Vraja Lila dd

I want to tell you a story about something that happened to me while I was in Vrindavana. It may interest you. Well, now I'll start.

It was my first trip to Vrindavana. I was looking out the window of our taxi and feeling amazed. Of course, I knew that the women wore brightly coloured saris, but it's so different to see it all. I was a bit disappointed not to see any elephants, but there were plenty of other things to look at. Camels pulling carts, cows in the middle of the road, garland sellers, monkeys, and at one point a bear! The bear was trained to stand on its hind legs and walk and also to give people rides without eating them. It looked pretty bored. This was all very exciting, but I was even more excited when we got to Krsna Balarama Mandira. We paid our obeisances to Vrindavana dhama and went to see the Deities. Then we booked a room in the temple guesthouse. It was nice to be so near the temple. Luckily, my family got room 8B on the first floor. I say 'luckily' because I don't like climbing lots of stairs, especially when I've got a cold.

It was still towards the beginning of our visit when we decided to go to Rupa Goswami's samadhi. (The 'we' is all three families, Daruka prabhu's family, Prahlada prabhu's family, and my family.)

Well, in the beginning everything went fine. We paid our obeisances to Rupa Goswami and sat in a semicircle in front of his samadhi. We were half way through a kirtana when I got a terrible fright. Someone from behind me grabbed my glasses and ran off with them. For a moment I thought that maybe one of the young children who were playing with some sand nearby had taken them. But no, they were all still there looking rather wide-eyed.

I went over to my mother and asked her who had stolen my glasses. She told me that a monkey had taken them. I felt rather annoyed with the monkey. Some of the devotees walked round the corner to find the monkey. I sat down, feeling confused. Would I get my glasses back? Would the monkey break them? I didn't know. I had heard of this kind of thing happening and laughed, but it was so different to have it happening to me. Rama found a bag of carob drops in her pocket. She brought them round the corner to where the monkey was. A few minutes later my father came back with the glasses! The ends were chewed but that didn't matter. What mattered was that I'd got them back. A brijbasi lady had got them back for me. She had enticed her (the monkey) down off the wall with Rama's sweets. The monkey had come down, put the glasses down and picked up the sweets. Then the lady chased the monkey. It was really scared and didn't know what to do. It ran up the wall again. But it had left my glasses behind. My mother wouldn't let me put them on again right there, especially as the monkey came back for a second go! Happiness and distress. A minute ago the monkey had been happy but I had been distressed. But now I was happy and the monkey was distressed. I never felt safe with monkeys after that.

P.S. I saw an elephant on the way to Delhi airport at the end of our visit. I also had a ride on it!