Srila Prabhupada has come to Chicago now
Suresvara das : We were all waiting for Prabhupada to come to the carts on State Street. Finally Srila Prabhupada rides up in a Volkswagen, gets out, and without any hesitation just bows down on the filthy street in front of Lord Jagannatha. And that really struck me because I had been thinking in my mind, "I'm not going to bow down in the street." But Prabhupada didn't hesitate, he just bowed down right there in front of Lord Jagannatha. Then he gets on the cart and Prabhupada is riding on the cart below and myself and a few others are riding up top, and we have the blissful engagement of throwing flowers and bags of prasadam, it might have been peanuts and raisins, something like that, off into the throng as we were going down State Street toward the Civic Center.
Then it occurred to me that Srila Prabhupada has come to Chicago now and this is 81 years after the first Indian swami had come to America, and that was Vivekananda, the famous Vivekananda who came and was preaching "daridra Narayan" philosophy. At that time, Vivekananda, who had been invited by clergy for the World Parliament of Religions in 1893, he was saying, "What is all this talk of God? I see so many Gods loitering before me in the street, daridra Narayan, poor Narayan." In other words, everybody is God. Mayavada. So finally 81 years later here is a pure devotee, a Vaishnava, who has come to Chicago, and I was thinking in my mind, "I wonder what Srila Prabhupada is going to say when he gets to the Civic Center because this is very historic actually. Finally the Vaishnava siddhanta is coming to Chicago after all these years." So we get to the Civic Center, and there aren't that many people there surprisingly as I remember it. But without hesitation, as soon as Srila Prabhupada took the microphone he said, "In the Vedanta Sutra it is said janmadyasya yatah, the Absolute Truth is that from Whom everything emanates." So he was establishing that everything comes from a person. So I was really smiling, "I'll bet Srila Prabhupada was thinking of this." So that was wonderful.
Reference: Following Srila Prabhupada-A Chronological Series by Sureshvara Dasa
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