Srila Prabhupada reportedly had a pampered childhood.
One can get clues by reading the complete edition of Lord Krishna's Cuisine
by Yamuna Devi.
Devi was one of the earliest converts to ISKON and became a personal chef
for Srila Prabhupada.
Devi writes:
Quote
"One of Srila Prabhupada's travelling cooks, Srutakirti Das, told me a story
that confirmed Srila Prabhupada's appreciation of pooris. On an intercontinental flight, Srila Prabhupada was relishing a baasi poori from his lunch box.
"When I was a boy", he said, "my father encouraged my favorite tastes. He would
return home from work long after I had been sent to bed, would wake me up to sit together and relish our favorite combination: hot pooris and hot milk. Up until nearly my twentieth year, I only ate pooris as my bread--I had no taste
for chapatis and practically refused to eat them. It was awkward to go to a
friend's home for prasadam and not eat chapatis if they were served, but
somehow I always managed to avoid having to eat them."
Lord Krishna's Cuisine, by Yamuna Devi, 1987 Bala Books, page 137
(At the end of this essay, there's a footnote describing
pooris. This was no ordinary midnight snack. It was a luxury item.)
If Prabhupada told the truth and did not fantasize, it appears he had a close relationship with his own father.
Making it the more troubling that he taught disciples to withhold affection from their own children.
Here is another anecdote from Lord Krishna's Cuisine. If true, it suggests
that Prabhupada was pampered outside of the family circle.
This story has to do with kachoris - a type of fried pastry.
Quote
"As a child, Srila Prabhupada liked to watch the street vendors cooking on the busy roadside accepted kachoris from them until all the inside and outside pockets of his vest were filled.
"That pastime won him the name "Kachori-mukkhi" or "Kachori-mouth" from his grandmother."
Lord Krishna's Cuisine, page 489.
Readers, look closely at this scene.
If this story is true, young SP was pampered away from home -- with apparent
approval of his grandmother. And given so many fried pastries that his vest pockets were full.
Those vendors were lavishing food upon a single boy.
There is no shortage of hungry children near an Indian food vendor's stove.
The vendors would have gone broke had they given free goodies to just half of these kids.
So Srila Prabhupada forbade disciples to dote on
their children the way Prabupada's own family had doted on
him.
History was cruel to Bengal, to Calcutta and very likely was cruel to a silver broker's family.
Here is what history visited upon Calcutta -- which Prabhupada survived.
Calcutta and Bengal Famine 1943
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Calcutta Partition Riots 1947
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Images
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Perhaps that may be why Prabhupada created a sect which perfected escapist mood states and which consistently ignores history and looks to a mythical, idealized past.
A sect which put focus on food and acquisition of money.
A sect in which disciples restored Prabhupada to favored child status, enthroning him, bowing to him, depriving their own children of care and attention.
A guru who could ignore his city's history in favor of a Vedic golden age
would know how to teach whole scale denial to disciples.
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Perhaps the Bengal Famine of 1943 sent Prabhupada on his mission to colonize
the Western mind. He was all too successful.
His legacy:
Emotionally famished children.
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Legacy
The economic dislocations caused by the famine, war in the east and the partition of Bengal four years later sent the region of Bengal on a vicious downward spiral. Once the most prosperous province of India, Bengal remains to this day an economically backward region
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Edited 8 time(s). Last edit at 01/22/2017 07:48AM by corboy.