20220615 Pānihāṭi Ciḍā-dadhi Mahotsava Short Address

mūkaṁ karoti vācālaṁ paṅguṁ laṅghayate girim
yat-kṛpā tam ahaṁ vande śrī-guruṁ dīna-tāraṇam
hariḥ oṁ tat sat

Jayapatākā Swami: Today we observed the ciḍā-dadhi-mahotsava and I am very happy to see how many devotees in the kitchen downstairs helped me. In the Manor we have about this many people. We have two big pots, two medium pots and four small pots. Since the auction will take us a long time, therefore we advertised the pots ahead of time and all the pots were purchased in advance except three. So the big pots were sponsored for 250 dollars. The medium pots were an 150 dollars. Small pots 25 to 50 dollars. In the auction sometimes people gave 1000 to 2000 dollars per pot. And now please correct me, he is the money exchanger, the exchange is 78 rupees per dollar. You can calculate. But we did not charge for the festival and people gave their contribution to the auction. In Melbourne, Australia they sell all the pots in auction and sometimes they receive 10 to 13,000 dollars. The pots are very big. About the same big size. But it is only 25 or 26 pots here and there are so many people. I would like to taste a teaspoon of each pot and see how they came out.

We know that this festival was done about 500 years by Lord Nityānanda. And Raghunātha dāsa who later became one of the six Gosvāmīs, Raghunātha dāsa Gosvāmī. Lord Nityānanda’s secretary said, “There is Raghunātha dāsa offering his obeisances!” Lord Nityānanda said, “Oh! He is a thief! Let him come here, I will punish him!” Because he would go and see Lord Caitanya, but he would not go through Lord Nityānanda! And if you want to get the mercy of Lord Caitanya, you need to get the mercy of Lord Nityānanda. Lord Nityānanda was a very funny person. He told Raghunātha dāsa, “I am going to punish you! Daṇḍa debo!” Then He went and put His lotus foot on the head of Raghunātha dāsa. He said, your punishment, your daṇḍa, is that you should feed me and all my associates, ciḍā-dadhi and fruits. Raghunātha dāsa was very happy to hear the punishment. One name of this festival is called the Festival of Punishment, the daṇḍa-mahotsava. So, we are helping Raghunātha dāsa pay his punishment to Lord Nityānanda. Do you feel blissful serving Raghunātha dasa, serving Lord Nityānanda? Haribol!

So, anyway, I will explain some more about what happened, later today, in the evening. We have different flavors. We have yogurt and fruits and we have condensed milk and fruits. About 16 flavors. Then we have salads. We have salty which are also about 6 flavors because many people like salty. In America we have North Indian and South Indian, Italian, Mexican, American, that is in New Orleans. But here in the name of South India we have one Karnataka, one Kerala, one Tamil Nadu, one Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. These were made by people from those states, and I don’t know how they came out. I would like to try one teaspoon of each. Because we never made Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Kerala, Andhra, Telangana. Also, I did this in foreign countries and there we have one traditional with mangos and litchis. But here in India, the tropical fruits are in immense quantity. So I made two additional flavors, one mango and one jackfruit. But we did not have many berries. We did not have much Western fruits. Anyway, that is what we did. We helped putting the fruits in the pots by Caitanya Avatārī Prabhu and his wife, Rasamayī devī dāsī and Harilīlā Prabhu. And all the devotees, many! Haribol! And they have been offered to Nitāi Gaura and His Holiness Bhānu Swami he offered something in every pot! Anyway, I was supposed to speak for one minute! But I love this festival so much!

On this festival whoever gets the pot, they distribute it to everybody. But you can keep the pot yourself. The pots are beautiful! I don’t know who the artists are? Anyway, they were amazing! (Acintya Caitanya dāsa: Those who made the pots can stand up) Haribol! This is Lord Jagannātha and He is the Lord of the whole universe (gesturing to a pot). Not only of this universe, but ananta-koṭi universes! This whole material world is one fourth of His potency and spiritual world is three fourths. This pot has all the flavors of east, west, north and south. Jagannātha Svāmī kī jaya! The other pot is Narasiṁhadeva, you know Narasiṁhadeva? This is a special dry fruits mix. And it has many dry fruits. And of course, you have beautiful Narasiṁhadeva. Haribol! On the tope of every pot are sweets and savories, murukkus.