In the Caitanya Caritamrta, there is a description of a Ratha car that Krsnadas Kaviraja says was “as high as Mount Sumeru.” In the purport, Srila Prabhupada refers to a photograph that appeared in London’s Guardian newspaper, a photo which made the London Rathayatra canopy seem almost as tall at the 170-foot-high Nelson’s Column in Trafalgar Square (CC, Madhya, 13.19). Was the verse an example of hyperbole? Not quite! (Admiral Nelson was a well-known colonizer).

Something we tend to strive for is creativity, sometimes called laterality, ingeniousness, innovation, originality, differentness, inventiveness and uniqueness. Its not unusual to want to be imaginative, singular, and special. This concept was known to Srila Prabhupada. In a now famous letter to Karandhar, he wrote, “our leaders shall be careful not to kill the spirit of enthusiastic service, which is individual and spontaneous and voluntary. They should try always to generate some atmosphere of fresh challenge to the devotees, so that they will agree enthusiastically to rise and meet it. That is the art of management: to draw out spontaneous loving spirit of sacrificing some energy for Krishna. But where are so many expert managers?”

This is not exactly a “Thought for the Day,” but I’d like to recommend – for those who can afford it – “The Complete Prabhupada DVD Library,” an ITV production. It claims to contain the complete film footage of Srila Prabhupada. I have viewed much of it, and can say it’s well worth the money.

It’s comforting to note that Krsna’s Name is non-different from Krsna Himself – that He is so easily accessible. Srila Prabhupada writes, “For example, here in this material world, if we are thirsty and we want water, simply repeating “Water, water, water, water,” will not satisfy our thirst, because this word has not the same potency as water itself. We require the water in substance. Then our thirst will be satisfied. But in the transcendental, absolute world, there is no such difference. Krsna’s name, Krsna’s quality, Krsna’s word-everything is Krsna and provides the same.” (from The Reservoir of Pleasure)

Whether or not this piece ever gets published in the Hindustan Times, I probably won’t know for a while. Nonetheless, I thought the essay suitable to read as a “Thought for the Day.” Here it is: Invisible controllers are at work. They can be reduced to three obvious forces: governments, economics and the intelligentsia. Our lives are not our own. The nation, economics of the day, and the prevailing `intellectual’ climate limit our freedom at every juncture. But there’s a fourth, more insidious influence at work: Hollywood. Entertainment is yet another, more subtle phenomenon that has a way of invading our consciousness; it determines our actions. It tells us what we should be; where to go. It sets our goals; makes us do what our instincts demand, usually that which is daring and cool. James Bond, we loved you! Above and beyond these four, lies the realm of God, millions of light years away, in astronomical language. Billions of miles travelled at the speed of mind, a Vedic philosopher might say. To the behaviourist, the moon is a satellite and heaven is outer space. God is imagined, irrelevant, irrational. Maybe God equals destiny, but in some metaphysical sense, God is inscrutable, and the concept is pigeon-holed as MYSTICAL. Some self-styled people (we may call them behaviourists) considered that they moved earth and sky — like the Man Who Would Be King in the famous Kipling story; they thought they caused the movements of heavenly bodies. They were the centres of their universes. Illusions like this that have kept most of us on the wheel of samsara for aeons and forced us to skate and slither on the rock we call earth. Some, however, feel the presence of this fifth unseen controller, who, as Brahma says, burns up all the karma of those who are imbued with devotion (BRAHMA SAMHITA, 5.54). Such is the awareness of the theist and the seeker.

What most people think are curses-things like disease, old age, loss of loved ones, bad luck, and death-are like blessings to a devotee. The essential verse in this regard is when Queen Kunti prays: “I wish that all those calamities would happen again and again so that we could see You again and again, for seeing You means that we will no longer see repeated births and deaths.” (S.B.1.8.25)

If we consider that ingenuity, creativity, innovation, originality, inventiveness, uniqueness, thoughtfulness, and imagination are often thought to be the mark of all things great and powerful, a Bhagavad-gita verse comes to mind. The verse, 10.41 is: “Know that all opulent, beautiful and glorious creations spring from but a spark of My splendor.” This means that anything superb can only be attributed to Krishna, the original source of anything of unusually high excellence.

In India, two ekadasi days per month as well as many other holidays throughout the year are observed as sacred rituals. This contrasts sharply with Western superstitions and observances, which tend to be bizarre and scary. Indian events, even funerals, tend to be happy, musical and auspicious occasions.

On a morning walk in Durban, Srila Prabhupada spoke about some of the British atrocities committed in India. One was that the British rulers cut off the thumbs of cloth weavers (presumably Gandhi-ites) so their protest against clothes made in Manchester would be undermined.

We in the West have been taught that winter and summer in earthly regions, above and below the equator, occur because the direction of the world’s vertical axis is slightly tipped, the top leaning generally towards the sun in summer and away from it in winter. However Srila Prabhupada, on a walk with Jayadvaita Maharaja, indicated that this is incorrect.