Krishna and His beloved cows

The festival days of Janmastami and Srila Prabhupada's appearance in Kharkov/Ukraine are my most blissful days of the entire year. It is the time when I can taste a different flavor of joy and absorption - not preaching and giving lectures, but creating a Vrindavan panorama on our altar in order to open a window into the spiritual world - Goloka Vrindavan.

Already one year ago we had set the theme for this year's Janmastami festival: "Krishna and His Beloved Cows." During Kartik 2017 I had purchased a herd of around 45 little cows in Vrindavan and had sent them back to Kharkov with devotees who were visiting India. Over the entire year I had meditated and planned how we can decorate the altar to help us remember Krishna and His beloved cows. During my writing retreat in Kharkov we had several meetings in order to coordinate the arrangements, and I deeply enjoyed the entire meditation. We sent our brahmacarinis to the shops to purchase tiny little buckets and clay pots, and we crafted little brooms, fences, straw and hay bundles - even little dried cow stool paddies! Furthermore, we had a few little gopas, with a lunch packet hanging from the stick over their shoulder. And a lake with rocks and frogs, where the cows assembled to drink water. Some of the cows received some extra color, and Nalini Mataji created a big calf to be next to Lord Nityananda! Our teenage boys went to the forest to collect moss and decorative branches and tree bark. In this way we engaged our minds in preparing for Janmastami.

Every year before Janmastami Prema Mataji would take me to a special place on the banks of a nearby river to collect wildflowers, grasses and beautiful things from nature for the vases and altar decorations. I also did not miss my chance to go to the big flower market to choose all kinds of beautiful things - little trees and exotic flowers and greenery. The day before Janmastami we were busy all day getting everything ready according to a chalked out plan - such a blissful meditation....!

We had the good fortune to receive HH Bhakti Vaibhava Maharaja for the festival days. Sri Sri Gaur Nitai looked indeed just like Krishna-Balarama, and of course our festival Deities of Sri Sri Radha Syamasundara were also there. The altar turned out to be simply wonderful, with many sweet little details - a true feast for the eye and heart!

The festival program had a good focus on sravanam kirtanam. Throughout the day several speakers were elaborating on the Lord's appearance in this world and were also reading from Krishna Book. After a beautiful abhishek Maharaja gave the main class in the afternoon, followed by a maha kirtan. We offered gifts to the Lord, and the birthday cards were read out to Him and the assembled devotees. A group of matajis performed a little drama, and then we were swinging little Radha Syamasundara accompanied by sweet and melodious kirtan. During the last hour from 11 pm to 12 pm I gave our traditional "Krishna Meditation" speaking about this year's theme of Krishna and His beloved cows, with lots of nice quotes from Srimad Bhagavatam. After the midnight artik I rushed home and took a short rest of around 3 hours......

On the next morning of Srila Prabhupada's appearance I came to the temple at 5:30 am with three girls to decorate Prabhupada's Vyasasana - another one of my favorite services. This year we had made more fancy arrangements which required coordinated preparations and planning in regards to the length and color combination of the garlands. And it had all taken place during the day and evening of Janmastami - to make sure the flowers would still be fresh! It was also the first year where we made special and fresh vases for Srila Prabhupada's Vyasasana - not simply re-using the vases from the Janmastami festival. Devotional service is ever increasing - we can always make it more and more beautiful from year to year......
And Srila Prabhupada's Vyasasana looked indeed stunning - the best we ever had! It had also been newly upholstered - very special and elegant!

During the program for Srila Prabhupada's glorification we introduced this year a video class given by him, and several short videos with Srila Prabhupada inbetween devotees reading homages. We observed the standard program of Guru Puja and abhishek, followed by Maharaja speaking about Srila Prabhupada, and homages of GBC's/Guru's. Many of our local devotees spoke very deeply about Srila Prabhupada's glories, expressing their gratitude to him and re-dedicating themselves to serving his mission. Finally we offered the feast with many items cooked in small quantities for him, and we concluded with puspanjali and Gurv-astaka. The feast was served at 5 pm - as every year we like to spend most of the day remembering, glorifying and worshiping our beloved Srila Prabhupada......!

Both festival days were ecstatic and deeply nourishing our devotion to the Lord and His pure devotee......

Your servant, Devaki dd