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by Govinda dasi ACBSP |
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Since Srila Prabhupada's stroke the previous year he always
regularly took Ayurvedic medicine. He brought with him a supply
of medicine when he returned from Vrindavana and then Acyutananda
who was still in India would regularly send medicine to him as
well as some particular nuts from India called parayalyche (?)
These nuts had to be grounded to powder and they were as hard
as bricks and they had to be mixed with his medicine. So Gaurasundara
would sit regularly with mortar and pestle and grind these nuts
into powder; then 3 mornings a week Gaurasundara would grind
Srila Prabhupada's medicine along with the nuts. It consisted
of all these little herbs and Prabhupada also mentioned there
was gold in his medicine. It was a time consuming task - the
grinding of these little brick-like nuts which Gaurasundara did
regularly, and Srila Prabhupada often said this Ayurvedic medicine
was helping him, and because Gaurasundara and I were taking care
of Srila Prabhupada, giving him medicine, trying to take care
of all his needs and running errands we naturally were a bit
over-protective. Sometimes in my overprotective mood I would
mother him a bit and he would say jokingly to me: "Physician
heal thyself" since I was always sickly. "You first
heal yourself", he would quip in a loving fatherly fashion
but the big problem came when he would stay up late with guests
preaching. Srila Prabhupada loved to preach and if someone wanted
to hear about Krsna he would continue on and on, often late into
the night. But then, unknown to that person who had stayed late,
the next day Srila Prabhupada would feel headachy and ill and
tell me: "Oh, Govinda dasi, I should take rest earlier.
I should not over-exert like this". So I would be distressed
to see him feeling ill and then try to curtail his late evening
programs. Yet, when I would try to remind him or whisper to the
devotees: "Its night, it's late, come on out now",
he would usually insist on continuing. So in that sense it was
a difficult job to try to remind him not to over-exert but to
also be the one who was the party pooper or the bouncer. Perhaps
that was the most difficult job for me in my life with Srila
Prabhupada in the year and a few months that we spent with him.
Yet I am still grateful for that service to Srila Prabhupada
and I thank him to this day. Thank you, Srila Prabhupada for
giving me the opportunity to mother you, take care of you and
give you your medicine. Thank you for giving me the opportunity
to be your bouncer even though a lot of devotees were very offended
and I humbly request that any devotees who felt offended will
please forgive me for I was only trying to do my job of keeping
our spiritual master well so that he could do his work. Thank
you, Srila Prabhupada for your grace on me, thank you for coming
and thank you for coming back after your illness and tolerating
so much inconvenience to preach in the Western world, even not
being able to get your parayaliche (barayalyche??) nuts from
India which was always an ongoing problem. Thank you, Srila Prabhupada. |
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