Moscow

This was my first visit to Moscow after almost twenty years. The senior ladies of the yatra had repeatedly requested me to come, and HH Niranjana Maharaja had also encouraged me to do so. Thus I felt obliged to accept the invitation...

In the early days during my married life, when we started the preaching in Riga/Latvia in 1989 we had sometimes visited Moscow. We had been there for the very first Ratha Yatra in 1991, and we were cooking the prasadam for all the devotees and people in general, which had been a real challenge. I also remember the big vivaha yajna at the Red Square where the parade had ended, and many couples sanctified their marriage by receiving the blessings of Lord Jagannath and the assembled devotees. Later we sometimes attended the big festival at Suchajevo outside of Moscow, where many Maharajas would assemble and conduct seminars during the day and kirtans in the evenings. It was almost a first and simple version of what we have today in Ukraine as the Bhakti Sangam Festival.

Even in those early days Moscow had always been a difficult place to establish Krsna consciousness systematically. The city is so gigantic - fifteen million people plus another five million of commuters coming and going who are not officially registered. The energy in such huge cities is rather intense and impersonal, with everyone fighting for their survival. Furthermore Moscow has always been a very expensive place to live, and today it is one of the most expensive cities of the world. Over the years the devotees had experienced many set-backs, having been forced to constantly move from one place to another without any opportunity to purchase a good temple property. Also the government and church had given a lot of trouble to the devotees, and several times it had almost come to the point where Krsna consciousness was banned altogether. Thus the yatra had been experiencing many challenges, which had made it difficult for a steady community to develop.

​Now, on the 28th of April devotees were happily welcoming me at the airport - surprisingly enough the wheather was nicer and warmer than it had been in Villa Vrindavan in Italy! I was accomodated in a flat in walking distance of what serves as the main but temporary temple. The devotees had been renting this rather suitable building for several years. There is a nice Govinda's Restaurant and a good size temple room, and several other rooms and facilities. But very soon the devotees will have to move once again, which is always very unsettling to community development.
I was invited to give a SB class, and on another morning I also visited the other much smaller temple of Lord Jagannath and gave the mornign program there. The smaller temple is situated in an old house - the mood almost reminded me of the very early days. A few bhaktas and brahmacaris are living here, under the guidance of HH Bhakti Ananta Krsna Maharaja.

The devotees kept me busy: I gave the Sunday feast lecture on the topic of death, and another evening program on The False Ego - our Constant Companion and Trouble Maker. Both topics captured devotees' attention and were well attended and received. I met with the temple president Sadhu-priya Prabhu, coming originally from India. We had a lively discussion for a couple of hours, and he shared how he had come to Moscow as a student around the same time when we established the preaching in Riga - in 1989. Infact I even vagely remember seeing him on our early visits to Moscow. Another funny incident came up: he shared how recently the Indian Embassador of Moscow had visited the temple. He had started his service very recently here, and before he had served in Dhaka. The Embassador had mentioned how he liked to visit our ISKCON temple in Dhaka, and how he had once met a lady there from Europe. And now Sadhu-priya Prabhu was wondering whether he had maybe been refering to myself? And yes, indeed I had met him on a farewell program in Dhaka temple, which the devotees had arranged in his honor, and I had offered him some gifts and had taken prasadam with him together, engaging in pleasant conversations and exchanges. And I was happy to hear that one of the first places for him to visit in Moscow was our ISKCON temple.

​​One morning I visited the brahmacari ashram outside of Moscow which Bhakti Vijnana Maharaja has established. Around 40 nice and enthusiastic boys are living here, and their main focus is on studies. The set-up is perfect: a simple two-storey wooden building in a quiet and undeveloped part of Moscow, away from all kinds of mundane influences and energies. A good place for brahmacaris to be undisturbed in their spiritual practice and studies. The mood was very welcoming, and I offered a two-hour session from the course "Men and Women in Spiritual Culture". The boys eagerly participated and opened up for questions - I could sense how relevant and interesting the topic was to them. I took my breakfast with them outside on the lawn, and afterwards had a phone conversation with HH Bhakti Vijnana Maharaja who welcomed me to Moscow and was making sure that I was well taken care of.

On another evening I met with a nice group of senior ladies to discuss the principles of establishing a bramacarini ashram. We spent several hours churning the topic, and I tried my very best to inspire and convince the ladies of taking up this burden of love in order to give the ladies an opportunity for systematic training. We all know how important material education and training is for material success in life. In the same way, spiritual training and education forms the very foundation to spiritual success. It gives a solid basis to all other phases in life: the grhastha ashram and vanaprastha ashram.
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​​The main and foremost event I had come to Moscow for was a seven-day retreat for the ladies where I offered the course "Men and Women in Spiritual Culture." Around 35 ladies assembled from the District of Moscow and various parts of Russia, some even arriving by a domestic flight. We all gathered at the large house of Ojasvi Gopi Mataji and her good husband who live around one hour's drive away in the rural suburbs of Moscow. The facility was perfectly suited to conduct such retreat - a very spacious three-storey building surrounded by a garden. Ojasvi Gopi Mataji and her husband received us in great Vaisnava hospitality - a wonderful example of perfect grhastha life: opening their home to receive the Vaisnavas in a wonderful mood of service. Our group was very mixed with a good number of senior ladies attending, but some young devotees had also come to join the event.

​We spent seven days deeply churning various topics centered around the principles of spiritual culture and receiving clear insights into Srila Prabhupada's instructions in his purports of the Bhagavatam. We followed our usual morning program, spent the day in the seminar presentations, and some evenings we were conducting sweet and prayerful kirtans. Such association amongst ladies is very powerful and transformational, and at the same time so sweet and deeply purifying on all levels. At the closing session we exchanged gifts and words of appreciation and gratitude, and our hearts were deeply moved.
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​We know the famous letter which Srila Prabhupada wrote to Hamsaduta in 1972: 
"Now we have got so many students and so many temples, but I am fearful that if we expand too much in this way that we shall become weekened and gradually the whole thing will become lost. Just like milk. We may thin it more and more with water for cheating the customers, but in the end it will cease to be any longer milk. Better to boil the milk now very vigorously and make it thick and sweet, that is the best process. So let us concentrate on training our devotees very thoroughly in the knowledge of Krsna consciousness from our books, from tapes, by discussing always, and in so many ways instruct them in the right proposition."

​​Throughout my visit to Moscow I was reflecting on Srila Prabhupada coming here. He had this clear vision how Russia would be an excellent place for spreading Krsna consciousness, and now we have indeed so many Russian devotees! Now the time has come to vigorously boil the milk to make it thick and sweet, so that we all become burfi-like devotees: sweet and solid. If I can only contribute in some small way to this process, my life will be successful....!

On the 11th of May I flew on to Simferopol in Crimea....

Your servant, Devaki dd