Insights
because They were already there on the altar; still it was like the second coming of Christ for the Christians or something like that. It's hard to find anything else to compare it to. So much preparation went on before Their arrival. We heard They were on the road and taking five days to reach Maydpur. Everyone was frantically running around, making the altar ready, preparing Their outfits, gathering all the parapher- nalia for the abhiseha, etc. Then came the day when we went down to the Yogapith to greet Them. Hundreds of devotees were there with a mahd-hirtana and everyone was carrying little flags on long poles. It was a very festive atmosphere. The mood of expectation was enormous. All the locals and the shopkeepers were baffled. They didn't know what was going on. Then the truck carrying Their Lordships becarne visible around the corner, and the htrtana exploded into this wild thing. There was also an Indian brass-band present and the mixed sound became tumultuous. It was far out. No other description comes to mind. The truck was driving very slowly towards the temple so all the devotees could fol- low it. Somehow Lord Nityananda's hand had come unwrapped from the protec- tive bolstering that was covering Him, so all the devotees took turns touching it. Back at the temple the unloading of the deities is a whole other story which I won't get into. It took days before They were finally in place on the altar and ready for the big event-the maha-abhiseha. All I can say is that I felt chosen to be allowed to watch that wonderful event. It is hard to describe the combined mood of the thousands of devotees gathered when the doors to the altar were first opened. The roar that rose up and greeted Their Lordships when They revealed Themselves was a transcendental sound of such volume that it was completely out o[ proportion to the number of people gathered. The closest I can think o[ is the roar of 50,000 European football fans when the home team is scoring a goal.I was reminded of the descriptions in Caitanya-
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