My life in Guyana 
I must say that since I started practising Krishna bhakti in a small way, it has helped me to be a better person than before.
My parents and brothers and sisters left Guyana to live in Scarborough, Canada and Heston, England. I live with my grandparents in Guyana. The Guyana dollar is very low and with my wage I can never afford a computer or visit my relative abroad. But by the mercy of Krishna I receive a free plane ticket to spend two weeks with my brother, Vipin, in Heston, England. It so happens that he gave me a good second hand laptop as a present.
I will return home this Wednesday and I am happy to do so. This foreign climate is not for me. In Guyana we have hot sun or rain. There is pure water, fresh air, lots of fruit trees. I bought a tulsai bead and a bead bad, but before, I used to chant on buck beads. I just went to Vergenoegen bush and chop a few stems of buck beads from a buck bead tree, then I took a pliers and pull out the shoot in each bead then I string my own bead. I changed to tulsi bead because a prabhu told me tulsi bead is recommended.
I work on a farm all day and I chant in my mind while I work. Farm is work with nature. We plant cassava, plantain, sweet potato, yams, ochro, boulangers, bora, baji, squash, pumpkin, peppers, etc. Dhal, rice, paratha and sada roti are the staple diet.
The population is mainly Indians and black. The main religion is Christianity, Islam and Hinduism. Sadly the rum shops are spoiling a lot of Hindus. In my village, there is a Hindu temple, a mosque and Christian church. The burial ground is divided into three. When somebody die, the night before we would know. The dogs would cry out aloud in the dark. And next morning we hear that somebody died in the night.
It is nice having a rice bag hammock in the yard. The air afternoon part can be very breezy and nice. We have a long sea wall through out the West Coast Demerara to prevent the sea water from coming in and flood the land. Sometimes part of the sea wall would break and the sea would come in and flood the area and we would be in water up to our knees, but this is rare.
We have nice fruit trees, like ginip, star- apple, different kinds of bananas and mango, whitie, cashew, tamarind, jamoon, cowa, sugar- apple, dongs, guava, etc. Many people usually have chickens, ducks, turkeys, and many have cows, goats, sheep. Many people keep a dog to guard their homes at night. The dog stays in the yard.
The Rathayatra festival is getting better each year in Guyana. A lot of people are coming from abroad to attend it. Srila Prabhupada books used to be sold deep inside a sewing machine shop on water street, Georgetown, long ago, but now devotees sell them on the street at Stabrook market, and Bourda market, Georgetown and other places. Materially speaking, the people are getting up in life, although cost of living is very high. Easy easy more and more people are getting Krishna bhakti.
Greetings and respectful obeisances to the members of Srila Prabhupada's ISKCON site! Haribolo!
Comments
Yes, Prabhu Anand. Here in Winnipeg, an acquaintance lived in an apartment building on Osborne street, over an old cemetary that had been torn up to accomodate the street many years back. He experienced being punched, assaulted, by an invisible something, and wax falling upwards from candles, and other bizarre poltergeist, ghostly, activities. The man living there was clearly nervous and drawn.
A Catholic priest came there, but after a half hour, ran away and refused to come back. A police friend and skeptic spent a nite there, laughed at the whole thing, and he also was punched by something invisible, more than once. He changed his skeptical mind after this !
My friend from work was a real live ghost investigator, Mr. Roy Bauer. We recorded knocking and a voice by EVP recording there. We asked it to knock, heard nothing, but on playback, three distinct knocks could be heard. There was also a voice. There were also three good witnesses to testify!
They later asked me to try to intercede. I bathed, dressed in cotton dhoti etc, and took prasadam there. There, i sprinkled prasadam water, spoke gently to the ghosts and invited them to take prasadam, chanted my gayatri and gave them the credits, chanted Hare Krsna, asked them to please go along upwards now and not stay there any more, not to remain there anymore, and left by a circuituous route home so they could not follow me to my own home.
He did not have any more occurances for up until a year after when i saw him last in about 1987! AGTSP !
Prasadam and chanting will help or drive off ghosts, of course. We had one such similar incident in the Montreal Temple. The temple had been owned by the Rosicrucians before, and there was a back stair leading up to their black-painted ceremonial hall. Many brahmacaries who slept back there seeking quiet, awoke finding themselves unable to move and frozen, for several seconds. Afterwards, they expressed as feeling spaced-out or dopey-headed, for several hours.
I also experienced this, but by now knew it was a ghost, so again with the maha prasadam as before. The ghost perhaps benefitted and left the place afterwards, as no more reports after. There were similar occurrances on the roof Tulsi quarters, but this area was closed off and no attempts were made to remove the ghost maybe up there also. Always harinama and maha prasadam proved effective.
Toronto temple has a ghost. There was also a fire, a devotee died protecting the Deities. I was told he likes to cause new persons to have bizarre night mares sometimes there. I once had a dream in which animal parts and animal organs were flying through the air in detail and on massive scale, gory streams flew into big meat grinders etc I have never had before or since seen such a weird nightmare. I got up and chanted for hours afraid to sleep! Swami said that happened to sensitive devotees who moved into the ashrama. In all very weird. A devotee dying in the temple would not come back as a ghost, I am sure !
Srila Prabhupada once or twice expressed being aware of ghosts, and noted that they had their feet backwards, one class of ghosts.
There are a great variety of living enitites! Some are gross, some subtler! Please join our Paranormal group onsite, for some fun, some of it serious! Hare Krsna, Anand Prabhu. Hare Krsna! Jaya Sri Prahlada Nrsngha !
PS; Ghosts like the top of one's head or to enter through the mouth. People who sleep with mouth open or drool etc can invite ghosts to enter through that electrical conductor. Keep Gita at the head of your bed, and immediately chant the Names of Godhead if possessed temporarily even in within the mind. You wil see, it must leave immediately, within a few seconds only.
Hare Krsna, Jaya Sri Prahlada Nrsngha Swami !
Ananda Prabhu dit;
Hare Krishna Prabhu. My respectful obeisances at your lotus feet. I am glad to be back home. And I am glad to be on this site to read and learn and understand the lives of the pure devotees and to gain wisdom from their lives which is the quintessence that nourishes and enlightens a neophyte like me. You really did a magnificent work on the main page to mix all the beautiful pictures and videos and transcendental writings. It is indeed excellent. Thank you very much. My devotee friends are Aditya das Prabhu, Rameshwar Prabhu, Gopal Prabhu, Suresh babu, Amit das Prabhu, to name a few. I do not own a farm. I am just a farm labourer. My boss Rameshwar Prabhu owns the farm and he takes on devotees as employees. Guyana is a very green country, and the Government encourages agriculture. In Guyana, many people in the countryside plant up their back- yard with greens and vegetables. And we have a lot of freedom without fear. Neighbours mix as friends. Tomorrow I have to build a kerala and a squash machaan on the harm.
Hare Krishna Prabhu. My respectful obeisances at your lotus feet. Thank you very much for the lovely video. My boss has cds of songs by Pandir Jasraj, and midday we usually eat under a cherry tree and listen to him. He has a strong voice. I like Hari Om sharan songs as well. My father told me that many years ago before I was born, the mighty Mukesh from India came to Guyana at the Zeeburg temple on the West Coast Demerara and he sang some powerful bhakti songs. Oh he sang some haunting songs in hindi movies like Saathi and sangam, etc. that guy raj Kapoor, he used to sing mukesh songs in old movies like Anari and so on. Since I started Krishna bhakti my attention turned to bhakti songs. I had 4 song books with old Indian songs, I just throw in in the drain. It was hard to part with those worldly song books but I think Krishna will like if I sing bhakti songs instead.