Morning Walk Conversation
with His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada
March 18, 1974, Vrndavana

Prabhupada: Not kirtana. Kirtana, arati, bhoga, lecture, so many ways. I have explained this.

Guru dasa: Yes. [break]

Prabhupada: …big hotel, ISKCON Vegetarian Hotel.

Tamala Krsna: Five star.

Prabhupada: Eh?

Tamala Krsna: One of the big points is…

Prabhupada: Yes.

Tamala Krsna: …five star hotel. It must be very gorgeous.

Prabhupada: Yes.

Tamala Krsna: (indistinct)

Prabhupada: Immediately submit plan and… Where is Surabhi?

Guru dasa: Surabhi? He’s here. [break]

Prabhupada: Where you get plan for hotel in Bombay?

Surabhi: Inside?

Tamala Krsna: Full front of the land, whole front land. No temple.

Prabhupada: Whole…

Surabhi: Only hotel.

Tamala Krsna: Yes. With a hall, hall on the ground floor. Covering the whole land.

Prabhupada: Not for the whole ground floor. First floor.

Tamala Krsna: On the first floor, one big, big hall.

Surabhi: Only hotel? One plan?

Prabhupada: Yes. You have got the site plan of the land?

Surabhi: Yes, I have all the plans for Bombay.

Prabhupada: Ah. Then you can make a sketch. [break] …plan.

Tamala Krsna: One thing you should know, Prabhupada. The hotels in that area are being sold. [“Hotel” in India may mean merely a restaurant. Publisher’s note.]

Prabhupada: Let them be sold. Our hotel does not depend on them. We are always independent.

Guru dasa: Why are they being sold? For lack of people coming?

Tamala Krsna: Whatever the people may be doing, they…

Prabhupada: Two hotels?

Tamala Krsna: Two. King’s Hotel, and Horizons.

Prabhupada: Are for sale, or they have been sold?

Tamala Krsna: They are selling. The owners are selling.

Prabhupada: So…

Tamala Krsna: They say… I spoke with one hotel man, and he says the price of petrol is now three rupees, twenty-five paise per liter.

Prabhupada: Eh?

Tamala Krsna: Petrol now costs three rupees twenty-five per liter. That means about three or four times what it was previously. So people are not so much inclined; since they have their business in the city, if they stay in Juhu…

Prabhupada: That is one of the reasons.

Tamala Krsna: …they have to go all the way from Juhu into the city. It costs twenty-five rupees by taxi.

Guru dasa: This is happening all over the world to the hotel business.

Prabhupada: Eh?

Guru dasa: All over the world. All over the world.

Prabhupada: Hotel business declining?

Guru dasa: All over. Because of the petrol shortage.

Tamala Krsna: But it’s not permanent.

Guru dasa: They’ll have to do something, because…

Tamala Krsna: It’s not permanent. The thing is that our life, if we put up a hotel, Prabhupada, all of our life members, at least, I know, in fact, will use the hotel. Plus many foreigners will still use. Because we are not, we are not… Our hotel will not simply be for the business foreigners.

Prabhupada: It is for spiritual culture.

Tamala Krsna: Spiritual culture. Right. So for that purpose it makes no difference the center of the city or elsewhere.

Prabhupada: Yes. [break] …dependent any condition. We are independent. And you are criticizing. Permit has not been obtained. And if you think that there is no possibility of temple being sanctioned, then we start hotel. [break]

Tamala Krsna: (indistinct)

Prabhupada: All right, that is already there. But if the sanction is not there, what we will do? Keep the land vacant? [break] That I am trying to get sanction, “Is it all right.” If you don’t, then hotel.

Tamala Krsna: Otherwise build a hotel in the front and a temple in the rear.

Prabhupada: Yes.

Tamala Krsna: And then it satisfies both. [break]

Prabhupada: No. The same view. Eh?

Devotee: Yeah. [break]

Prabhupada: One man’s walking, Letchmore Heath.

Devotee: Like this.

Prabhupada: It is like this. Atmosphere is little different. It was cold out. The sky is not so clear. Otherwise, land view is the same. [break]

Pusta Krsna: Remembering that Krsna’s here.

Prabhupada: Eh?

Pusta Krsna: There’s always the memory that Krsna’s here.

Prabhupada: Yes, Krsna is everywhere.

Satsvarupa: When Prabhupada was walking in Letchmore Health, he said, “This looks like Govardhana Hill.”

Prabhupada: Yes, yes.

Bicyclist: (ringing bell) Hare Krsna! Hare Krsna! Hare Krsna!

Prabhupada: Hare Krsna.

Devotee: It’s like you said last night. They begin to chant.

Prabhupada: Yes.

Guru dasa: Do the rickshaw drivers in Letchmore Heath chant Hare Krsna?

Prabhupada: No, they were sleeping. (laughter) That is western. Here you will find even the old man rises early in the morning. Yes, take bath. Without any reference to Hare Krsna. They chant Hare Krsna. In the village, they take bath early in the morning. That is very healthy. [break] …I have generally… (indistinct) (heavy wind noise)

Satsvarupa: Mixed with moisture?

Prabhupada: That I do not know. The scientists say that it is a blazing fire, sun planet. Fire is generally red color with little yellow. Why it is white? We have no experience of fire, white. So how do they say it is fire? That is my question. [break] …tell me what blue I have seen. Red I have seen. Where is white?

Guru dasa: (indistinct) the sun is a reflection of the brahmajyoti?

Prabhupada: That is another. First of all, you answer whether it is fire or something else. [break]

Satsvarupa: …dew.

Prabhupada: Where is the moisture? It is clear shine. Where is the moisture? [break] (laughter) It is not fire. It is a brilliant body. It is not fire. [break]

Satsvarupa: …body of Vivasvan?

Prabhupada: Whole planet, I mean the population, they’re so bright.

Satsvarupa: Sometimes in your lectures you explain the living entities can live there because they have bodies of fire.

Prabhupada: Fiery. Not fire.

Guru dasa: Fiery.

Prabhupada: Because there is heat and brightness, therefore they can say fire. Just like, what is called, diamond. Diamond looks like, bright, like this beautiful. But that is not fire. Diamond, real diamond, you keep in dark room; it will be light. But that is not fire.

Devotee: Effulgent.

Prabhupada: Yes. Bright. Brightness. (heavy wind noise) [break]

Devotee: That stars?

Prabhupada: Stars? They are planets like this planet. Like moon planet, the moon planet. Naksatranam aham sasi. The stars, they are so many moons, not suns. They say “sun.” And we say, “No, it is moon.” Sun is only one. In each universe there is one sun, but there are many planets like moons.

Tamala Krsna: Reflections.

Prabhupada: Reflection. We get it from Bhagavad-gita. Naksatranam aham sasi. (heavy wind noise) [break] …due to the sun, reflect.

Guru dasa: Why does the moon reflect? They say the moon is sandy, but this sand here is not reflecting.

Prabhupada: That… They are not going to the moon planet. They are going to some other planet, Rahu planet.

Guru dasa: Rahu?

Prabhupada: Yes. There are many planets invisible. So there is a Rahu planet which comes in front of the moon planet, and that is called eclipse. So there is a planet rotating. I think they are going to that Rahu planet, not to the moon planet.

Hamsaduta: How can they make such a mistake?

Prabhupada: Eh?

Hamsaduta: How is it that they made such a big mistake?

Prabhupada: Their whole life is mistake. (laughter) They cannot do anything but mistake. Why you are so much confident about that? Their whole life is simply mistake.

Pusta-krsna: Prabhupada, they see a little fire, and they see that it has heat and light, and so they see a huge thing having heat and light, and so they conclude that that’s also a fire. So if that’s their deductive method, then if they see that whenever there’s intelligence, there must be a person, then why don’t they conclude that behind the universe, there’s so many wonderful things, that there must also be a person?

Prabhupada: Yes, we say there are persons, combination of fiery persons. Therefore it looks so bright.

Aksayananda: Is the brightness of a diamond because of the presence of a jiva?

Prabhupada: Eh?

Aksayananda: The brightness…? No.

Prabhupada: Suppose you get a diamond body. Just like glowworm. Glowworm, it has a glowing body. That’s all. But the glowing substance is different from the soul. Owner of the body is different. What he’s doing? [break] …came other day, morning?

Guest: (indistinct) [break]

Prabhupada: …have purchase this land for him for preaching Christian Bible. So he, maybe he was getting some salary on this land in this way. He gave up Gaudiya Matha association and he became Christian. So I know that this land belonged to him. His wife was there.

Tamala Krsna: In Allahabad.

Prabhupada: Maybe at Allahabad. He’s the proprietor. He was Mr. Cakravarti. (end)