“Salted Bread”
Sri Sri Guru Gaurangau Jayatah
Please accept my humble obeisances. All glories to Srila Prabhupada.
Recently, I read a book "Salted Bread", which speaks about difficulties and struggles of Krishna's devotees in the early days of our movement in the former Soviet Union. "Salted Bread" is a great source of inspiration for all book distributors who are daily meeting different challenges. It is especially effective for preaching to our rascal, ever complaining mind, because we can understand that our difficulties are nothing in comparison to what these great souls went through. They were all 22, 23 years old boys who sacrificed their lives for spreading Krishna consciousness by book distribution. Thanks to them, there are so many temples all over Russia.
It seems that many devotees have not read the book yet. Many senior devotees have recommended this great book. Below there are three sections which especially touched our hearts.
Your servant, Vasudeva Datta dasa
Sarvabhavana Prabhu at the Police station, p. 122
At that point, three large, muscular men started to kick me as if I was a ball. My nose was bleeding until I could not feel it any more. Then they asked me to stand up, which I did. One of them took hold of my ear and took me close to the metal door and asked me to place my fingers between the door hinges. I refused to do so. He then asked help from the other man, who placed my eight fingers there and started to close the door slowly while screaming into my ear, "Where are the books hidden, who is printing them, and where?" I do not remember what exactly happened after that, but after I came back to consciousness, I noticed that all my fingers were cracked and bleeding. While I was lying down there one of them took electric heater and brought it close to my face and screamed at me, "So now we will cook you, man! Let's see who is who, we will eat you up okay?!" My face and nose were burning. I closed my eyes so they would not be burned. Then another man came and asked the first man to take the heater away. I was screaming and trying to tolerate the pain. Two men took hold of my arms and took me to the bathroom and asked me to wash myself quickly. I looked myself in the mirror and closed my eyes immediately. I was all bloody and swollen and bruised. I had seen a face resembling that in the movies, but not in real life, especially not my own!
Sacisuta Prabhu's glorious departure in the prison cell, p. 240 (Told by one non-devotee co-prisoner)
"One morning, he was feeling better and asked me for a favour. He asked me if I could shave his head and leave a little bit of hair on the top at the back. I asked him why he wanted that, but he did not explain anything. 'Just do what I say, please,' he replied." The man then described how he had shaved Sacisuta's head, and then Sacisuta managed to take a shower somehow in the narrow toilet, and then cover himself with a clean bed sheet tied as a dhoti. He made a nice garland by stringing some coloured papers torn from magazines and used toothpaste to make tilak marks on his body. After that, he sat in a lotus yoga position and chanted Hare Krishna as usual on his bread beads, while looking at the Panca Tattva and Harikesa Swami's small picture in his left hand. "He was happier than usual, and I was very happy to see him in that mood, thinking that he was recovering and feeling better. I was very sick as well at that time," the man continued, so a guard took me out of the cell to give me my daily injections. It took hardly twenty minutes. When I came back, I saw that Sacisuta was still in the same place in the same way, and it looked as if he was chanting. I lay down on my bed and read newspaper. After a while, I noticed that Sacisuta was not chanting, but simply sitting and smiling. I asked him why he was not chanting but smiling, but he did not reply. I asked him that again and again, and I asked him different questions. But he was silent. I stood up and came close to him then. I pushed him gently and asked, "Why are you smiling, my friend, and not talking?"
"Then I understood that he was not there, or that the soul was no longer there, as he would have said. I screamed and banged on the door. With tears in my eyes, I told the guards that they killed this innocent boy! They came and took his body after some time, and I never saw him again. I do not know who Sacisuta was and who you people are! I do not believe in God, but I would like to die just like your friend died right in front of my eyes! He is a hero to me, and all my life I will remember him, all my life! He was an extraordinary and pure person."
First visit of Russian devotees to India p. 253
Soon our bus took off towards the Radha Govinda Temple in Kolkata, which was the first real temple we had ever seen. At the temple, there was another super ecstatic kirtana and reception waiting for us, and thousands of flowers fell from the balcony on all the devotees. We slowly came up the stairs and entered the temple. The entire scene mad a great impression on all of us. This was the first time we ever had an opportunity to see such beautiful Deities and altar. The moonlike faces of Radha and Govinda were smiling at all of us as if to say, "Finally you are home. There is no KGB here, so please chant and dance as much as you like."
I can never forget the taste of my first charanamrita and maha-prasadam from Radha-Govinda. Lord Jagannatha's big beautiful smiling eyes were looking at us, as if He were about to jump from the altar to take part in the heavenly kirtana. After a while one devotee pulled my hand and dragged me to the Lord Jagannath Deities to show me the tears that were dripping from the Lord's eyes, shining like diamonds and slowly coming down His cheek.
Finally, Kirtiraj Prabhu came into the temple room, and with a microphone, asked all the devotees to stop kirtana and come to the balcony for lunch prasadam. Krishna Kumar Prabhu, who was Kirtiraj's right-hand man, was translating everything into Russian for all of us. But the kirtana was going on in such a powerful way, like it would never end, that no one could stop it. It took them many announcements to stop the kirtana and start to serve prasadam.
Sankirtan Yajna ki Jay!
