Life until that moment was vaguely ordered, modestly tranquil, except perhaps for my 18-year old preoccupation with hard-core music. Ach! What's this younger generation coming to? 20 hours later, British Airways hurled me abruptly into the unapologetic squalor of Calcutta. Streets were thick with Bengali blacktop. a brown-grey sludge from monsoon rains. It was hard to know if the pockmarked roadways and rickety bric-a-brac shops were half built with the stuff or half demolished by it.

Participating in ISKCON Calcutta's Maha Vyasa-puja - a celebration of the 100th Anniversary of Srila Prabhupada's birth- was total immersion. The ISKCON Calcutta devotees had labored intensely to prepare a celebration in the city's largest indoor stadium. With crowds of 10,000 anticipated each day over the two-day event, ISKCON's efforts were visible everywhere. Huge full-color billboards line the main roads of the city. Full-page ads announced the event in local newspapers. And the stadium itself was a metropolis of enterprise - there was the construction of elaborate arches with more than one million flowers being threaded into garlands and the fabrication of hug floral art designed to line the stadium walls. 

The task was gargantuan. Srila Prabhupada is Calcutta's native son, the local who made it big in America. Calcutta wanted a celebration with teeth..."Don't spend your money to bore us," one life-member bluntly put it. Because Srila Prabhupada was for Bengali life-members the greatest Bengali who had ever lived, they wanted to see the stars, to be wowed, to feel the sensation of His Diving Grace's greatness. The pressure to deliver was gruelling. It would have been a staggering endeavor even under normal circumstances. But the devotees were still exhausted from having successfully organized the precious months's mammoth Rathayatra festival.

But they did it. Despite occasional confusion over which guest or which performance came next, the devotees celebrated Srila Prabhupada's achievements in perfect vaisnava form.

Each of the two days events began with mangal-acarana - recitation of prayers to invoke auspiciousness. The Mayapur Bhajana Band kept things lively, and every moment provided some amazing surprise. The morning of the first day was reserved for the 1,000 devotees who had come from all over the world. As master of ceremonies, I had the honor of interviewing each of the devotee speakers and introducing their achievements to the assembled vaisnavas. Niranjan Prabhu kindly helped me keep the order straight and brought each speaker up to the stage. "Who's next?" "Vrndavana Candra." "Who's that?" "Srila Prabhupada's son." I turned around and must have embarrassed him by staring so hard. Vrndavana Candra is a sincere, soft spoken gentleman. The attention he gets, the prying looks, the expectations - "Does he look like Prabhupada? Does his voice sound the ?" - are unfair, and in hi comments Vrndavana Candra admitted to having been nervous about appearing on stage before so many of his father's adoring followers, but he was eloquent and composed and spoke lovingly of how as a child he would go with his father on pilgrimage to India's many holy places. I listened and watched bug- eyed.

The time came for the bathing of Srila Prabhupada. Conchshells sounded, auspicious hymns vibrated off the cavernous walls of the stadium, and crystal waters from 1,008 sacred kunds, rivers and sarovaras began to flow over the murti of Srila Prabhupada. Everything seemed to go into slow motion. The crowd surged forward, desperate for a drop of the liberation-bestowing water, but there was no panic, no mad rush. The sacred waters cascaded down Srila Prabhupada beautiful form slowly, as if defying gravity to relish longer their contact with him. This abhiseka was the culmination, an affirmation of Caitanya Mahaprabhu's prophecy, an acknowledgement of Srila Prabhupada as the great soul, who Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura had predicted. Time/s grip appeared to slacken for the moment, just to let this offering last a little longer.

After two days of hosting two such 13-hour programs, I physically felt nothing. I was numb. Even the sciatic nerve in my leg had taken a hike - a miracle!

However, emotionally, I was overwhelmed. I felt like an interlope in the spotlight that rightfully needed to shine on the devotees who had labored for months and years to pull off this stunning demonstration of love for Srila Prabhupada. Let the true sons and daughters step forward and be recognized.

The list of worthy servants who helped put the event together could fill a book. Driving down the stress of his city, his starting place, and meeting people who knew him, then provided palpable points of reference for the life story I had studied since joining Krsna consciousness in 1969. he was sent by Krsna. But here entrenched in the sights and smell he knew growing up, seeing the goats led down the street to slaughter - the sight of which he would write in books then unpublished - the impulse to imagine what it was like on a human level was irresistible, and I think now with pride he really did it. He took the order of Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati to heart, left this place, and spiritually resuscitated the entire planet.

The question which his achievement implicitly poses is this. By what right do we conclude, by what criteria dare we decide - this is my limit? That this is all I am capable of doing, all anyone should ever expect from me. Compared to what he went through, our job is a cakewalk. He took responsibility for the really tough part, bulldozed a path in the wilderness, laid down the bricks and mortar. Then when there was a comfortable place for his followers to sit, he patiently explained that there is no attachment too strong, no hurdle too high, no habit too deeply ingrained for anyone to declare "Not possible for me, at least not in this lifetime." Krsna consciousness can be achieved. He requested it, and it was not an unreasonable request. He provided us with the tools to do it. For me the proof was all around, in the hundreds of blissful faces of first, second, and third generation disciples who had gathered for the celebration.

If confirmation were needed that Prabhupada's power was growing, no diminishing since his departure, Krsna sent it as I sat writing this article in the Amsterdam airport waiting for my connecting flight. In the corner of the waiting room, a television played. Looking up, I gazed at the screen and a grin broke out on my face. "Music Mania, " Holland, was featuring a rock video by a devotee band, shaved heads, tulasi mala and all. The footage included a scene of an old man walking behind a hill and emerging on the other side as a young child. Thousands dancing to the maha-mantra sung to the hard-core Krsna-core rhythms...Ach! What's this younger generation coming to?