‘Banana Problems’ are Not Encouraging (10/20/11)
Dear ______,
Yes I find it a little disturbing when senior devotees are anxious about food. I want to distribute prasādam – not worry about food.
Yes, this is true. I think you are talking about ____ Mahārāja, but I cannot say that I appreciate your mood with him. And I think it’s time you two had a break from each other.
I am hoping that similar to India the diet here will reflect the local cuisine more than anything else. Just like in South India a great majority of the prasādam is geared toward the local taste. After all, we are here more for the Mexicans. Otherwise we just look like a bunch of gringos who want to bring our own tastes with us along with our superior culture and intelligence.
Yes, I mostly agree, except that we are everywhere to satisfy Mahāprabhu above all, be it India or Mexico or wherever. Prasādam that is geared to local attraction is very desirable, but as you will remember when you were in Vṛndāvana, you could not or did not like the oil-soaked, chillied-out-to-the-max cooking of the Vraja-vāsīs, and you had to balance your diet with good old American toast, etc. You even had your own toaster oven (I would have done the same). So please don’t be so hard on ____ Mahārāja (don’t pass out his little stash of bananas or whatever). _____ Mahārāja does not do well with Mexican food – another reason why he will be in India soon if everything goes well.
There are bigger management issues ahead than prasādam, so in time I hope that you will be up to the task. Truthfully speaking, when someone has to email me, when I am halfway around the world, about a banana problem — well, it’s not that encouraging to say the least.
Anyway I am sure under your guidance things will work out nicely.
Yes… when the devotees are sincere, tolerant and merciful then everything is sure to turn out okay by Kṛṣṇa’s grace. We have some success here in India and I hope that a similar mood in our āśrama in Mexico will produce similar results.
At present, the devotees from Mexico City are over at Imlitala and from there they are going to Madana-Mohana, Govindadeva and Gopīnātha… and then back to Rādhā-Dāmodara temple for evening āratika. They are fired up and absorbing everything nicely. In the next few days ____ will be offering āratika to Śrīla Prabhupāda in Prabhupāda’s room. That will be a big step forward. The Mexicano devotees are fired up!!!
When the devotees return to Mexico everything will grow nicely so long as they have mature Kṛṣṇa conscious leadership and good examples to follow.
More later.
Gaura Haribol,
Swami Narasingha
