Saturday,
March 11th, 2017
Milton, Ontario
Get Ready
for Gaura
My walking
is strictly indoors right now, and that is very embarrassingly limited. The gout can’t, at this point, handle the
squeeze of the shoes. I was driven by
Nakula, the young son of Umesh, to his home.
Umesh was with me in Cuba. We
swam off the bay in Cienfuegos, where boldly he would grab palm-sized jellyfish
and toss them out of his way. Brave!
Umesh had deities
installed in his home
in Milton today—deities of Gaura and Nitai.
The entire world of Vaishnavas in the line of Gaura (the golden avatar)
is gearing up for his birth anniversary tomorrow. In lieu of this, we are also basically
preparing for the celebrations tomorrow with a bhajan/dance presentation in His honour.
Gaura, also
known as Chaitanya, was quite the chanter, and quite the walker. He roamed throughout the countryside, going
from village to village, encouraging the culture of song and dance. His mission was unofficially inaugurated in
the first decade of the 16th century in Bengal and then beyond. It spread throughout the sub-continent of
India. Kirtan is the word affiliated with Chaitanya.
Not
everyone is fully aware of kirtan
just yet. For instance, Greg, a good
friend of mine, who arrived during our practice time for bhajan, recently met a girl with an OM tattoo on her arm. He
asked her if she knew what OM meant.
“Something
to do with yoga?” she guessed.
“Yes, but
you’re not familiar with kirtan?”
“What’s
that?”
It looks
like Chaitanya’s influence still needs expanding; a little extra push from
adherents like us perhaps?
May the
Source be with you!
2 km
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