By Giriraj Swami
Saturday night we performed hari-nama–sankirtana, chanting the holy names of the Hare Krishna maha-mantra, at the Dallas Oak Lawn Halloween Block Party, attended by tens of thousands of people dressed in costumes of many lands, cultures, and eras. Almost everyone heard the transcendental sound vibration of the names of the Lord, and many joined in the singing and dancing. Being with the people on the street there, I thought of Srila Prabhupada’s experience of a somewhat similar scene, in Haight-Ashbury, San Francisco, 1967, as described by Mukunda Goswami in Miracle on Second Avenue:
“On weekend evenings Haight Street had acquired a perpetual background soundtrack of guitars, bells, bongos, recorders, flutes, seaweed horns, and rock music that pounded from storefronts and handheld blasters. Many were smoking pot and hashish or were drinking Olympia beer out of brown stubbies, sharing Gallo wine, or swigging Johnny Walker out of big bottles in brown paper sacks. Others with packs and sleeping bags on their backs strummed on guitars, singing as they walked. Dozens of boys and girls and same-sex couples walked past holding hands or arm in arm. Some embraced and kissed, leaning against storefront windows. Cross-dressers lounged in doorways. . . .
“I walked in silence next to the Swami . . . I thought the whole scene before us must appear very decadent to the Swami, and I didn’t know what to say about it to him. Finally, I said, ‘It’s a beautiful night.’
“The Swami scrutinized the street sellers, looked at passing smokers and bongo players, people with painted faces and wild, brightly colored costumes. He appeared to smell the air, taking in the burning odor of marijuana and the sharp putrid stench of alcohol, which was tempered by the fragrance of roses and carnations. He turned, smiling, and said, ‘Everything is beautiful.’
“I was surprised, because I thought the Swami would perceive this streetscape as being debauched and disgusting. But as we walked in companionable silence, I realized . . . that the Swami perceived Krishna in this place. Many of these people were genuine seekers, eager for knowledge, ripe and ready for Krishna consciousness. . . . There was no good or bad from the pure angle of vision—everything and everyone in every part of creation was Krishna’s energy, and because the Swami was in touch with that energy, he saw this beauty. The people were beautiful because they were all potential devotees. Everything was beautiful because everything was connected to Krishna.
“His remark was more an instruction than a casual comment.”
Reflecting on Srila Prabhupada’s vision and how a new generation of devotees, who had never met Srila Prabhupada personally, were continuing his mission, I felt renewed hope for the beautiful future of Krishna consciousness and Lord Chaitanya’s sankirtana movement.
In a talk in New York City in 1976, Srila Prabhupada said, “There is a verse spoken by Narada Muni, that even by sentiment, not understanding properly the philosophy of Krishna consciousness, even by sentiment—‘All right, let me also dance and chant like these people, the saffron-colored, shaved-head people, are doing. Let me do that’—once dancing with them will never go in vain. It will immediately be accounted, ‘Ah, he has danced.’ It is so nice. It will never go in vain.”