Tuesday, November 10th, 2015
Manhattan, New York
The Finish Line…The Tree
We
had yet to complete New Jersey before hopping on to a ferry for
Manhattan, taking us towards our final destination for this walk.
Two
more players entered our trekking arena; a local person, Bhakta
Avatara, and Jake from Michigan. Seven of us took boldly to the streets
despite it being overcast with light rain. Through Newark downtown we
went. And then we came upon bridges with walkways - rarely used. They
take you over the river before reaching Jersey City. Before we came to
the posh and clean waterfront with new high-rises, we traveled through
areas of human embarrassment - trash, rejected objects of food, coffee
containers… We walked by a massive auto grave yard catching a glimpse of
the symptoms of Kali Yuga, the age of forgotten values.
In
Manhattan, the world of cultural power catches the attention. We came
upon an extraordinary memorial in honour of Irish settlers who took the
long journey to the US in response to devastating famine. Not far from
there, just two blocks away, we observed another monument. This one was
to honour the departed souls of 9/11. It was a huge square-ish run of
water trailing down a dark deep well. Very impactful.
Another
one of those tiny miracles occurred when I was stopped in the street by
another friend, Sudha Jiva. He came at the point when the rain came
more profusely. Conveniently, we took shelter of his vehicle nearby
where we could talk.
“Much
work needs to be done”, we both concluded in regard to promoting
spiritual renaissance, one that encourages us back to the land and
simple living.
A kirtan chanting party was set for our last leg of the 950-mile walk in honour of our teachers (and specifically our guru Srila Prabhupada).
It began at Union Square and proceeded to Tompkins Square Park to its
central point, the elm tree. It was under this tree that our divine
teacher inspired his first followers to engage in the prime function for
the people of this age - celebration of sacred sound. There was a
small gathering that came to honour our humble event of walking from
Boston to Butler and to New York. I’m grateful that Abhiram, my
spiritual friend, came to join us. Not all of us hugged that very
special tree but we all circumambulated it offering it the reverence and
credit that it deserves.
I
had the good fortune to speak about the glories of bhakti-yoga and our
recent walk to a gathering at the nearby Bhakti Center. I hope that I
successfully took them out to the trail in an imaginary way through the
woods and along the crazy highways to capture even for a moment the
glory of introspective walking.
Although
this walk is now completed, I will continue with more trekking and
we’ll update you with more tales. Thank you all for following us.
May the Source be with you!
17 miles / 27 km
No comments:
Post a Comment