Room Conversation

Prabhupāda: ...so small fly, and they can come so far only for that light.

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: What do they see in that light? Their death.

Prabhupāda: That is material world. [break]

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: Actually, as I could see in that building, the kitchen is nearly completed. So even if they have not completely opened that building, still, if the kitchen is completed, they can begin to cook there immediately. Why should they wait two or three months? The storeroom is a storeroom. That can be used immediately and put strong locks, and one man is in charge, and he has a register, coming in, going out.

Prabhupāda: No different store? No different...

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: No different store?

Prabhupāda: Two servants always cleansing. As soon as somebody eats, the servant cleanses the place, take the plates and washes, return to kitchen. You have seen cut rows, wood. Devotees have seen. You can purchase. Engage one wood cutter. Then that will be... Everything can be arranged. Simply good management. Sleeping management will not help. And everyone... Such a big hall. Everyone should eat.

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: What, Śrīla Prabhupāda?

Prabhupāda: Such a big dining hall. The other day they were showing, "Here is the sign. Here is the sign." So let them be utilized. Simply showing it?

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: [loud clanking in background] This kind of sound spoils the whole peacefulness of this guesthouse, this kitchen. And it starts from early in the morning, at 5:30.

Prabhupāda: It is disturbing to me. Where is guest?

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: Actually they do have a number of guests here. They're having about twenty...

Prabhupāda: That's all right. Welcome. But no cooking there.

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: No. No, that's cleared up. Immediately we can start using that hall for feeding our meal. Actually there's no reason why certain parts of that building can't be utilized now, not just sit. On one day there has to be some, you know... We may have that to show opening ceremony, but still, certain places can be utilized ahead of time. Just like they're using some of the...

Prabhupāda: No, opening ceremony... Gurukula is going on.

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: Yeah. Some of the offices are already being utilized. So the dining hall can be utilized and the kitchen floor.

Prabhupāda: That offices I cannot understand. There is no management; then office. Big, big office, but no management. All bogus. Office means manager. But there is no manager, and the office. Office, what does it mean, office?

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: Good manager.

Prabhupāda: That's all. But if there is no good management, where is the use of office? Simply occupying seats? Management is... I have told him that. And he has brought some management. But there is no one. Just like government, the Filing Center, the Filing Center. Where is the file? Nobody knows. This is going on. What can I do? How the things are being done finally, nobody knows. But it is informed. "I am informing." Is it not? Anyway...

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: I was... Actually, I was also thinking about this management this morning. That's why when you called me I didn't come immediately. I was with Akṣayānanda Mahārāja.

Prabhupāda: Akṣayānanda waiting for another man, and he is waiting for another man. And nobody comes. That's all. You are finished: "I am waiting for another..." And he'll be finished: "I am waiting for another." And he's finished: "I am waiting for..." Bās, finished business. There is no such arrangement that things are going on very nicely, automatically. That is management. Anyway... Every dining, every cooking should be there. First of all manage this. And cooking should be done in good place. Bās.

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: This dining hall has been built here. They have a dining hall...

Prabhupāda: That can be used for other purpose.

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: It shouldn't be used for the...?

Prabhupāda: No, one dining... That.

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: Devotees and paying guests...

Prabhupāda: Ah, yes. No separate. One dining hall.

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: 'Cause in Māyāpur the people who live in the guesthouse, they get served in the guesthouse.

Prabhupāda: You have dining place here.

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: You said that a high-class person should be served where he's...

Prabhupāda: No, who is high class, low class? Everyone.

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: If they can bring the prasāda from the cooking arrangement there to over here, it's all right if they serve them here? 'Cause I think the guests prefer that they can eat in this guesthouse.

Prabhupāda: Yes, that plates can be brought.

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: Yeah. So we'll see to that first of all.

Prabhupāda: One store, one kitchen, one dining room. Bās. Not separate.

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: Not separate dining hall.

Prabhupāda: That is not management. Such a big hall, such a big kitchen, sufficient. If some special per..., it can be done in that kitchen.

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: In that big kitchen.

Prabhupāda: Hmm.

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: Yes.

Prabhupāda: After all, a man will cook. So he'll cook there.

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: What about the fact that the guests eat different prasāda than devotees?

Prabhupāda: Then go there.

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: And we'll serve them different types of foodstuffs.

Prabhupāda: Hmm.

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: Devotees will get one kind of food and the guests will get a different kind.

Prabhupāda: Yes. They can prepare there. What for that separate kitchen?

Tamāla Kṛṣṅa: No, there's no reason.

Prabhupāda: Separate cooking may be made... [break] ...cannot. Simply they have... Even cheap people goes there. What they have done? Tell me that "This they have done, very beneficial to the human society." What they have done?

Śatadhanya: They say that they are curing disease.

Prabhupāda: Disease? So what is the benefit? One disease after another disease...

Śatadhanya: They say that the life-span is getting more years.

Prabhupāda: That is another bluff. Formerly people used to live very long. Actually even in this Kali-yuga the limitation is one hundred years. But who is living one hundred years?

Śatadhanya: Even less.

Prabhupāda: Fifty, sixty... Average India, thirty-five years. In your country a little more. Nobody lives hundred years. That is also another bluff. But even if you live for hundred years, does it mean that you have stopped death? Then what is the benefit? You are eternal. Na jāyate na mriyate vā, na hanyate hanyamāne śarīre [Bg 2.20]. You are eternal, but why you are dying? What the scientists have done? Na jāyate na mriyate. Eternal means one who has no birth, no death. But you have birth and death, so where is your scientists' help?

Upendra: The reason the original faith was placed in the scientists was because radio, airplanes, tape recorders have been manufactured, and people are impressed by these originally.

Prabhupāda: So what is the benefit? Without radio, people were dying, or with radio they are not living?

Upendra: They say they are living more comfortably.

Prabhupāda: Nonsense comfortably... [laughs] They have changed the season? Is it comfortable? We have to take this cooling machine. What is the practical benefit? You can say that it is comfortable. That's all right. But that does not mean that you have moved the uncomfortable situation. You are struggling against. That much you can take credit. Real benefit is not there. That is stated in the Bhagavad-gītā: janma-mṛtyu-jarā-vyādhi [Bg 13.9].

[Humility, pridelessness, nonviolence, tolerance, simplicity, approaching a bona fide spiritual master, cleanliness, steadiness and self-control; renunciation of the objects of sense gratification, absence of false ego, the perception of the evil of birth, death, old age and disease; nonattachment to children, wife, home and the rest, and evenmindedness amid pleasant and unpleasant events; constant and unalloyed devotion to Me, resorting to solitary places, detachment from the general mass of people; accepting the importance of self-realization, and philosophical search for the Absolute Truth—all these I thus declare to be knowledge, and what is contrary to these is ignorance.]

Real unhappiness is that you are "Why I am struggling? I don't want death." Actually, why I am taking massage and so on, so on? So that I may not die. So where is the scientists' guarantee, "No, you'll not die"? Has he any...? You'll struggle only. That's all. The scientists cannot guarantee, "No, you'll not die." That is real guarantee. "You'll die comfortably." Hmm? Die comfortably. Now there is no appetite. Where is the scientist, assuring, "Take"? What actual benefit they have done? They are giving some... Nothing they have given. It is simply bluff. Things without which we could do, such things are there. There were no motorcars. There was horse carriage and bullock carriage. Things were going on. Not that without this horseless motorcar society would have been vanquished. No. There are other alternatives. Rather, they were complicated. As soon as you ride on a car, there is anxiety, especially in your country, so many cars. When you ride on a car, full of anxiety. At any moment there may be accident. It is not comfortable. If you are full of anxiety... Aeroplane may be. At any moment you can die. It is your time only. They're going in good faith: "I shall go there." But before rising to the sky, finished, crash. So many aeroplane has been... So where is the comfort? As soon as you get on the aeroplane, you are in full anxiety that at any moment there may be crash. Is it not? Then where is comfort? Real comfort is without anxiety. That is real comfort. Cāṅakya Paṅḍita has given, real comfort means arni akyavad[?]: "One who is not out of home and one who has no debts, he is happy." Nowadays people are going out of home, and everyone is debtor to the bank and so many... The economic machine is so made that one is put always in debts for some so-called comfort, and he's full of anxiety. The whole month you have to work to pay debts. [end]