Early in 1967, several of Srila Prabhupada's disciples left New York and opened a temple in the heart of San Francisco's Haight-Ashbury district, home for thousands of hippies and "flower children" from all over the country. Within a short time, Srila Prabhupada's temple there had become a spiritual haven for troubled, searching, and sometimes desperate young people. Drug overdoses were common, and hundreds of confused, dazed, and disenchanted young Americans roamed the streets.
Haridasa, the first president of the San Francisco temple, remembers what it was like.
Haridasa:
I think it saved a lot of lives; there might have been a lot more casualties if it hadn't been for Hare Krsna. It was like opening a temple in a battlefield. It was the hardest place to do it, but it was the place where it was most needed. Although the Swami had no precedents for dealing with any of this, he applied the chanting with miraculous results. The chanting was wonderful. It worked.
Michael Bowen, an artist and one of the leading figures of the Haight-Ashbury scene, recalled that Srila Prabhupada had "an amazing ability to get people off drugs, especially speed, heroin, burnt-out LSD cases-all of that.
Every day at the temple devotees cooked and served to over two hundred young people a free, sumptuous multi-course lunch of vegetarian food offered to Krsna. Many local merchants helped to make this possible by donating to the cause. An early San Francisco devotee recalls those days.
]People who were plain lost or needed comforting ... sort of wandered or staggered into the temple. Some of them stayed and became devotees, and some just took Harsarani
The sacred sound reinforced the spiritual mood of the temple and helped to ease the tensions and frustrations of its young guests.Throughout lunch, devotees played the New York recording of Srila Prabhupada chanting the Hare Krsna
Sunday, January 29, 1967 marked the major spiritual event of the San Francisco hippy era, and Srila Prabhupada, who was ready to go anywhere to spread Krsna consciousness, was there. The Grateful Dead, Moby Grape, Janis Joplin and Big Brother and the Holding Company, Jefferson Airplane, Quicksilver Messenger Service-all the new-wave San Francisco bands-had agreed to appear with Srila Prabhupada at the Avalon Ballroom's Mantra-Rock Dance, proceeds from which would go to the local Hare Krsna temple.
Thousands of hippies, anticipating an exciting evening, packed the hall. LSD pioneer Timothy Leary dutifully paid the standard $2.50 admission fee and entered the ballroom, followed by Augustus Owsley Stanley II, known for his own brand of LSD.
in the early morning at the Radha-Krsna temple was an important community service to those who were "coming down from LSD," because the chanting would "stabilize their consciousness on reentry."and how it had spread from the small storefront in New York to San Francisco. The well-known poet told the crowd that the chanting of the Hare Krsna At about 10:00 P.M., Srila Prabhupada and a small entourage of devotees arrived amid uproarious applause and cheering by a crowd that had waited weeks in great anticipation for this moment. Srila Prabhupada was given a seat of honor onstage and was introduced by Allen Ginsberg, who explained his own realizations about the Hare Krsna
By the time Srila Prabhupada stood and began to dance with his arms raised, the crowd was completely absorbed in chanting, dancing, and playing small musical instruments they had brought for the occasionthroughout the ballroom, enveloping everyone. Hippies got to their feet, held hands, and began to dance as enormous, pulsing pictures of Krsna were projected around the walls of the ballroom in perfect sync with the beat of the The chanting started slowly but rythmically, and little by little it spread
.
Ginsberg later recalled, "We sang Hare Krsna all evening. It was absolutely great-an open thing. It was the height of the Haight-Ashbury spiritual enthusiasm."
only a few weeks before. The chant rose; it seemed to surge and swell without limit. When it seemed it could go no further, the chanting stopped. Srila Prabhupada offered prayers to his spiritual master into the microphone and ended-by saying three times, "All glories to the assembled devotees!" The Haight-Ashbury neighborhood buzzed with talk af the Mantra-Rock Dance for weeks afterward.as the amateur musicians had been at the Tompkins Square As the tempo speeded up, the chanting and dancing became more and more intense, spurred on by a stageful of top rock musicians, who were as charmed by the magic of the
on a daily basis. In just a few years, temples were opening all over North America and Europe, and people everywhere were hearing the chanting of Hare Krsna.(hand cymbals) to chant the (clay drums) and Within a few months of the Mantra-Rock event, devotees in San Francisco, New York, and Montreal began to take to the streets with their
included exuberant choruses of the Hare Krsna and a hit single, "The Hare Krishna Mantra," produced in September of the same year by Beatle George Harrison and featuring the devotees, introduced millions to the chanting. Even Broadway's long-running musical hit instruments and sing on John and Yoko's famous recording "Give Peace a Chance." This song, which included the On May 31, 1969, when the Vietnam war protest movement was reaching its climax, six devotees joined John Lennon and Yoko Ono in their Montreal hotel room to play throughout the day and distributed "The Peace Formula," a small leaflet based on Srila Prabhupada's teachings from the Vedic scriptures. "The Peace Formula," which proposed a spiritual solution to the problem of war, was distributed en masse for many months and influenced thousands of lives.
At the now historic mass antiwar demonstration in Washington, D.C., on November 15, 1969, devotees from all over the United States and Canada chanted the Hare Krsna with musical instruments, were now a familiar sight in almost every major city throughout the world.
Because of Srila Prabhupada's deep love for Lord Krsna and his own spiritual master, his amazing determination, and his sincere compassion, "Hare Krsna" had become a household word.
- Chant and be happy (Chapter 3)
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