![\"\"](\"https:\/\/lh3.googleusercontent.com\/-yEjCEelfVL4\/VbDyaEWg8xI\/AAAAAAAARYY\/HfIWdcKdNUM\/s0\/2015-07-23_15-55-46.jpg\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
By Rohininandana dasa<\/strong><\/p>\n Woke up again with barely any hearing (my M\u00e9ni\u00e8re fluctuating), so had to skip as usual the SB-lecture here in rural Almviks gard, ISKCON farming community, by Hari Sauri Prabhu (during our yearly Bhakti Sangam festival) which I was planning to attend. Therefore also no audible chanting today, had to rely on mind-chanting, which I am far, far from perfection yet.<\/p>\n Was serving the cows and devotees in the morning, hay to the cows, breakfast prasadam to the devotees.<\/p>\n Asked the glorious Danish bookdistributor Janardana Prabhu if he had a place in his car for me to the yearly Maha-Harinam (this year 2015, July 19) which was to start at 12:30 in Stockholm. He said “Yes, and we go at 10:30”. I asked “Why so early?”<\/p>\n Janardana said “We will distribute books (a group with Mahabhavi Prabhu, Raman Vanmali Prabhu, Amarendra Prabhu and other sankirtan-heroes), and we will start an hour before the Harinam starts. Do you want to distribute books also?”<\/p>\n I thought for myself “No hearing, what\u00b4s the use? But… why not try? Surrounded by almost 100 chanting vaisnavas and many book-distributors, maybe there is some mercy to get?” Suddenly a strong desire emerged in my heart so I said enthusiastically “Yes, let\u00b4s try!”<\/p>\n Ran home after the breakfast-serving, grabbed my old brown sankirtan-bag from the 90\u00b4s, packed a banana-box with all the distribution books left at home, 25 Maha-books (actually 28, but 3 I gave to a Danish devotee for distribution).<\/p>\n I don\u00b4t know why I took them all, because when I distribute in devotee-outfit, with a lot of people around me, very shy, inhibiting for me, and in Stockholm, never liked distribute in big passionate cities, it should have sufficed with maybe 10 books.<\/p>\n Sat waiting on the banana box for the sankirtan-car at the crossroads in Almvik near the mailboxes, waiting and waiting… and when the time was almost 11:00, Tribhanga Sundara Prabhu passed by and said jokingly “This is not a train-station, there ain\u00b4t gonna come any trains to pick you up”. I joked back and said “Maybe you can order a helicopter for me (112), because otherwise I think I will miss out the book distribution today with all my heroes”.<\/p>\n Then by Krishna\u00b4s mercy came bhakta Sergei Prabhu with his wife Shyama Kishori devi dasi driving out of Almvik with their car and they looked at me with compassion in my desperate situation and asked me if I needed a lift. Yes I said expectantly, and asked “Do you go to Stockholm?” They said “No, but we can drop you at J\u00e4rna train station”. But when they saw in the timetable that there was not going any train for long time from J\u00e4rna to Stockholm, they generously drove me all the way to S\u00f6dert\u00e4lje train station, so I could catch a train at 11:30. Thank you so much!<\/p>\n Arrived in Stockholm at 12:15 and at \u00c5hl\u00e9ns just before 12:30, and there were only 3-4 devotees standing there by then, amongst them Prahlad Prabhu, which I took as a good sign, because when we once were distributing books together in Sm\u00e5land for a few days the books went out like anything.<\/p>\n About 12:45 the book distribution group from Almvik came, and they said that they had been looking for me for quite some time in Almvik, and I said that I had been waiting for them for quite some time. I speculated they had left earlier and therefore took a lift, so unfortunately I missed their association from Almvik to Stockholm. Felt so joyful with the very nice Harinam now going on (sweet melodies) and seeing so many book distributors around me, also Dharmaharmya Prabhu, blessing me with a hug.<\/p>\n Felt like back in the 80\u00b4s, with the famous extended Christmas Maha-Marathon in December 1984 – January 1985 (my first Marathon, book distribution my full-time service 1984-2000), when the whole Swedish yatra went out with books, with at least 10 book distributors each day just along Drottninggatan in Stockholm. Nothing beats the feeling of being surrounded by book distributors in every direction you look.<\/p>\n And yes, I got some special mercy today, the books went out like never before in Stockholm, and people gave one big donation after the other. Almost everyone whom I presented with Srila Prabhupadas Srimad Bhagavatams and Bhagavad-gitas bought books (one excited Muslim lady who was following and filming the procession for a long time I gave a book for free since she did not have any money), and by Krishna\u00b4s kind arrangement all books were distributed in 1 \u00bd hour, so I could join the blissful Harinam party for the last 1 \u00bd hour and just sing and dance. So the Harinam lasted for 3 long hours this year!<\/p>\n My hearing changed a bit to the better during the Sankirtan, so I could hear the people passably (with the help of hearing aids) while distributing books and the Hare Krishna-mantra while taking part I just said to people, “I am coming from… Hare Krishna! Do you like happy surprises?” And then handed out Krishna and Prabhupada into their hands, and a little philosophy into their ears, and they seemed to be so happy, especially when accompanied with the Hare Krishna-mantra pouring into their souls from His Holiness Bhakti Bringha Govinda Swami, Keshava Prabhu and all the other devotees in the Harinam party.<\/p>\n In the end I asked everyone, “Do you want to come back to this world after you leave your body or to go to a better world?” Their minds goes full spin on that, so I help them out, “To a better world of course?” “Yes”, they say then, after finding it logical, and then I end with, “This book is all about the better world”.<\/p>\n At Gamla Stan at one place we had a ring of devotees singing, with our devoted Harinam-general Nataraja Prabhu inviting people inside the ring to dance and sing to their hearts delight, and swinging people in the air in such a spectacular way, that making a trip to Gr\u00f6na Lund (amusement park) would be pointless. People came out from the restaurants and shops along the street to partake, by clapping their hands, jumping and smiling. It was joy through and through. <\/p>\n All these nectarian episodes were filmed by Pitambara Prabhu, who made an 2 \u00bd hour long Harinam-documentary which is planned to be released on a DVD.<\/p>\n A few amazing things happened during the book distribution, things which only happen when one is out of the mental platform, when the mind is not in between you and the person you meet. For example, there were two boys who bought books, they said they were from Dalarna County, and without any thinking I just exclaimed, “From Avesta?” “Yes”, they said, completely astonished.<\/p>\n There was a living statue standing in Gamla Stan, with outstretched arms with slighly bent fingers in a graspable position. It looked so inviting, as if something was missing there, so I got inspired, couldn\u00b4t resist to place a Srimad Bhagavatam in the hands of her. Paramesvari devi dasi helped me with this delicate task.<\/p>\n The most astounding thing happened when I met the very last person, an extremely nice and humble boy from Norrbotten (you meet such persons maybe once a year) who bought the last 3 books I had with me. We went into the grocery store Konsum at J\u00e4rntorget, because we didn\u00b4t find any cash dispenser outside, so he got cash from the cashier, and gave me 200 kronor and asked if I also wanted something from the shop. I said I just need some dextrose, so I don\u00b4t need to risk falling into an insulin coma when the blood sugar goes too low.<\/p>\n When we came out from the shop, I suddenly felt the urge from inside to tell him how old he is, so I looked him straight in the eyes and said, “You are 22 years old, aren\u00b4t you?” “Yes”, he said, “How did you know that?”. And then I said, “You\u00b4ve been studying philosophy in school, haven\u00b4t you?” (very few Swedes study philosophy) “Yes”, he said, now even more astonished.<\/p>\n Then I said to him, “Knowledge comes from different sources, one such is from God inside us, and He guides us, and now He has guided me to you, because now the time is ripe for you to start your spiritual journey back home to God”. Then I shook hands with him and his meek girlfriend and wished them good luck.<\/p>\n Harinam Sankirtan yajna ki jaya! Your servant, A few amazing things happened during the book distribution, things which only happen when one is out of the mental platform, when the mind is not in between you and the person you meet. For example, there were two boys who bought books, they said they were from Dalarna County, and without any thinking I just exclaimed, “From Avesta?” “Yes”, they said, completely astonished. There was a living statue standing in Gamla Stan, with outstretched arms with slighly bent fingers in a graspable position. It looked so inviting, as if something was missing there, so I got inspired, couldn\u00b4t resist to place a Srimad Bhagavatam in the hands of her. Paramesvari devi dasi helped me with this delicate task. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18597","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18597","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18597"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18597\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18599,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18597\/revisions\/18599"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18597"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18597"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18597"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nin the Harinam. I was completely blissed out. <\/p>\n
\nVaisnava association ki jaya!<\/p>\n
\nRohininandana dasa<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"![\"Hare](\"https:\/\/lh3.googleusercontent.com\/-W3NNQ8jBxyA\/VbDylR0HjYI\/AAAAAAAARYg\/7fxfyWV1Drc\/s0\/2015-07-23_15-56-38.jpg\")
By Rohininandana dasa<\/strong><\/p>\n