thiru adhyayana uthsavam - At newyork - A Summary (part12)

[Guest guest]

Srimadh Azhagiya Singar thiruvadikaLE saraNam

Sri RanganAyikA samEtha Sri Rangarajan thiruvadikaLE saraNam

 

Dear bAgawathAs,

 

Some also helped for taking the prasadham to perumaL

and back for offering, serving, other errand, mini shopping etc.

They are Sri Ayyala Viswanathan and his family members, Sri Arun

Sridharan, Sri Nandakishore and his family members, Sri Ananda

Padmanaban and his family members, Sri pArthasarathy and others.

There were a few bAgawathAs who constanlty worked on the perumAL

mALai. They are, Smt Radhai, Smt. Vaijayanthi, Smt. Padmaja, Smt.

Prabha Kidambi, Smt. Shashikala iyengar, Smt Sunitha, and Smt.

Satya Viswanthan, and many others from Bridge water, and Boston,

and many others. There were three book saree, and jewelry stalls

displyed in the hall. The Book, CD & sovenir stall was managed

by Sri. Ammakannu Bagyalashmi, Sri Jagan and the jewelry stall

by Smt Bargavai Sunderrajan. The stage was arranged by Sri

Murali Kidambi and co-ordinated by Smt Dr. Shashikala iyengar.

The hall was arranged by SmtDr.Shashikala iyengar. " mAvilai " and

" veRRilai " was arranged by SriRagavan of NJ. Many sthapathis who

are working and staying in SriVenkat's house helped cleaning the

house, floor, hall, kitchen, vessels, and loading unloading of

provisions pallakku, and mobilising chairs and tables etc. all

throughout the 2 weeks.

 

The hosting of the outstation guest were facilitated by

many. Among them some are Smt gOdha dhatthAthreya, Smt Dr. Shash

ikala iyengar and her sister, SmtDr Utthra kOdiyalam, Smt. Seema

& Sri Jayaraman, Smt. Hema & Sri Sripathy, Smt. Prema & Sri Raj

Acharya, Smt. Raji & Sri Malur Sampath and many others. Child

care was provided by Smt Rama Sundar, and Smt Padma Kannabiran.

A group photo of all children were taken with perumAL. Children

were all given with a certificate for their participation in

" thiru adhyayana sEvai " , from Sri Ahobila muth.

 

On 26th all the rest of the pAsurams of Sri nammAzwAr and iyarpA

were chanted. The after noon session of NAMA was very impressive.

Sri MG Prasad's presentation was attended with pindrop silence.

Smt Ramya RamnArayan and her students did perform a wonderful

classical dance presentation. There were also male and female

vocal singers who all sang on perumAL on Kannada, telugu, tamil,

and sanskrit. In the evening the chanting of madal was very

musical and wonderful. During the chanting, there was also a few

bAgawathAs assembled in the other end of the hall in a QA session

with Sri Anbil Ramaswamy and Sri MG Prasad. In the evening al the

perumALs were taken back to the temple. Smt Nagu Satyan may

provide some more info on the participants and the agenda of the

annual NAMA conference. On 27th all the 400 and odd pasurams of

Sri Desika prabhandham was chanted. This concluded the thiru

adhyayana sEvai in Newyork in 1999. After this, many of the

bAgawathas went on a site seeing tour to see the temple site,

Newyork city etc. adiyEn went to timesquare.

 

Through out the uthsavams, we had (a mini vidhwath

sadhas) or a friendly but fierce debate between adiyEn and Sri

Venkat. The topic was " Who is superior periya perumAL Sri Arangan

or Lord SriKrishna ? " . As obvious I was arguing for peria perumAL

and SriVenkat was arguing his case for SriKrishna. While he would

quote from Srimadh bAghwadham and Swami dEsikan's gOpala vimsathi,

adiyEn will quote mainly from 4000 divya prabhandma and as well

as Swami desika prabhandham. The arguments were tense, emotional

and even noisy as we thumped while saying something forceful

about perumAL. Occassionally we had Sri Dileepan and Sri Anbil

attempting to provide some hints to Sri Venkat with some clues on

AzhwAr pasurams when adiyEn was not present in the scene. However,

they would come back to support adiyEn when adiyEn comes back

after attending a phone call or something. Sri Krihsna HIMself

was supporting adiyEn. adiyEn's contention was mainly driven

from Sri nammAzwAr's pAsurams and poorvAcharyA and adiyEn's Ach-

AryAs kAlakshEbams. adiyEn never gave up. adiyEn was driving

a point that it is a vEsham of Sri Ranganatha and why give promi-

nance to vEsham over the original when Sri Rangantha HIMself is

present. However, SriVenkat finally said on the day of leaving

that, " Ivarkku Krishna than ellAmnu pErukku oru vArtthai sonnA

enna vanthicchu? anyway Sri Rangantha than ellam. " ie., Respected

Swamin could say just for the sake of pleasing adiyEn that Sri

Krishna is everything (ie supreme), it is ok, Sri Ranganatha

is everything (ie., supreme) " . It was a very healthy and friendly

debate and many bAgawathAs enjoyed the " sandai " all throughout.

It was earlier observed that this mega event organised first

time in this massive scale was similar to doing marriage for 4

daughters at the same time. It is also observed by some in a

jovial sense that, in the spirit of a grand, succsseful marriage

celebrations this marriage also ended with a " sambhandhi sandai "

over P & R (Pickup and Ride) as similar to Washingtanil thiru

maNam and an amicable settlement of the same at the end.

 

Subam

 

Srimadh Azhagiya Singar thiruvadikaLE saraNam

Sri RanganAyikA samEtha Sri Rangarajan thiruvadikaLE saraNam

thiruk kudanthai Rengarajan

 

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