By Ramesh Kallidai
500 people from different regions of Britain attended the colourful festival to inaugurate the Hare Krishna Centre. The Centre features a large mantra meditation hall and prayer room, a traditional altar with Panca-Tattva deities, a library, gift shop and Swansea’s only 100% vegetarian restaurant called Govindas.
Hundreds of elegant women clad in colourful Indian sarees and men in traditional Indian dhoti-robes danced and sang at the arati ceremony when Deities of Lord Chaitanya and his associates were installed by His Holiness Sivarama Swami Maharaja, Governing Body Commissioner of ISKCON.
Sivarama Swami explained that Swami Srila Prabhupada, the Founder of ISKCON had established many temples around the world. Srila Prabhupada had encouraged the opening of preaching centres with restaurants and libraries to spread the glories of Vedic culture across the globe.
The Centre was the brainchild of Welsh-born Hare Krishna devotee, Tarakanatha Dasa. “One of our ISKCON sannyasis, Devamrita Swami actually told me that this Centre was organically grown in South Wales,” he smiled, referring to the fact that all volunteers and monks at the Centre were from Swansea and local areas.
Activities at the Centre include mantra meditation classes, daily lectures on Srimad Bhagavatam and Bhagavad-gita, a Sunday feast, cultural programmes, and celebration of traditional festivals like Janmashtami, Rama Navami, Diwali and Dusshera.
As the devotees started singing beautiful bhajans a busload of Indians from Cardiff arrived and joined the festivities.
Sri Radha Raman Dasa, a Vedic priest conducted a traditional fire yajna, using orthodox procedures that involved mudras (hand gestures), metre-tuned mantras and oblations of ghee.
The ceremony concluded with a grand vegetarian feast cooked by volunteers.
Manoj Dubey, a visitor from London said, “The delicious feast cooked by Nimai Prabhu and other volunteers brought a smile of satisfaction on the lips of every single person who came to the festival.”
As I sat down to eat, I was suddenly accosted by a suave Welsh gentleman, who seemed vaguely familiar.
“Do you recognise me?” he asked with a wide grin, just as I realised he had asked me the world’s most dreaded question.
I racked my mind to find out where I had met him before, just as my brain did a short-circuit, and went blank. I looked back at his expectant face with eyes empty of expression and a mouth full of paneer-sabji.
“I met you at Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, where we were both learning Sanskrit,” he exclaimed, after he realised my memory was not as brilliant as he had imagined.
“Oh, I do remember now,” I said with unaccustomed ease, even though I couldn’t remember a single thing.
“I am from Wales,” he explained. “And I think this temple opening is the most auspicious thing that has happened to Swansea in the last 5000 years.”
I had no reason to disagree with him and continued an animated discussion on teaching styles for learning Sanskrit.
In the evening, Swansea bay took on a look of novelty. The sun-bathers lounging in the hot weather were delighted to see saree-clad and dhoti-draped devotees sweeping nonchalantly through their beaches, chanting seriously on their rosary beads.
“Are these people from the Harrys – the Harry Krishnas?” enquired a gray-haired lady I had met earlier at the hotel I was staying in.
“They have nothing to do with the imaginary world of Harry Potter,” I replied rather cheekily. “You see, they have just come down from the spiritual world.”
I beat a hasty retreat before she could beat my head in.