With a Little Help
from My Friends

from Maha Srnga dasa, Prague

In the summer I was distributing from door to door in a small village together with Krsna-nayaka Prabhu. Soon after I started, three little girls around ten years old spotted me and began to make jokes about me. They even shot cherrystones at me.

I continued with my distribution and they became curious about why I was going from door to door and ringing all the bells. One of them asked me who I was and what I was doing there.

"We are monks," I explained, "and we have to distribute very important spiritual books."

I showed them my books. They became excited but didn't say anything. I went on and they followed me. I went uphill with only five books in my hand and left my trolley down at the bottom. One mom took a book and because I didn't want to go down and up again, I called on one of the girls.

"Can you please bring me the black book from the trolley, the one I showed you before."

She very quickly found the book I wanted and ran to me with it. I rang the bell at the next house but it seemed that no one was there. I tried the front door but it was closed. I wanted to leave, but one of the girls stopped me. "It's not possible," she said. "My aunt lives here, and she should be home."

The little girl tried the door and opened it effortlessly. I couldn't believe my eyes. We went inside together, and she called her aunt. The aunt was surprised to see her and asked what she needed.

The little girl took the books out of my hands and explained to her that these are very important books and she should just buy some. So the lady did. And it went on like this practically the whole morning. We approached some houses and they told me who lived there, if they were home, what they did and usually also distributed the books to them. I just witnessed how the books were going out. The little girls distributed almost all the books I had in my trolley.

We did most of the village, and finally we approached the house of the parents of one of the girls. She was the daughter of the mayor of that village, but her mother didn't want the book. But the daughter was pleading: "You must take it because it's very important and everybody in our village took some books."

So the mother surrendered and bought two books but said to her daughter, "Now you must stay 'cause it's time for lunch."

"No, no. I want to go with him."

"No way," said the mother. "You must eat." The daughter almost started to cry but the mother was determined.

I went on with the two remaining girls till we approached the house of the second one. The same story was repeated. So with the last one, I went on but after half an hour I saw two little kids running swiftly down the hill towards us. Lunch was over, and our two little friends joined us once again.

Soon we met the other devotee and I showed our van to the girls. I explained to them how we live, gave them some maha-prasadam, thanked them for their help, and bade them farewell. That day I could very easily realize that I am not the one who is actually distributing Srila Prabhupada's books.

Your humble servant

Maha Srnga dasa (Prague CZ)

CHAKRA 27-Oct-98