The Cambodian Odyssey [Part 1 of 3]: Preaching Opportunities Galore

It was 1996. We, a group of devotees from Sri Krishna Mandir, went on a preaching expedition to Cambodia to see if we could introduce them to Krsna Consciousness and to explore possibilities of opening a Hare Krsna center there.

We landed at Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia, and since we had no contacts we checked into a lodging house with facilities to cook for two weeks.

We found Cambodia to be a beautiful country just like Malaysia with the people being very friendly and helpful. We soon made friends with some of the locals and saw that there was a good potential for setting up a temple there. We did not have any books in the local language and many did not speak English well enough to be able to read many of Srila Prabhupada's books. There was a need to eventually translate them to Cambodian in order to spread the teachings more effectively.

Nevertheless, we devotees went on regular Harinama to the social hub of the town each day while we were there and many local Cambodians joined us for the Kirtan and were also singing and dancing along with us. They were very easy going people and were very friendly. Since they were predominantly Buddhist, they did not see us as a threat to their beliefs. We soon made friends with people who showed symptoms of being potential devotees. It was very encouraging for us to see that Srila Prabhupada's desire to establish many temples around the world would also take place there in Cambodia. We were very excited and began seriously looking into the possibility of opening a Cambodian Hare Krsna temple.

We then made plans to travel up north of the country to Siem Reap to see the famous Angkor Wat temple. This is the biggest ex-Hindu Temple in this part of the world. It was built by King Jayavarman, a Hindu king, during his reign sometime in the 12^th century.

It is something that Cambodia is famous for; in fact, if anyone coming to Cambodia does not visit the Angkor Wat, they are deemed to have missed the very purpose of their visit to the country. Furthermore, we had read too much of it to give it a miss. In addition, as it had been a Vishnu temple before being converted to a Buddhist one, it was a must-see for us. There was no looking back.

We made plans and soon discovered that it would take a six-hour boat ride to the place as that town was situated on the northern bank of the largest fresh water lake in South East Asia called Tonle Sap. We had two options to go there – either a 45 minutes' flight by helicopter or a 6-hour speed ferryboat ride.

We decided to travel by the ferry and since there were six of us, it was more economical. Soon we boarded one and were travelling. We had a chance to interact with the locals and to witness their day-to-day life style.

It was amazing to see how the people were caught up in the webs of Maya and how they were struggling to maintain their livelihood. The modes of nature do not spare anyone even if they are unsophisticated. The advantage they seemed to have was that they were very simple in their living; if that can be coupled with the mercy of a pure devotee, Srila Prabhupada, it would be to their tremendous gain. Their lives would become successful.

The ferry was stopping at various stations en route and there were a constant pool of people embarking and disembarking. Some were coming in with their children and others with their provisions of daily necessities. It was like taking one of the public buses in a rural area of a third world country.

The ferry was actually a small fast boat with three powerful 750 horsepower outboard engines. On account of these powerful engines, the boat was skimming on the surface of the water at great speed. We were feeling very insecure as this might have caused the hull of the boat to crack, thereby sinking the boat.

Notwithstanding all the water-slapping, it all went well for us and we safely reached Siem Reap town. We again checked into another small lodging house for our stay.

The Lord’s Garland Changes His Destiny

The mention of Prasadam usually gives us an idea of the deliciously prepared food offered to Lord Krsna in devotion. But it means more than that. It also includes anything offered to the Lord, like flower garlands, clothes used by the Lord, neem twigs, etc.

Usually we are very inattentive about the glories of these items and tend to take them lightly. As Lord Caitanya has said in the prayers of the Sikshastaka:

namnam akari bahudha nija-sarva-saktis

tatrarpita niyamitah smarane na kalah

etadrsi tava krpa bhagavan mamapi

durdaivam idrsam ihajani nanuragah

-- Caitanya Caritamrta Antya Lila 20.16

"My Lord, O Supreme Personality of Godhead, in Your holy name there is all good fortune for the living entity, and therefore You have many names, such as "Krsna" and "Govinda," by which You expand Yourself. You have invested all Your potencies in those names, and there are no hard and fast rules for remembering them. My dear Lord, although You bestow such mercy upon the fallen, conditioned souls by liberally teaching Your holy names, I am so unfortunate that I commit offenses while chanting the holy name, and therefore I do not have any attraction for them."

This is our position; although all these paraphernalia are very powerful, we do not have much faith in them. In this regard, there is an incident among the followers of Sri Ramanujacarya. They challenged him on the potency of Prasadam and to prove to them its glories, he took a palmful of rice Prasadam and requested them to follow him. He led them to a tank. In India, most temples have a small reservoir of water for the pilgrims to take bath or to freshen themselves before entering the temple.

There he demonstrated the power of Prasadam by throwing it into the tank. Immediately, the fish in the tank started to partake of it. Immediately after taking the Prasadam, the fish visibly transformed into four-handed forms, similar to those of Lord Vishnu and were seen going upwards to the spiritual world. It was indeed a very wondrous miracle to witness.

The followers of Sri Ramanujacarya were astounded by what they had witnessed and they immediately inquired as to why this had not happened to any of them although they had been honoring the Lord's Prasadam for a much longer period of time. To that, Sri Ramanujacarya replied that they did not have the faith whereas the fish simply ate without any reservation.

There is a similar incident in the Caitanya lila where Lord Sri Krsna Caitanya Mahaprabhu examined Sarvabhauma Bhattacarya on whether he had given up his attachment for the impersonal teaching that he had been practicing.

The Lord brought him some of Lord Jagannath's Maha Prasadam very early one morning just as the Bhattacarya had risen from his bed. On receiving the Prasadam, the Bhattacarya immediately honored it without rinsing his mouth and finishing his morning rituals. He quoted a verse explaining that if one receives Maha Prasadam, he should immediately honor it as it is non-different from the Lord. This particular behavior of the Bhattacarya pleased the Lord. He was satisfied that the Bhattacarya has then become a Vaisnava – a devotee of Lord Krishna.

If one becomes attached to the Prasadam of the Lord, he becomes cured of the poisonous effect of Mayavada philosophy which promotes oneness with the Supreme Lord, an offensive perception that leads one to a hellish situation.

Narada Muni became a great devotee simply by tasting the remnants of Prasadam left behind by the sages whom he and his mother were taking care of. He mentioned in the Srimad Bhagavatam that just by tasting those remnants, his heart became purified, similar to those of the pure devotee sages.

We have other incidences like the four Kumaras who smelt the flavor of Tulasi manjaris offered at the lotus feet of the Lord and became pure devotees, giving up their impersonal realization.

All these incidences definitely prove the potency of the Lord's Prasadam but sometime we tend to identify them as some stories of bygone ages and not take them too seriously. To prove to us that this is not true, the Lord enacts His glories time to time to the devotees to strengthen their faith.

Here is one incident that happened in our temple. One day, somewhere in the mid-1990s, a devotee's friend had passed away and to help him further, the devotee decided to place on his body, the Deities' Prasadam garlands to help him on his onward journey. This kind gesture on behalf of the concerned devotee had a profound effect on the departed soul. Usually we do not emphasize much on dreams as they would usually be taken as someone's fantasy. But in this case, however, the departed soul actually appeared in dazzling clothes and was looking very effulgent in a dream to our devotee who had previous helped him with the Deity's Prasadam garland.

He apparently spoke saying that because of the Prasadam garland from the Deities that was placed on his dead body, he had received a higher birth. He thanked him profusely for his kind service of saving him which granted him a promotion to the higher planets instead of degradation to the hellish planets. He was extremely grateful and he thanked him again and again before finally departing in the dream.

Upon awakening, the devotee was stunned by the dream that he just recollected and was surprised by what he had heard. This incident certainly proves the glorious potency of the Lord's Prasadam.

The Nectar of Devotion sheds more light on this topic:

Accepting Flower Garlands

The next instruction is that one should put on flower garlands which are offered to the Deity. In this connection, in the Eleventh Canto, Sixth Chapter, verse 46, of Srimad-Bhägavatam, Uddhava says to Krsna, "My dear Krsna, I have taken things which You have used and enjoyed, such as garlands of flowers, saintly articles, garments and ornaments, and I eat only the remnants of Your foodstuff, because I am Your menial servant. So, therefore, I am sure that I shall not be attacked by the spell of material energy." The purport of this verse is that for any person who simply follows these rules and regulations of decorating the body with the marks of tilaka of gopi-candana or sandalwood pulp, and who puts on the garlands which were offered to Krsna, there is no question of being conquered by the spell of material energy. At the time of death, there is no question of such a person's being called by the constables of Yamaräja. Even if one does not accept all the Vaisnava principles, but still takes the remnants of foodstuff offered to Krsna, or krsna-prasäda, he will gradually become qualified to rise to the platform of a Vaisnava.

Similarly, in the Skanda Puräna, Lord Brahmä tells Närada, "My dear Närada, anyone who puts on his neck the flower garland which was formerly used by Krsna becomes relieved from all disease and reactions to sinful activities, and gradually he is liberated from the contamination of matter."

We are very often caught in the webs of Maya and do not even perceive or believe that there is life after death. We, devotees, should take our devotional lives seriously so that our faith can solidify by remembering these pastimes. We can then be sure of returning to the Lord at the end of this life.

Incidences like these would certainly prove the supreme potency of the Lord which is prevalent at all times. We should not be misled by atheistic philosophies which have scant regards to the very idea of the Supreme Personality of Godhead or His pastimes. The only way to understand the Lord and His pastimes is to obtain the mercy of a pure devotee of Lord Krishna. Then we would be able to surely grasp all these pastimes with complete faith.

yasya deve para bhaktir

yatha deve tatha gurau

tasyaite kathita hy arthah

prakasante mahatmanah

"Only unto those great souls who have implicit faith in both the Lord and the spiritual master are all the imports of Vedic knowledge automatically revealed." [Svetasvatara Upanisad 6.23]

Thank you very much.

Hare Krsna!

-- By Sundar Gopal Das

Govinda's Gifts

Hare Krsna! Here is another interesting incident.

It was sometime in 1994. When we had moved our temple premises to Mountbatten Rd, we decided to open a Govinda’s Gifts shop in Little India along Serangoon Road to facilitate our preaching activities. In 1985, we had a similar store in Little India where we reached out to several souls whose lives were changed through Srila Prabhupada's books. We had closed the preaching store sometime in 1988 located at the current Serangoon Plaza.

We wanted to revive the store front preaching and with all earnestness, we were seriously looking for another location in the Little India area.

We managed to locate an outlet at No. 3, Kerbau Road. We were very excited with the news and immediately accepted the offer to occupy the place. The purported landlord Mr. Balakrishnan was only too keen in renting out his premises for our intended use. All went well and we soon started our renovation work for the shop. As the renovation work progressed, another interesting event unfolded.

The building had a living quarters behind the shop and the tenant living there was a Muslim gentleman, Mr.Hamid. He approached us to find out what was going on at the shop front. We gladly enlightened him about our new venture of a proposed new gift shop selling Srila Prabhupada's books and other religious artifacts. He was very happy to hear of our enterprise and welcomed us with an open heart although he was a Muslim.

However, he began to reveal that this Mr. Balakrishnan was a cheat and mentioned how he had cheated many other people like us in the same manner by purportedly renting out the property and then evicting the new tenant with them losing all their investment and rental deposits. Mr. Hamid further added that actually Mr. Balakrishnan was not the landlord. The property apparently belonged to Mr. Hamid's relatives and he suggested that we meet them to clarify the matter.

Following this turn of events, we readily accepted the proposal and went along to meet the new landlord who happened to be a Muslim lady. They hosted us in their house very warmly and began to tell their side of the story. The property apparently belonged to their father and this Mr.Balakrishnan rented it from them and soon after, he stopped paying any rent to them. They could not evict him as the property was awaiting repossession by the Government and they were waiting compensation and were not supposed to rent it out. Knowing this, Mr.Balakrishnan wanted to forcefully take over the property and claim that he was actually the person to receive the compensation as he was doing the business and was the rightful claimant. By some kind of trickery, he was trying his luck out.

After looking into all the relevant documents, we were firmly convinced that the property belonged to the Muslim lady and proceeded to deal with her and ignored Mr.Balakrishnan. Fortunately, we had not paid any monies to him and we did not reveal to him of our intentions too; it was a blessing of Krsna.

Once the renovation work was over, Mr.Balakrishnan came over requesting that we give him a set of keys too which we denied and also enlightened him of our intention of paying the rent to the Muslim lady. He was furious and threw himself into a rage and started to hurl abusive words at us but it was all to no avail as we were undeterred.

He was visibly very disturbed and would come daily trying to create a disturbance at the storefront thus making our sales difficult. We tolerated his menace and kept up our determined stand of not submitting to his attack. He was caught in a fix. He had lost his shop, the source of his livelihood, and had every reason to retaliate. Furthermore his chance of claiming a huge sum as compensation benefit was evaporating.

He then decided on his next course of action. It was a Saturday night. He brought some of his friends in a van to the shop after we had closed for the day in the evening to carry away all of our things and then to put a new lock. In other words, he wanted to evict us forcefully.

After we had closed the shop, he started his operation. While he was trying to break the lock, unknown to him and fortunately for us, there were some plain clothes detectives of the Police department doing their rounds and were just standing right in front of the shop. They inquired from him as to what he was doing. He remarked that he had lost his set of keys and was therefore trying to break the lock to replace it. The cops waited till he broke the shop open and they went in along with him.

By Lord Krishna's arrangement, the cop happened to be a friend of our society and and was taken in for a surprise when he saw that it was actually our shop. He immediately questioned and arrested Mr. Balakrishnan and then called us over. Mr.Balakrishnan was at a loss of words in trying to defend himself. The police had caught him red-handed while "shop breaking" which, as we later came to know, was a serious offence that carries a jail term of 7 years.

He was placed in jail while the police recorded our statements and was later released on bail awaiting trial. He eventually was very remorseful of his actions realizing the consequence he was about to face. He was pleading with our lawyer to drop the charges and to save him from this terrible outcome.

Finally, after a year or so, our legal solicitor advised us to pardon him and to receive a compensation for his folly. We too agreed to the proposal and proceeded on with our service of distributing Srila Prabhupada’s books with no hindrance and with greater vigour.

This proves to us how Krsna is always protecting His devotees who are sincerely trying to preach his Holy name. We went on to distribute many of Srila Prabhupada's books and introduced Krsna consciousness to many a soul.

Srila Prabhupada Sankirtan ki jaya!

-- By Sundar Gopal Das