Author Archives: H.H. Bhaktimarg Swami

Yorkville, Toronto   Best Avatar   This entire week followers of the Gaudiya Vaishnava tradition give honor to Nityananda. The following is my poem as a meditation to him:   Best Avatar   He is indeed by far The mercy avatar F…

Yonge St., Toronto   Prominent Persons   A prominent sun dominated the sky and when it was time for it to make its ever so graceful exit a reigning powerful king in the form of the moon set itself firmly in the heavens.   During the ho…

Rosedale, Toronto   Higher Taste   Much of the snow has turned into water, trapped between heaps of white and bordered by slush. The reason is the mild temperature. It got up to 8°C and that meant wrapping my jacket around my left arm, leav…

The balcony at 243   Chain of Fools   Tuesday afternoon is my time for an in-depth look at the Bhagavad-Gitaand currently my two other callers from the Stratford/London, Ontario district are looking at chapter four.   Chapter four open…

The balcony at 243   Seeing Through Windows   My balcony pacing continues, usually in the evening and from either of the three arch-shaped windows. I can see the weather conditions quite clearly on this west end of our building. What is the…

The Balcony at 243   Go Slow   “Slowing Down in a Fast-Paced World” was the theme chosen for the Mauritian Zoom crowd. I started off with everyone doing a boogie snap of the finger and singing Simon and Garfunkel’s first stanza to 59th Stre…

The Balcony at 243   Go Slow   “Slowing Down in a Fast-Paced World” was the theme chosen for the Mauritian Zoom crowd. I started off with everyone doing a boogie snap of the finger and singing Simon and Garfunkel’s first stanza to 59th Stre…

243 Avenue Rd., Toronto   Getting Messages Out There   At noon we had a Zoom. “Mindful Trinity” is a regular broadcast/podcast from South Africa and I had the pleasure to be interviewed on one of those “Tales from Trails” by an elegant host…

243 Avenue Rd., Toronto   At the Pots   There is bliss in service. That bliss is demonstrated by those in the devotional realm of bhakti. One person, whom I snuck up on, who characterizes this joyful practice, was a person in the kitchen of…

243 Avenue Rd., Toronto   Another Reminder   Texas got hit hard by a winter storm; residents are not used to such weather. Snow, cold and more Arctic dynamics put the whole state into unpreparedness.   “Get your winter coat on!” a nort…

Queen’s Park, Toronto   Dark Brown Chutney   Today I learned how to make tamarind chutney. It goes good as a dip for samosas or pakoras, although probably not good for monks. There’s just too much sugar in it, although jaggery is a natural …

Cary, North Carolina   Sometimes Eyes Have a Cold Nose   There is no disputing the benefits of walking – walking increases cardiovascular health, reduces the chance of developing heart disease, lowers blood pressure and helps with stress ma…

243 Avenue Rd., the Balcony   For the Family   Today is family day and it is celebrated as such in sections of the US and Canada, although not specifically on this calendar day for some locations. Fortunately, where I live, in Ontario, it f…

243 Avenue Rd., The Balcony   Cold Hot   I stepped outside and winter was so there. Temperatures are not so severe. In some parts of the continent they can be brutal. Try Calgary, for instance. It often enjoys the warm chinooks coming from …

243 Avenue Rd., Toronto   Noises   I believe the train nearby makes a run every hour. Most neighbours become oblivious to it’s passing. It goes unnoticed in its routine, however, I sense it a good amount of the time. The window pane’s mild …

Seaton Village, Toronto   Karn Gone   An American devotee from North Carolina, Karnamrita, passed away this week. He was one of our best counsellors; a sensitive person with a big heart. I would say he was a real brahmin. He was a student o…

Ramsden Park, Toronto   An Uninvited Guest   A living creature couldn’t make it in the crawlspace between the two floors of our temple. Our renovation workers spotted an oily leak through the ceiling drywall. They felt obligated to open up …

Seaton Village, Toronto   Sports Active   Amala Ratna is a highly devotional-type of person with a night job. She drives around from skating rink to skating rink in the downtown area for maintenance of those operations. They are all over th…

243 Avenue Rd., Toronto   Inspiring Captain   A poem I wrote to honor the guru (Prabhupada):   Inspiring Captain   Bless that a new power be bestowed upon me To be humbled as if standing next to the big sea. It’s what I’ve never k…

The Balcony, Toronto   Back At A Canal   Once again, my pacing today took place on the balcony of the temple room. I must have covered, by my calculation, 2 kilometres. I went in an east-west, back-and-forth movement, although the balcony i…

243 Avenue Rd., Toronto   How Much You Got Left in the Tank?   The message came from Ohio. It came from a fine fella who considers himself a punk, perhaps an X. His name is Kaustubha and it is good news — I’m sure he doesn’t mind me sharing…

The balcony at 243   From Passion to Compassion   I took to a balcony walk and had some time to reflect on today’s class with the Scarborough crew. The topic was “From Passion to Compassion.” I mentioned to the group on Zoom that I would com…

243 Avenue Road, Toronto   Drama King and Drama Swami   Temperamental weather today. The gods are at work. All was melting. Rains came. Wet snow. Then a blast of arctic freeze hit the land. Ice predominated and walking was unfavourable. Wal…

Seaton Village, Toronto   The Sun/The Darkness   The sun was beckoning me to come out in the afternoon. More than that, when taking east-west Dupont St. on the northern, warmer side of it the sun was saying “peel it off” as in “take off the…

The Balcony, 243 Ave. Rd.   God Walks and Does Not   “The supreme Lord walks and does not walk. He is far away, but He is very near as well. He is within everything, and yet He is outside of everything.”   The above quote is referenced…

Ramsden Park, Toronto   Two Victories   Wow! So, one of our monks, a student of Bhakti Raghava Swami, Canadian monk extraordinaire, has accomplished something wonderful. At a length of 73 minutes, Krishna Chandra, broke the world record for…

Yorkville, Toronto   To Rochdale   I have a number of choices as to which direction to take when I step out the door for my night walk, that is if I don’t have a specific destination, such as picking up a donation for the temple at Subuddh…

Our Streets, Toronto   Winter Blues, Winter Streets   When I say “our street” I mean the one that we live on as well as the back alley that runs parallel to it and let’s not forget the street parallel to it and then the one also parallel bu…

Yorkville, Toronto   Routes   Twice this message was sent to me. “The longest walkable road of the world is from Capetown to Magdan (Russia). There are bridges across rivers, no boat or air journey is required. It is 22,000 km long and take…

St. Jamestown, Toronto   Strong and Steady   Shyam was about three years old when I last saw him — fuzzy sand coloured hair, climbing the walls, trying to speak. Like most kids his age, he loved the temple on Sundays. There are all kinds of…

243 Avenue Rd., Toronto   Not Nice History   It was nice to hear that the Indonesian President, Joko Widodo, accepts Lord Krishna as his ultimate superhero. That’s pretty cool, considering the nation is an Islamic-dominated community. At on…

Seaton Village, Toronto   Thoughts & People Along the Way   Carefully selecting the streets I take, where there’s less foot traffic, I made my way to Subuddhi’s home to pick up some donations from donors who dropped them off at her hous…

The Balcony, Toronto Fight the Real Storm I wait by the storm till my driver will arrive. So intense is the snow, I hope he’s still alive. Wicked is the weather, the vision is obscure. Fearless he appears, that is him for sure.   I’m grateful …

Ramsden Park, Toronto In the Jaws The king of elephants, Gajendra, found himself in a difficult spot. After spending some leisurely time in the water with his female friends, the fun stopped when one of his legs was locked by the jaws of a menacing…

Queen’s Park, Toronto   Getting Around by Zoom   My first Zoom for today was with a new group from Windsor, Ontario headed by Kadambha Kanana, who resides there but is employed in Detroit. It is a nice group, or sangha, that gets together r…

The Annex, Toronto   From the Window’s View   The corner of Avenue Road and Roxsborough is notorious for auto accidents. I was sitting at my usual corner, inside what we call Prabhupada’s quarters, when I heard a slam/bang sort of sound. I …

Yorkville, Toronto   Walking Reflections   Esa had his cremation today in Philadelphia. Memorial events will take place in both Philly and Port Royal, more specifically Gita Nagari, a rural community in Pennsylvania.   Thats a state I…

Ramsden Park, Toronto   I Heard the Beautiful Sound   I heard the beautiful drone sound, and a voice of sincerity accompanying it, both leaking through the door where I was solemnly sedentary. The music compelled me to get off my seat, take…

Yorkville, Toronto   Some Talk In the Night   Tuesday afternoon is a fairly bland time and the evening can be even more so. I had the fortune to at least get some walking in. That in itself is an adventure even though minimal.   Midway…

Rosedale, Toronto   Grids and Curves   The streets in Rosedale are not necessarily running on a grid. There are some curves that make it interesting for a walker, a driver or a cyclist. The fox in the neighbourhood, with their shared compan…