Bali-mardana and Upendra knew that this was now a tried and tested formula. So many of their Godbrothers and Godsisters had gone to various places and tried the same process -- in Boston, St Louis, Montreal, San Jose, Santa Fe, Hamburg, London -- and they were meeting with success. And Prabhupada had several times reiterated what the actual standard of success was. "I never thought about the audience," he had said. "I was prepared to chant even if there was no-one to hear me." The actual principle of chanting was to glorify the Lord, not to attract a crowd. "If Krsna hears nicely, then He will ask some sincere devotees to gather in such a place."
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Bali-mardana and Upendra went out each day into the sunny streets and parks of inner Sydney, one chanting and one distributing literature. The small stock of Back to Godhead magazines had long been distributed -- they had requested more from America -- and now their Macmillan Bhagavad-gitas were practically all gone.
Upendra: Almost immediately we wrote up a single-sided piece of paper with a picture of Srila Prabhupada and excerpts from his essay On Chanting Hare Krsna, and printed up copies, which we sold for twenty cents. It wasn't much, but it was something. We'd hand them out and ask for "two bob". "Two bob?" they'd say, "For a piece of paper?!" But at the end of the day, we'd count up our money.
Bali-mardana wrote to Srila Prabhupada in Los Angeles with news of the Sydney centre. Upendra had added a short postscript, plus a clipping from a local newspaper -- the first to appear in Sydney's press, entitled "Bali has Brought a Message". The article described Bali-mardana as being "high on God".
Publishing the Hare Krsna mantra in full, the article described Bali-mardana's mission: "Bali arrived in Sydney a fortnight ago after singing and dancing for six months in the streets of Tokyo. His hope is to establish a Sydney centre for bhakti-yoga."
- From "The Great Transcendental Adventure" by HG Kurma Prabhu
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