Transl. Mahalaksmi temple is below. Above that is Peddar Road and above that is Carmichael Road. It's on a hill.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Yes Mataji?]

Indian lady: [Transl. May I have little water?]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Water? Yes. Give water. Yugal Kishora Birlaji had a desire to build temples all over the world.]

Indian man: [Transl. His father build many opulent temples. Recently he built a temple in Kalyan. On last Ekadasi in the month of Asadha about 1,50,000 people visited it.]

Indian lady: [Transl. In Kalyan a beautiful Laksmi-Narayana temple and a Vithoba-Rukmini temple.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. No, I am talking about outside India.]

Indian lady: [Transl. He tried many times to do that. He went there four times, but could not secure any land.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. In London?]

Indian lady: [Transl. Yes.]

Indian man: [Transl. Now Churches are available.]

Giriraja: Everything is all right?

Prabhupada: [Transl. I also bought Church. We have a temple there on a 70 acres of land. It was donated by George Harrison. It costs 55 lakhs. Another temple is in the city. Two temples.]

Indian man: [Transl. I had been to your London temple. It was a rented house.]

Indian lady: [Transl. I had been to your New York temple and took darsana. It was there before. Now you have a very big one.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. In New York we have a 12 storey building.]

Indian man: [Transl. 12 temples?]

Prabhupada: [Transl. 12 storey temple.]

Indian man: [Transl. 12 storey temple.]

Indian lady: [Transl. I visited that place six years ago. It was small ISKCON. I took prasada also.]

Indian man: [Transl. We went there five years ago.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Now we have got a big palace.]

Indian man: [Transl. Three of your disciples were there. Then we went to a store because we had to buy something. I forgot exactly what it was. But they said that because Lord Krsna never ate it so we will not eat also. Such is their devotion.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Their devotion is unshakable.]

Indian man: [Transl. Whatever they do, they do it with perfection.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Yasya deve para bhaktir yatha deve tatha gurau, tasyaite kathita hy arthaḥ prakasante [Svetasvatara Upanisad 6.23]

Indian man: [Transl. I was really surprised when they said that because Lord Krsna didn't eat so we will not eat also.]

Prabhupada: So, where is Giriraja? When you will show… [Transl. Where are you taking the plates? Leave them here only. There is no place outside. Wash your hands. That's all. This is the etiquette we follow in the temple.]

Indian lady: [Transl. Leaf plates would have been better?]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Wash your hands.]

Gopala Krsna: [Transl. Now we will show you the movie. How are you? He is our gurukula boy. You came yesterday? Say one sloka.]

Gurukula boy: isavasyam idam sarvam

yat kinca jagatyam jagat
tena tyaktena bhunjitha
ma grdhaḥ kasya svid dhanam
Īsopanisad mantra 1]:

Indian man: [Transl. Tell us what's the meaning?]

Gopala Krsna: [Transl. What's the meaning?]

Gurukula boy: "Everything animate or inanimate that is within the universe is controlled and owned by the Lord. One should therefore accept only those things necessary for himself, which are set aside as his quota, and one should not accept other things, knowing well to whom they belong."

Gopala Krsna: [Transl. Mataji, now you will watch the picture of New Vrndavana. In Vrndavana, we have small boys. Here in Bombay we are building a gurukula.]

Indian man: [Transl. Where here?]

Gopala Krsna: [Transl. In the back side. Our devotees are from everywhere because India is spiritual capital. America is business capital but India is spiritual capital.] [end]