Comments on: ISKCON – the Annual Hare Krishna Parade http://famousankles.com/2008/06/14/iskcon-the-annual-hare-krishna-parade/ Documenting my wanderings around and about NYC Tue, 15 May 2012 14:23:02 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.com/ By: Swarup Das http://famousankles.com/2008/06/14/iskcon-the-annual-hare-krishna-parade/#comment-449 Wed, 18 Jun 2008 06:26:56 +0000 http://famousankles.wordpress.com/?p=2458#comment-449 I’ve been affiliated with the Hare Krishna Movement since ’69 and participated in the first New York Rathayatra in the summer of 1977. I got a big kick out of seeing your photos and reading your comments. You let me see our Rathayatra festival through the eyes of an objective onlooker (with a camera) and it was refreshing — especially that you kept an open mind about the whole experience. Very nice.

Did you know that the very first Hare Krishna center was opened in 1966 at 26 Second Avenue? A few years later they relocated a few blocks “uptown” to 61 Second Avenue (between 3rd and 4th Streets). That’s where I joined. At the time the East Village was still the center of hippie culture. The Fillmore East was only two blocks from us. A few nights a week we’d go out chanting — up St. Marks Place to 6th Avenue and the West Village and then back down to 2nd Avenue via Bleeker, MacDougal and The Bowery.

Thanks again for sharing your photos and observations.

– Swarup Das (Steve H.)
Santa Cruz, California

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