The magic of Sankirtan
I was distributing books on Queen street, Auckland’s main CBD shopping street for a short time before driving to Hamilton another city outside of Auckland.
There is many places that a book distributor or street collector could stand and I choose a strip which would be handy for my husband to pull up and pick me up. Although there was another girl at this spot distributing flyers for ‘Uber eats’ I didn’t fancy moving as it also seemed to be a good spot for the sun rays which on this colder day was appealing.
So here I was basically back to back with the Uber eats girl. We exchanged a respectful hello and both continued with our mission, beside each other. I figured she knew the book distributors and the books having seen us on Queen St while doing her flyer distribution.
After a couple hours of no books going out I thought to see what my friend’s flyers were about and how she came to get her job. As soon as she started responding I recognised her accent as being Russian. Turns out Anna is from Vladivostok the city where Bhaktine Liliya in Wellington is from and also the closest city to my husband’s home town and where we had stayed in the ISKCON temple for a couple nights a few years back.
We made that connection which softened us both up to each other then she in turn asked me what I was doing. On explaining the books to Anna she revealed she was doing Yoga and was quite interested in the books. Funnily enough just that morning I had said to Ananta naga that I should
probably put another Russian Gita back into my book box as now I had a German and French Gita and Chinese books thanks to BBT Sydney so at least I should have something for the Russians. Prior I always carried a Russian Gita but had distributed a copy a month back and hadn’t put a new one in. Anna was surprised to hear that I just put the Russian Gita in my box this morning and happily received the copy and gave some laxmi for it. Then she continued to distribute Uber eats flyers with the Gita tucked under her arm. She was happy to have a quick chat with Ananta naga when he came to collect me.
Your servant,
Gokula lila dd
