Upendra: I was quite surprised when I saw him. He was lanky, a bead bag around his neck, and wearing thick rimless glasses. He wore a "Prabhupada hat", which covered half his forehead, the straps hanging down over his three-day beard. He appeared unappealing to my eyes -- rather like an ascetic -- with a wrinkled kurta over similarly wrinkled jeans. I was expecting a little bit more, but at least the kirtana was heartwarming.
Bali-mardana helped Upendra with his bags and the two walked out of the terminal building, greeted by a blast of hot Sydney summer air. Sydney had been experiencing heat wave conditions, and temperatures were still soaring at 40 degrees and above. An early-model Holden taxi waited out the front. Bali-mardana tapped on the window and a bleary-eyed, similarly dishevelled man awoke and slowly emerged from the back seat.
Upendra: As we drove towards the city, Bali-mardana introduced me to our red-eyed driver. He was Noel, a young, simple man who drove a taxi and who was coming around and chanting a bit, and helping out by donating some of his taxi earnings to "the temple". I don't know what I imagined "the temple" to look like, but we soon arrived -- outside an abandoned house! It had no electricity, no hot water and cockroaches as big as skateboards. It wasn't very clean and the wind blew through broken panes of glass. My bed was covered with sheets of newspaper -- I just cried and cried. We were living in the squats!
The next few days were difficult ones for Upendra, who had a hard time adjusting. "How can we live like this?" he asked Bali-mardana. "Well," replied Bali-mardana, "we have practically no money -- we're saving up rent for a new place". Not long after, Bali-mardana located a small house in Potts Point, a suburb directly adjoining Kings Cross. Although the dingy street was sometimes inhabited by drunks who slept in the gutter, it was better than the squats. Situated on a cliff-face, overlooking the vast expanse of inner-city Sydney with its dockyards and rolling parklands, the prominent blue building was quite suitable; it had a sunny compound and a few rooms, one with a veranda. The two young men wondered how they could afford it. Then Upendra remembered Gargamuni's loan -- and the money was soon spent on the new house.
- From "The Great Transcendental Adventure" by HG Kurma Prabhu
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