May 13 I left Zagreb and flew to Luton, England, to be picked up by my old and dear friend Bhagavat Asraya prabhu, who everyone knows has a heart as big as his belly

Here's Bhaggy with another very old and dear friend, Kurma prabhu

Uncle Bhaggy is always a genial host and I am happy to say he is my best friend in Krsna consciousness. We have known each other since he joined in Melbourne in late 1974. He has hosted me on numberless occasions and his wife Sarva Mangala is one of my wife’s best friends.

I stayed the night at Bhaktivedanta Manor and the next afternoon I hired a car and drove up to the famous, ancient, hallowed university city of  Cambridge.

There I picked up my oldest daughter Sachi.

She is 25 years old, and two years ago graduated in engineering from Cambridge university. She likes it so much she decided to settle there and just recently she and her Mum bought a house there.

Before going up I had a surprise exchange about Sachi with one of the veteran sankirtan devotees at the Manor, Sriman Dayal Nitai prabhu. Without knowing I was about to meet her he told me he had been up in Cambridge in early March this year selling books. He had  bumped into a small group of young women on the street. He started chatting with them, and asked each one their name. When one of them replied “Sachi” he told her, “That’s great, that’s a spiritual name.” To his great surprise she smiled and told him she knew, and that her father was Hari-sauri dasa. They had a good exchange, she was happy to give a donation and accept a book, and it turned out that it was Sachi’s birthday and the other girls were visiting friends. [Sachi was born on Gaura Purnima in 1985 in London, that's why she got the name.]

Dayal Nitai told me, “I have to tell you, she was so well spoken, polite and intelligent, I was really impressed with her. She really came across as a decent, caring human being.”

I was very happy to hear his assessment because I split up with her Mum in 1986 and although I always kept in touch Sachi hasn’t had any direct contact with the devotees and doesn’t know very much at all about Krsna consciousness. I confess it remains a regret on my part that I wasn’t able to offer her a spiritual upbringing, although I understand that Krsna has His plan and we all have our own karma to fulfil.

Nevertheless, she was well brought up, is a life-long vegetarian, and went to an exclusive girl’s school called Haberdasher’s Aske’s School for Girls [see http://www.habsgirls.org.uk/index.php] which rather ironically is just down the road from Bhaktivedanta Manor.  She is extremely bright, won a scholarship to Cambridge, graduated in engineering manufacturing processes, and has spent most of the last year and half doing research on alternative energy.

Anyway, we had arranged to drive up together to visit my Mum and spend the weekend with her in the ancient, famous, hallowed precincts of Scunthorpe, North Lincs., which I will write about in the next part of this blog.

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