Saturd ay, March 20th, 2010

Digging Up Old Stuff

Toronto, Ontario

This morning Raghavendra and I hit the winding residential streets of Rosedale, the place of stately Victorian homes. The walk was awesome as usual. It’s about every morning that I spot a raccoon climbing his way up the bark making that crackling sound as he ascends to a spot and looks down thinking, “I hope they go away!” referring to the strange workers. He looks down with those Zorro eyes and attempts a staring contest with his opponents…us. We accept the challenge. Usually our furry friend gives in, turns his head upward and shimmies his way up another branch. I have been interested in raccoon behavior like this for years.

The bulk of the day was primarily occupied in an exciting archival project indoors. For posterity purposes our colleagues in Canada decided to pull out of Temple storage any memorabilia including news clipping, old documents, periodicals, photos, pictures, movies tapes, slides and anything at all that could be of archival value. We might call the project ISKCAN, short for International Society For Krishna in Canada.

It’s tedious work sorting through vintage stuff but with help it makes the burden lighter. A photographer, Rsi, offered to help me. Yes, we got dirty. We ended up stirring up dust and dirt but it’s rewarding. To our knowledge Krishna Consciousness has been in this city since 1969. In Montreal it would have been since 1967, Canada’s 100th birthday. Vancouver was probably started in 1969 also. In these locations and other places in Canada, like Ottawa, there must be ‘stuff of sentimental value’ that needs digging up.

Generations yet to come will want to know what we went through in the ‘early days’ to establish this higher consciousness for Krishna, the Divine. They would like to know of public opinion and how that’s changed over the years.

It’s an interesting project. Recently an e-mail was sent to us from a Rasananda, one of the founding fathers, you might say, of our Toronto chapter. From the Toronto Daily Star dated January 16, 1971 a caption reads, “Young man quits medicine to join the growing ranks of ascetic Krishna sect.” An intriguing article by reporter Sidney Katz expounded on the Title.

5 KM