Gita Nagari Farn News-Winter2007

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International Society for Krishna ConsciousnessFounder Acarya His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada

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BY VEGAVATI DD

On Sunday, November 4, at 10:45 am,

Her Grace Lalitamrta-devi dasi lefther body, at Gita-nagari dhama, after

struggling with cancer for over 5years.I do not know how to properly glorifyLalitamrta. She stands supremelyglorified by her own good qualities.Having joined ISKCON in Philadel-phia, she lived at Gita-nagari for 18

years; still, many who visited overthose years dont know her at all, be-cause she never put herself forward.

She was always satisfied to stay in thebackground, serving. To me she per-sonifies this statement Srila Prabhu-pada made when describing the Vais-nava quality of silence: Silent work-ernot advertising. A few years ago, at a gather-ing for ladies, we were asked to thinkof times in our lives when we weremost happy and fulfilled, and to drawpictures of ourselves in that setting.Lalitamrtas drawings showed her dis-tributing books in the airport and at awriting retreat, typing away for her

guru maharaja, HH Sastvarupa Ma-haraja. While at Gita-nagari, she alsoregularly dressed the gopis, Lalita andVisakha Devis, with a sweet devotionalmood. Though shy by nature (heridea of a good party was to get to-gether with two or three close friends),once she knew you she opened up andrevealed a depth of understanding and

good humor thatendeared her to herfriends. And sheloved to laugh! For variousreasons, she hadmoved, along withher husband Gan-d iva , away f romGita-nagari, to up-state NY, practicallyon the Canadian bor-der, last spring. Astheir host couple andG o d s i s t e r /G o d b r o t h e r , A n -napurna and Jiva,gradually came to un-derstand that Lalitam-rtas life was indeeddrawing to a close, theyasked her quite directly:Where do you want to be? Whenshe realized the time had come, shesaid, I want to be at Gita-nagari. By the strength of her devo-tion, everything fell into place: Lali-tamrta made it back to the shelter of

Radha-Damodar, during the month ofKartikka, and passed her last few daysin the shelter of the dhama amidstloving devotees, old friends and formerGita-nagari residents, now drawn fromBaltimore, Philadelphia, Florida,Rhode Island, come to pay their lastrespects; new friends from Gita-nagari who had warmed to her in re-cent years.

Though weak, she recognized andgreeted devotees as they came in,sometimes saying their names. Smiledas they reminded her of funny times inthe past. We took turns leading kir-tana, Gita-nagari style. The boys readKrsna book to her, the story of Putana

killed. Some devotees couldnt come,but sent notes, or called, or sentprayers, or gave donations. She leftthis world peaceful, surrounded byloved ones and in the shelter ofKrsnas holy name. Afterwards, therewas kirtana for hours, and three dayslater, we had a feast in her honor, withmore kirtana, and many of her favor-ite foods.

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Harinama Sankirtana On Thursday September 20th a few devotees from GitaNagari farm decided to go to State College to do harinama. Wepicked that day because it was world holy name day throughoutISKCON. It was a very nice autumn day and we were all veryexcited to go out on harinama. Moth er Tarun i, Go pi Gi ta ,Mother Kalki, Mother Manjari Lila, Mother Sudevi, a few guestsvisiting from New Jersey, and my- self gathered our musical instru-ments. We took some of Srila Prahbhupadas books and lots of very nice cookies made by Mother Jagannatha, anddrove offto State College. We were in two different cars, so when we got there we hadsome difficulty finding each other. It was just about lunch time,warm and sunny with many people out on lunch break. Collegestudents were coming in and out of the campus and lots of people were onthe sidewalk eating sandwiches. We thought this is the right time to approach the conditioned souls. We picked anice place right by the entrance of the campus then we began chanting. Some of us were distributing books, somewere passing out cookies and some of us were chanting and playing musical instruments. I thought the peoplewere quite receptive, almost all of them took cookies and some of them took books. We were all happy dancingand chanting on the street. Towards the end, one lady from the local newspaper came and started interviewingMother Kalki. She asked what we were doing and where we were from. She took many pictures of us chantingand dancing. She also took a book and some cookies. After chanting for about an hour and a half we drove backto Gita Nagari very happy and satisfied. When the weather warms up, we would like to go out again and spreadKrsna Consciousness by chanting and distributing books and prasadam. Hare Krsna!Your Servant, Vraja

Food ChannelDid you know that that you can now cruise the Krishna

Food Channe l ? I t can be found at h t t p : / /

www.food.krishna.com/. I found it quite by accident when

Sudevi dd sent me an inquiry from someone named Antony,

who wanted some food photographs from our Govardhan

Puja celebration. He said that he helps maintains this site.

Priya-darsana dasa maintains the Prasadam Lab. Heexplains, The process is simple: You post your recipes at the

Prasadam Laboratory forum and I will test the recipes in my kitchen. All recipes will be tested for quality

assurance, ease of preparation and deliciousness of taste. The best recipes will be posted here for everyone to try.

How about it? Why not check out the site and peruse Kurmas Blog, Festival recipes, and Rangas kitchen, which

are some of the offerings.

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Room 2 is now

the IoHURoom While on the Vaishnavi retreat at NewVrindaban, Michelle A. and I werediscussing various ways to improve some ofthe conditions at Gita Nagari. While weboth agreed that this is a monumentalundertaking and not anything that twowomen could do singlehandedly, we agreed

that there are certain small things we cando.

The thing we hit upon was the idea to refurbish the rooms at the ashrama, one at a time. That seemed tobe a project we would be able to tackle. We envisioned new paint, new mattresses and bedding, somenew furniture and cozy chairs for reading.Neither one of us thought that the beginning of our plan would come to fruition so quickly. Whileattending a IoHU meeting in Harrisburg, I happened to mention that we were endeavoring to do thisproject and two days later we received a check for $200 from the group to help us. Both Michelle and Iwere floored by the kindness that was shown us toward our project. When you next come toGita Nagari, make sure

to check out this newlyrefurbished room andmaybe, if you feel soi n c l i n e d , m a k e adonation toward the nextr o o m , w e p l a n t orefurbish. This will beRoom #1. It is largerthan room 2 and we willneed slightly more laksmifor the transformation

(there are four beds in theroom rather than two asin the first one).

You can make donationspayable to Iskcon PortRoyal and note: RoomRefurbish on the bottom.Your servant, Ortrun

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Death and Birth of a Computer.Recently, when I went to GN to do bookwork for Adopt a Cow, I foundthat the computer had kicked the bucket. What to do? We asked various people, who all advised it would be better to purchase a new/refurbished machine than to try to fix the old one.

Kaulini dd suggested to call Isvari pati as he is an expert computer guy.He wa more than willing to check out eBay for us and find some goodexamples of machines that would be good for AaC.

To make a long story short, he not only found a machine for us but thenhe decided to donate it along with a copy of Quickbooks to AaC so that wewill be able to keep the books the way we are supposed to keep them. This will enableus to easily keep track of income/expenses.

Many thanks to Isvari pati and his wife Victoria for their generous contribution to Gita Nagari! ys, Ortrun

Is it Winter Yet? by Kaulini dasi

We're grateful for such a good summer. It was a little dry at times,but overall I think the cows did well and were happy. The milk pro-duction of Salauni and Kishori was great. They averaged about 8-9gallons a day between the two milkings. That was especially nice, assome devotees took advantage, and we had pretty much all ourhomegrown milk for all the festivals and holidays, and who could ask

for milk any better!Now it looks like winter is setting in. Not too too cold yet, but milkproduction is going down, the grass is barely growing, and yes lotsof mud! We are hoping to get a few projects done before it gets too cold.Some cleaning of the barnyard needs to be done and stones putdown so the cows can move around better. The gutters need imme-diate attention and repair so they drain properly, and a few big slidingdoors need to be hung to help keep out that bitter winter wind thatblows through the heifer barn. Anyone who wants to help out withsome extra funds, that would be much appreciated. Winter is always a

challenge on so many levels, yet Krsna always gives His mercy.

Again I want to thank each and everyone of you who so loyally and enthusiastically maintain the Adopt A Cowprogram. We remain forever grateful.The two calves Paurnamasi and Premanjana are growing like anything. Paurnamasi just had her one year birth-day. She is a dark black color and her horns are really growing big now. Premanjana is still the baby, but shereally holds her own with the other cows. She is a very dark color also, but she is noticeable still by her two whiteback hooves, that is when they are not covered with mud! She is still very sweet and a loving disposition most ofthe timeHere's hoping for a Happy Winter

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Scenes

from theVaishnavi Retreatl:Rukmini dd & Narayani dd; r: Kaulini dasi & Narayani dd in

the Rose Garden at New Vrindban.

Srila Prabhupada says: Simply we have to desireto please Him, and notd e s i r e a n y t h i n g f o rourselves. then we becomesimply instruments for Hiswill. This is the importante s s e n c e o f K r s n aconsciousness. Letter toAtreya Rsi, October 20, 1973

If one renders even asmall amount of sincered e v o t i o n a l s e r v i c e ,

Krishna becomes obligedto elevate such person; andwhat to speak of onewhose entire life and soulhas been dedicated toKrishnas service. Letter to Harer Nama, November 6,

1969

The governing principlefor our activity should beto do what is favorable forpleasing Krishna. Letter to

Lalita Kumar, November 27,

1971

Krsna is the root ofeverything. If He ispleased, everyone will bepleased. If you pour wateron the root, the water willbe distributed all over tehtree. This is the bestservice to humanity. Letterto Mr. Karsan, December 2,

1976

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Ram Vi Jay Festival 2007By Bhaktin Alysia

On Saturday, October 20, we celebrated Lord Ramachandras victory over the demon Ravana.Preparation began early in the week so that as visitors arrived, a 12-foot Ravana murti, stood in thepasture, intimidating all living entities passing by. Thankfull y, His Holiness Varsana Swami arrivedin the early afternoon to dispel our fears. Upon his arrival, Mother Kaulini exclaimed, AHA! Wehave finally captured you! With a boyish grin, Mahara ja replied, It is very nice to have been cap-tured. After kirtan, Varsana Swami gave an amazing lecture, summarizing the Ramayana in its entirety.His intimate knowledge of Lord Ramas pastimes was so enthralling and enlivening, I questionedwhether or not we were still in Mrtaloka. The narration was literally out of this world and thedevotees appeared to be absorbed in the mediation of lila katha. At the conclusion of Maharaja s lectu re, kirtan started up and we paraded from the temple to the

pasture in anticipation of lighting Ravana on fire. Pariksit and Tamal Krishna Prabhus led thesankirtan party up the driveway and out into the field. The cows across the road came close to thefence to watch Varsana Swami as he threw the first spear into Ravanas ten-headed form. Thespear pierced his heart and immediately Ravana went up in flames. To the surpr ise of the on look-ing devotees, fireworks began exploding from Ravanas body. Several fireworks exploded in thecrowd and the devotees squealed and giggled in delight. The kirtan was lively and the devoteeslooked ecstatic. After Ravana was declared annihilated, prasadam was served afterwards. I would guess a nicecrowd of 200 devotees waited in line, anxious for the mercy of Sri Sri Radha Damodara. Thatevening they were dressed in gorgeous blue and gold outfits. Sweet bhajans concluded the eveningas the devotees paid their obeisances and hesitantly parted for home with their bellies full and theirhearts soft as butter.

All glories to the devotees of the devotees of Sri Sri Radha Damodara!Check out the pix: http://gallery.mac.com/ortrung#100068

VIEW PIX OF THEANNAKUTAFESTIVAL @HEMANTS HOUSEAcarya dasa constructed a faithful replica of Govardhan Hill from Gita Nagari Cow dung and brought the hill to the festivities. He

also told the participants about the origin of Govardhan Hill: In the western coast of India, in the island of

Salmali, lived Dronachala, the king of the mountains. Once a sage by the name of Pulastya

Muni, came to him to take his son Giriraja with him to Kashi (Varanasi). After offering some

initial resistance, Giriraja, somehow agreed to go with him only on condition that he should not

put him down on the earth in betwee n. If he does so, he woul d stay there foreve r. When they

were flyin g over the Vraja bhumi, Girir aja increas ed his weight to the extent that Pulastya had

no option but to put him down. Pulastya understood the mischief of Giriraja. He became

furious and cursed him that he would decrease by a grain everyday. But then repenting on the

curse he gave to Giriraja, he assured him that he would be blessed in the Dvapara Yuga and

everybody would start worshipping him s ince then. Check out the pix: http:/ /

gallery.mac.com/ortrung#100076