Taking it easy today, thanks to the feast yesterday. Note to self: keep a kilometer's distance to any and all feasts. I sincerely tried to avoid it. The problem seems to have been there already at Mahaprabhu's time. It is told that Subuddhi Raya would spend a good deal of his slim earnings supplying yogurt to Bengali devotees who would come to Vraja. Someone ought to resurrect the tradition and supply yogurt to Westerners who have a hard time surviving Bengali cooking.

In the afternoon we head for Baba's darshan. On the way, we see a baby dog, real small, who gets kicked into the sewer by two local brats. Unfortunately I cannot scream at them because some local people are around. We nevertheless stay back to ensure the puppy is left in peace. It is incredible how cruel the local people, especially kids, sometimes are towards the animals. If you want to drive that pig away, you don't need to throw a brick at him, something less will certainly serve the purpose. It escapes me how someone can torture a helpless, small creature. At where I come from, small kids like to pet animals of all varieties and sizes, in particular the juniors.

At Baba's place, I ask a question I am frequently asked. "What are the requirements for being your disciple?" Baba starts telling about the quantities of nama-bhajan people should be doing: four rounds of pancha-tattva-mantra, ten times the sad-goswami-chant, beginning with a minimum of four rounds of hare-krishna-maha-mantra, gradually increasing that to eight, sixteen, thirty-two, one lakh, two lakhs and so forth.

"And what of sadachar?" Sadachar means good conduct or proper behavior, often seen as varieties of external rules and regulations. "One should be of good character", Baba says. "No lying, cheating and stealing, like that." Such deeds are known as asat-kriya, false deeds that are obstacles on the path of our spiritual growth. In his commentary on Prema-bhakti-chandrika (27), Baba has explained how such faults in character and conduct grow into aparadhas, which are the gravest obstacles in attaining the treasure of prema. He explains:


I then ask about some basic rules, like in ISKCON Mandir they have the four regulations, such as no eating of meat, and no taking of intoxicants. "Oh, they come already before", Baba says. Thus, prior to hoping to truly cultivate good character, one ought to give up bad habits that perpetually plunge the mind into the quagmire of countless vices. Of course, cultivating good character is always in place, but one ought to not turn one's life into the famous elephant's bath.

In the course of the evening, I glance over a new translation of Radha-Krishna-Ganoddesa-Dipika of Sri Rupa Goswami, translated by Bhumipati and edited by Purnaprajna. The foreword has three silly typos. A good beginning. The first verse offers "obesiances" at the lotus feet of the spiritual master and the rest. Ten pages or so into the book, and the same goes on. Though for the most part accurate, the language often falls short of the poetic expression of the original, it doesn't really flow smoothly. Of course it is great that things are being translated, but I really wish that they would take the time to do it properly. "If it's worth doing, it's worth doing well", said the sages of the yore. Let's see if I'll draft out a full review of this one, it's an interesting title. I might put together charts and diagrams based on the text, there is really very useful content in the book.

I'm a bit knocked out with the fever, Malati is giving me Chinese acu-pressure treatment and some herbal stuff that helps me out. The evening goes with chanting and resting, and of course in posting in the daily news.