Victory smile

Govinda Dasi : This picture was taken by me while Shyamsundara Prabhu / Sam Speerstra read the letter from Mondakini Prabhu, agreeing to go to Russia and marry the Russian devotee that Srila Prabhupada made in his two day stay in Moscow, Ananta Shanti Dasa. Srila Prabhupada contemplated Russia a lot, and often talked about how to get Krishna consciousness into the communist countries. This was a "victory smile" one of the biggest smiles I ever saw in all my time with Srila Prabhupada.

He now had an emissary, our Mondakini Prabhu, who was willing to go behind the iron curtain and teach his new Russian disciple more about Krishna consciousness, so from this point on, the communist empire was going to change. He smiled victoriously and was overjoyed to hear one of his daughters was willing to take on this dangerous espionage assignment (think James Bond, only female). It WAS dangerous at that time.

So Mondakini was the heroine who was hand-picked by Srila Prabhupada for this job. And he was so sure of the success of her mission, he smiled broadly when he heard from her letter how determined and surrendered she was to his order. Thank you dear Mondakini, and thank you dear Ananta Shanti, you both gave your lives for Srila Prabhupada's Russian dream, and now the dream has come true - with thousands of devotees chanting the Holy Names all over the former communist/atheist countries.