Its sunny, its peaceful, its Malaga, its Spain, its a
Happy Janmastami and
Srila Prabhupada Vyasapuja!
Have a nice one!
Sri Sri Radha Vanabihari
Srila Prabhupada
personal Deities of Srimati Yamuna devi and Srimati Dinatarini devi
From August 2 – 6 I attended my first, and the seventh Croatian summer camp. It was held in the district of Lika, about 2hrs south of Zagreb in the center of the country, about 50kms. from the Bosnian border.
Its a beautiful part of the country, up in the mountains near the National state forest and at first appearance seems idyllic
you can collect fresh spring water for drinking which Vrsabha dasa swears is the best in the world
Its wolf and bear country
and this is one country where the bees are not dying out. These few hives produced 550 kilos of hunny last year
maybe that’s why the bears are there
Most of the houses in the district are less than 20 years old or have been or are being recently renovated
But its not the spiritual world. The reason why is because just 16 years ago the whole area was in the middle of a full-on war zone. Croats and Serbs used to live in peace side by side but due to the crazy politicians declaring their ‘independence’ the once friendly communities set about destroying each other. One group burnt out the others houses.
In retaliation the victims burnt out the attackers dwellings. All over the area stand the empty husks of homes, burnt remnants, bullet-riddled and sad reminders of the violence that lies just below the surface of our human veneer.
Nowadays only Croatians live here. As we drove through the local villages many of the locals responded with a wave as we passed them by and seemed friendly enough, but I couldn’t help but wonder what exactly these same people were doing just a short few years ago.
Anyway, out of the terrible past an opportunity arose which our devotees are taking good advantage of.
The government compensated the fleeing Serbs (after international pressure) and bought their houses from them, or renovated them, selling them off or renting them out at ridiculously cheap prices.
Seeing the opportunity our devotee hosts Murari Gupta prabhu and his wife Sundari
moved into one such dwelling 12 years ago, paying 10 euros per month rent! Now they are negotiating to buy it for about 12,000 euros. Murari’s house became the site for a summer camp
initially meant for the disciples of HH Bhakti Vikash Swami
but now its expanded and over 170 devotees attended this year.
Both of them are practicing doctors so they have been welcomed into the area by the locals, and other devotees have started to follow suit. This house belongs to one devotee who lives in Zagreb. Its under construction but eventually he will move here.
Almost attached to Murari’s house is a large barn that was burnt down and restored to become a spacious temple
They have the use of a couple of hectares of land belonging to a neighbor at the immediate back of their house which they use for growing vegetables and flowers
Of course they couldn’t accommodate so many devotees on-site and various homes, still empty from the war years or renovated for rental, were hired for the week.
Prahladananda Swami and Lilasuka prabhu, and myself and Hari Krishna dasa from Italy, were put up in a small house and adjoining wooden cabin about 15 mins. drive further into the hills
The weather was excellent, although chilly in the mornings and at night, and we were blissful and well provided for. All in all it was a perfect setting for a transcendental festival.
Hare Krishna hare krsna krsna krsna hare hare
Haribolo Haribolo
After Amsterdam I headed off for Zagreb. I was somewhat what impressed that Shiphol airport, although pretty chaotic in its older design had some nice facilities to while away transit time
My impression of Amsterdam overall is good-it seems to be a city where facilities for people have been emphasized over things. People-friendly and not just another money-is-everything industrial complex.
I spent 3-4 days in Zagreb
Its a nice temple but pretty quiet in the weekdays. I gave a few SPLB seminars on ‘Association’
and was impressed with some home-grown organic produce they were selling. Sundarananda prabhu, the temple president, told me that they have some other land where they are starting to do a bit of farming, although they don’t have any cows yet.
From Zagreb headed out to Rijeka on the coast. I had visited it for the first time last year and was happy to do a few programs there again this visit. Its a nice city, and our location is very central, right across the road from the main city square and the opera house
Considering that most devotees in the area are working (only one devotee actually lives in the temple) I got an enthusiastic reception with at least a dozen devotees attending my classes
Zagreb and Rijeka though were mainly stopovers for the main event, a summer camp in Lika
I am sure most of us have suffered email overload
Well today I decided to free myself from tyranny
I spent today answering all my outstanding emails. With great determination I ploughed thru the whole lot
My inbox is now at zero!
A minor victory I admit. Its amazing how something so trivial can give you so much satisfaction (you can understand how sad my life really is. Sick that it should come to this…)
And my other milestone (or is that millstone)
was that when I finished I noticed that my main email folder registered exactly 10,000 items.
So much for the liberation of information…
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
View Previous Entries
Categories
Syndicate this Blog using RSS
