{"id":28346,"date":"2016-06-07T11:10:56","date_gmt":"2016-06-07T09:10:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/?p=28346"},"modified":"2016-06-07T11:10:56","modified_gmt":"2016-06-07T09:10:56","slug":"iskcon-celebrates-the-chariot-festival-in-brisbane","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/?p=28346","title":{"rendered":"ISKCON celebrates the Chariot Festival in Brisbane"},"content":{"rendered":"

The rath (chariot) was bedecked with flowers, paper lanterns and garlands of fruit.<\/p>\n

And of course, images of Lord Krishna.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

A four-wheel wooden chariot, nearly two storeys in height, it made its way slowly through the streets of Brisbane CBD on a Saturday morning in early May.<\/p>\n

Built to resemble a temple, with a colourful red and yellow pillar made of cloth topped by a golden coloured dome, it carried the idols of Lord Krishna and Sri Prabhupada, founder of the International Society of Krishna Consciousness.<\/p>\n

It was hand-pulled by over three hundred ISKCON devotees, who used thick strong ropes with much fanfare. The catchy tunes of Hare Rama and Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna Hare Hare filled the air.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

With police escort and roads in the Brisbane CBD cordoned off, this was the grand celebratory occasion of \u2018The Festival of Chariots\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Festival of Chariots originated in Puri, Orissa over 2000 years ago and is now celebrated in every major city across the world,\u201d Niti Sheth, one of the festival coordinators, told Indian Link.<\/p>\n

It was marked originally at the Jagannanth Temple in Puri (from where the term \u2018juggernaut\u2019 comes) when the deities, to this day, are put in a massive chariot and taken for an annual tour of the city.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is one of the few times that we come out to the streets to really share the love. It\u2019s all about giving. Our tagline for this year is \u2018Joy of devotion\u201d.<\/p>\n

Where did the chariot come from?<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\u201cIt has travelled all the way from ISKCON\u2019s farming community in Murwillumbah from northern NSW,\u201d Niti revealed. \u201cWe bring it up once a year for the festival. It also travels further south to Melbourne.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Radha Dasi, the pulling of the chariot holds a special significance. \u201cWe are remembering the Lord of the Universe today,\u201d she said. \u201cWe are pulling this Chariot, so that Lord Jaganath (Krishna) can come and live in our hearts and can remain in our hearts forever.\u201d<\/p>\n

Winding through the streets of the CBD for over an hour, onlookers were in awe, trying to get a selfie or two. The Chariot was finally brought to King George Square, where a number of festivities were lined up for the day.<\/p>\n

There was free food from the \u2018Food for Life\u2019 tent, interactive games for children, stalls selling sweets and treats, henna and a card reading stall that imparted Vedic wisdom.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

A free-for-all event, the henna stall seemed to be quite popular with the Australians. Neha Attal, henna artist, told Indian Link, \u201cHenna comes from the leaves of a plant, Lawsonia Enermis. The scientific reason behind applying it is, it reduces body heat. It is catching up real quick in Australia and people thoroughly enjoy applying henna on their palms or a tattoo.\u201d<\/p>\n

Indian Link also popped into the card reading tent to get an insight into a bit of Vedic wisdom. The card read by Ranganath Das said, \u2018Know that all beautiful, glorious and mighty creations, spring from, but is a spark of, my splendour.\u2019 It forms the basis of one of the songs Lord Krishna sang to Arjuna on the bloody battlefields of Kurukshetra, a religious war that was fought to safeguard the principles of religion.<\/p>\n

Crowds thronged King George Square to revel in the festivities. Smiles, greetings, and enjoying oneself were the order of the day!<\/p>\n

Source: http:\/\/www.indianlink.com.au\/juggernaut\/<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\"HareBy Tasneem Zavery<\/strong><\/p>\n

A four-wheel wooden chariot, nearly two storeys in height, it made its way slowly through the streets of Brisbane CBD on a Saturday morning in early May. Built to resemble a temple, with a colourful red and yellow pillar made of cloth topped by a golden coloured dome, it carried the idols of Lord Krishna and Sri Prabhupada, founder of the International Society of Krishna Consciousness. It was hand-pulled by over three hundred ISKCON devotees, who used thick strong ropes with much fanfare. The catchy tunes of Hare Rama and Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna Hare Hare filled the air.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[90],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-28346","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28346","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=28346"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28346\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28348,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28346\/revisions\/28348"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=28346"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=28346"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=28346"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}