Hi folks!

Just thought I’d let you know that I have a new spiritually-focused blog over at sitproperly.com. The blogging here will continue as normal, I just thought I’d separate some stuff. Even thought about branching out into a music blog, but we shall see.

So to keep up with my dailyish goings ons and happenings like work, scooters, music, movies, bad TV shows and such, stay tuned to littleblackstar.com. For the spiritual stuff, take a walk over to sitproperly.com.

For you folks who follow the feeds at Planet ISKCON, I submitted the new site to the moderator, hopefully they will carry it.

Deal? Deal.

In Krishna consciousness, dreaming about the Krishna is a very auspicious thing. Also in Krishna consciousness, serving the devotees is often seen as more glorious than serving the Lord. So naturally, one can draw the conclusion that my dream about zombies and Madhava Gosh is pretty much as auspicious as I’m going to get.

The setting of this spectacular display of unconscious storytelling was indeed in Madhava Gosh’s house at New Vrndavana. The background was that the movie 28 Days Later was real and parts of it were filmed at New Vrndavana. Being that it was real meant that zombies were real and they were attacking. But these were somehow the zombies left over from filming 28 Days Later.

In this particular movie, the zombies run after you. In traditional zombie movies, the zombies are slow and lumbering. Since I only dream about traditional zombies, this dream nixed the running zombies in favor of the lumbering variety.

The zombies were attacking and entering Madhava Gosh’s house. But we weren’t really all that freaked out. See, these zombies didn’t seem to be too much of a threat to us, only a mere annoyance.

And that’s the feeling throughout the dream. Annoyance. Gosh was directing people through his house so that they could hide from the zombies, but there wasn’t terror. Just annoyance.

I actually woke up a few times annoyed that I was dreaming this and hoping that I wouldn’t fall back asleep and continue with the nocturnal narration. But that thought was soon met with Zzzz’s and it was back to work avoiding the annoying zombies. Clearly, in my half-sleep delirium, I didn’t realize just how incredibly awesome this dream was.

Nobody died or really much noticed that New Vrndavana was overrun with zombies. Yeah, we were annoyed, but ducking upstairs (Gosh’s dream house has a second floor) did the trick.

The zombies got into the house, but the annoyance factor woke me up again and, being 6am-ish, I stayed awake.

It was weird/fun/annoying to see New Vrindaban’s woods and groves crawling with zombies. That makes it.. New Vrin-ZOMBIE!!
Best. Dhama. EVER!

As mentioned, I spent a few days in New Vrndavana for Radhastami. I took a few pictures, which you’ll see below.

It was a great time and Sarah seemed to enjoy it too. Rati and Dwija were wonderful and I even got to meet Dwija’s parents. Woo!

The festival itself seemed pretty dead, though we did our own thing for the feast. But Sri Sri Radha Vrndavana Chandra were, as always, beautiful.

Here are the pictures… (they might look odd if you’re viewing this on Planet ISKCON, not sure – if they do, just go directly to my blog).

And here are Sarah’s pictures and a little write up.

I’m heading, with my friend Sarah, to New Vrndavana for the weekend. We’ll be staying at Rati and Dwija’s, who already have a packed house. I might even be sleeping in a van!

I’m really hoping that this isn’t my last time at NV before moving to Seattle. Hoping that I can get back for five day or a week before I leave at the beginning of October.

And hopefully when I’m in Seattle, I’ll be able to get back to New Vrndavana sometimes. It’s a weird little place and sometimes there is a healthy balance of love and hate, but really, it’s mostly love.

And I guess that’s my post for the day. I’ll send pictures back from New Vrndavana, I bet. Haribol!

This morning Madhava Gosh, Soma and I took a walk behind Rati and Dwija’s at New Vrndavana to the Peter Crow cemetery. Now, while this isn’t a devotee cemetery, it was pretty cool.

Gosh knows I’m a sucker for old cemeteries, so when he asked if I wanted to check it out, I jumped at the chance.

On the walk there, Gosh told me about how they used to plant corn and make hay on surrounding hills. Also, he said that this place was called Mahavana. There are twelve forests in Vrndavana, India and this being New Vrndavana, at one point, the devotees named twelve areas after the forests of Vrndavana.

At New Vrndavana, the best known ones are Bahulavana (where the old temple – but not the old, old temple – is), Talavana, Vrndavana (where the old, old temple is), Madhuvana (where the old Jaganatha temple was – just before you get to the palace). The area where the cemetery lies is Mahavana (meaning “large forest”).

The cemetery was from the early 1800’s and was pretty run down. Neat though. Took a bunch of pics, though my camera was funky. You’ll see.

As we were walking back, I asked Gosh (pronounced “Ghosh,” btw) what the large hill over yonder was. “Govindaji Hill,” he said. There was going to be a temple on the hill, circa 1975. They leveled the ground and even laid a cornerstone with a deity of Ananta-sesa inside of it. But the temple was never built.

I was told to follow the ridge and it would take me there. We counted some cows in a pasture below us and then parted ways. The walk along the ridge was great. Wonderful views. I got a bit winded walking up the hill though it was really worth it. You could see where the ground was level. This would make an amazing place for a temple. Such a shame that they never built it. Of course, by now, it would be abandoned and falling down.

Down from Govindaji Hill was the place where Srila Prabhupada gave his Bhagavat Dharma discourses. I walked down there, passing Sky Bear’s old trailer and outhouse (near the pump house) and walked up a lane to where this white bus that was used for the Rainbow Gatherings. However, it was on this spot where Srila Prabhupada sat. Amazing. Srila Prabhupada was HERE!

There’s a monument to it as well. There are a few monuments around Bahulavana that explain that Srila Prabhupada was here and a bit of what he did.

I then walked down to the Bahulavana, poked my head into the temple and wished that it would somehow all come back. The place is run down and basically beyond repair. Nevertheless, I have an attachment to it that doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. This is New Vrndavana to me. The temple now, even though Radha-Vrndavana Chandra are there, is simply not New Vrndavana to me. I don’t know why though.

Well tomorrow I’m back on the road. The rest was much-needed, but it’s time to get down to it. Tomorrow I ride roughly 325 miles. Luckily it won’t be too cold. I’ll hit some rain and it will take a hell of a long time, but by tomorrow night, I’ll be in a motel in Indiana along US Route 6.

Anyway, I took 108 pictures. Some of them are pretty crap, some of them are lovely.
You can check them out here.

New Vrndavana Accordion Ensemble Reunites for North American Tour

NEW VRNDAVANA, WV — The New Vrndavana Accordion Ensemble announced their first tour in decades Monday at a rehearsal in the Palace Lodge as a throng of fans crowded near the legendary Palace of Gold.

The group, which led the Sunday feast program with a live performance of its hit “In Vrndavana’s Fields and Groves,” officially broke up in 1992, most of the members pursuing solo careers.

Click here to read the exciting news.

Bhaktipada, the guru of New Vrndavana until 1993/94, who seems to have been getting some mention as of late, named many devotees some pretty freaky names (among other freaky things).

In Krishna consciousness, when devotees take initiation, they receive a new name, a name of Krishna with the suffix “das” or “devi dasi” (male or female) which signifies them as a servant of Krishna, God.

So here are a bunch of names that Bhaktipada and his era came up with. These were done after his 1987 expulsion from ISKCON.

This is, of course, not to lessen the horrible and insane evil perpetrated by Bhaktipada while inside and outside of ISKCON. Things like molesting small boys, forcing pre-pubescent girls to marry older men in their 30’s, arranging murders and generally being, well, Bhaktipada.

Keep in mind that many of these devotees are great people. None of the kids had a choice of their names (obviously). This is in no way poking fun at the devotees who received these names.

Please also keep in mind that these lists are not definitive. Names are missing and possibly some other details are incorrect. If you find errors, please leave a message in the comments. Thanks!

At first, like any ISKCON guru, he gave normal names like
Braja Kumari devi dasi
Lokanatha das
Jagannatha das
Remuna devi dasi
Cintamani devi dasi
Daya devi dasi
Yamuna devi dasi
Krsna das

However, he often couldn’t be bothered with the troublesome task of actually picking out his own disciples names, so the older boys in the ashrama (and others) helped pick out the names for him. So if it was someone they didn’t like, they’d pick a typically undesirable name.

At any rate, as the older boys left, the names went downhill.

Kid’s named after food:
Kitri
Jalebi (whose father, long before she was born, was married off by Bhaktipada -while still a “pure devotee” and guru in good standing in ISKCON- to an 11 year old. Bhaktipada’s youngest arranged child marriage was to a 9 year old, again, while still a “pure devotee” and guru in ISKCON.)
Halava
Puri (not the town)
Yogi Bar (there was a Yogi Bar energy bar factory in Gita Nagari)
He also threatened to name Kaladri’s twins “Rice” and “Oatwater”

Sanskrit/English initiation names:
Up until this point, there were varying degrees of normal Hare Krishna names. For some reason, Bhaktipada thought it would be cute to mix East and West. Many of these happened on Christmas Day, 1988, when they installed the Jesus murti next to Srila Prabhupada.

Dutiful Rama
Sita Love
Bhakti Joy
Shanti Peace
Laxmi Honest
Radha Grace
Sachi Hope
Arjun Surrenders
Jesusananda

Kid’s English names
During the Summer of 1988, Bhaktipada began giving newborn children English names.

Joyful
Peaceful
Sweet Sound (a boy whose nickname became “Sweetie”)
Mercy (he may not have named either Mercy’s – there were two – but it was definitely due to his wacky influence)
Zeal
Krishna’s Marathon (seriously, they just called him Marathon for short, but now they call him Martin. He was born and named in 1985 after his mother did really well on the Christmas marathon)
Pious
Harmony

Full English names from initiations
At the next initiation, roughly half a year later, Bhaktipada went full swing with the English names. These continued, interspersed with sanskrit names, through 1994.

Equanimity devi dasi(mother of Zeal)
Gentle Love devi dasi
Faithful Love das
True Love devi dasi
All Love das
Wonderful Love das
Merciful devi dasi
Serene Heart devi dasi
Nectar devi dasi
Spirit Soul das
Truthful das
Serenity devi dasi
Good Hope das
Strong Faith das
Pure Bliss devi dasi
True Peace das
Sister Piety devi dasi
Kind Heart devi dasi
Christian Charity devi dasi
Lasting Peace devi dasi
Joyous devi dasi
Patience das
Faithful das
Careful Love das
Sincere Heart devi dasi
Sincere Praise devi dasi
Humble Heart das (he technically wasn’t given this name at initiation, he already had a nice sanskrit name, but there were confessions at New Vrndavana and he was given this name because his confession was humble. The name didn’t really stick, most devotees went back to calling him by his original sanskrit name.)

Sannyasa English names (anyone know if there were more?)
Peaceful Swami (or Brother Peaceful)
Purity Swami
Devotion Swami

Sannyasini English names (sometimes called “Smommy” hehe – Bhaktipada was initiating women sannyasis as early as 1987)
Eternal Love Swami (the mother of Gentle, Faithful and True Loves)
Holyname Swami
Supreme Truth Swami
Compassionate Swami
Surrender Swami
Steady Swami
Joy Divine Swami

And that’s about all I could come up with (after talking to five or six devotees). If anyone has any other info about initiations or even rumored ritvik initiations, I’d love to hear it.