Buenos Aires / San Paulo
Last Hours in Argentina
My last hours were spent in
comfort, both physically and otherwise. I was asked to give another Bhagavatam
class, my fourth this week, and I caught up on some rest before the drive to
Tigre. Tigre (Spanish for tiger) is a tourist attraction outside of Buenos
Aires. There is located a vegetarian restaurant run by Daksha, and so visitors
from other ISKCON communities in the country made this fine dining place their
stop over before returning to, more in particular, Mar del Plata. We brunched.
We chatted. We joked. We even created a massage circle before my departure for
my flight. Most of all, we shared our realizations of guru, Prabhupada, through
expressing our appreciation of his magnanimity.
What an enriching gathering it
was, especially over the yummy prasadam.
Govinda Madhava drove me to the
airport and once I arrived at the gate I sat next to a Brazilian man and an
Argentinian woman. We struck up a great conversation surrounding spirituality.
The man asked why our group is so
small, referring to Krishna devotees. And my response to him was that believers
in Krishna on our planet numbers one billion. He also questioned the big gap in
Christian belief and eastern belief, regarding the concept of reincarnation. At
this point, the woman expressed that Christianity, which has roots in the Old
Testament, attests to the principle of reincarnation. I further elaborated that
practically all ancient traditions run parallel in concepts of soul
transmigration. The man said he lived for some time in Japan, where monks were
fighting with each other. My answer, “All problems stem from our
misidentification of the self. We are spirits, not bodies.”
May the Source be with you!
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