Exalted transcendentalists...

Yasodanandana : In the morning, after a Nectar of Devotion lecture, Prabhupada was sitting in the courtyard of the Radha Damodar temple near the samadhi of Rupa Goswami, when some simple, devoted Brijbasi villagers came. They were very attracted to Prabhupada and had an incredible exchange with him in Hindi. We were thinking, "Who are these people? They are not initiated, they are not even devotees, they are not even in ISKCON, they are not this, they are not that." But Prabhupada spent over an hour talking and laughing with them. He experienced increasing ecstasy over the course of this hour. We couldn't understand what they were saying, but they talked about Krishna, Mother Yasoda, Nanda Maharaj, the gopas, the gopis, the Yamuna, this and that. Prabhupada was in total bliss. Later Prabhupada said that some of these people were liberated souls, exalted transcendentalists, although they looked like ordinary village people. This was one way Prabhupada taught us to be respectful to the inhabitants of the Dham.