Prabhupāda: So we shall follow strictly. Here is God. Take. Because if you are serious after God, here is God, take Kṛṣṇa. This is our philosophy. Hm? What is the answer? If he's serious about God. I think this paper wrote that, that Village? "We thought God is dead."
Hari-śauri: Greenwich Village.
Prabhupāda: East Village? That paper? Long ago.
Harikeśa: Village Voice. The Village Voice.
Prabhupāda: Aha, yes. They told first, that "We thought God is dead." And actually they were dancing in the name of God. Acyutānanda and Brahmānanda. You have seen the picture showing?
Hari-śauri: In this French Back To Godhead.
Harikeśa: Oh, that's Acyutānanda too! Oh!
Prabhupāda: They were the first candidates to dance with my kīrtana.
Harikeśa: I didn't know that was Acyutānanda. I recognize Hayagrīva but...
Hari-śauri: That's not Hayagrīva, it's Brahmānanda.
Harikeśa: That's not Hayagrīva?
Prabhupāda: No. Hayagrīva...
Hari-śauri: It's a picture of Brahmānanda and Acyutānanda dancing, and Prabhupāda's playing on tabla, and Kīrtanānanda sat down on the corner.
Harikeśa: Boy, was he skinny in those days! This is Brahmānanda? And this is Kīrtanānanda Swami sitting down?
Prabhupāda: Just Brahmānanda, Kīrtanānanda standing together.
Hari-śauri: Acyutānanda.
Prabhupāda: Oh, Acyutānanda.
Harikeśa: Acyutānanda. And Kīrtanānanda's sitting down.
Prabhupāda: Kīrtanānanda's sitting there?
Hari-śauri: Yes. He sat next to you. He's shaved up.
Harikeśa: They're so skinny.
Prabhupāda: This was published in New York Times.
Harikeśa: New York Times?
Prabhupāda: With picture. The other picture was published in Voice, Village Voice, yes. Yes. Big picture. One page. They felt something; otherwise, why they should publish? Appealed to them, that here is God.
Harikeśa: This is really a historic picture.
Prabhupāda: Underneath a tree I was sitting and speaking. That's all. And when I would come back from the park to my apartment, at least two dozen people will come with me.
Hari-śauri: Like a Pied Piper.
Prabhupāda: Huh?
Hari-śauri: There's a story in the West about a man called the Pied Piper. He went to one place and played the flute and all the children followed him away from the village. You're like the Pied Piper who went to the West, took all the children.
Prabhupāda: If you know French language you can read it.
Harikeśa: He knows French.
Prabhupāda: Ah, you know. What is written there?
Hari-śauri: The article is by Hayagrīva, and the heading, it says, "Are you from India?" That was when he met you on the street.
Prabhupāda: Yes, he first of all met me on the street and asked me this question. And I brought him, "Yes, I have taken one apartment here. You come here with me." Then I came back to show him the apartment. And from the next day they began to come, Kīrtanānanda and Hayagrīva.
Hari-śauri: Second Avenue apartment?
Prabhupāda: Yes. And this Umāpati. Then Satsvarūpa. They began to come regularly.
Harikeśa: Mukunda, you were already...
Prabhupāda: Yes, Mukunda was before that.
Hari-śauri: When was this, then, when Acyutānanda and Brahmānanda came. That was after...
Prabhupāda: This was in the park, Tompkins Square.
Hari-śauri: That was after Hayagrīva and...
Prabhupāda: No, simultaneous.
Harikeśa: This was the fall of 1966. October maybe.
Prabhupāda: Yes. I was going in the park on Sunday and began from three. Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, that dundubhi. What is that, in the hand?
Harikeśa: A tom-tom.
Prabhupāda: Tom-tom. Yes.
Saurabha: He's explaining why you came to America and that in three years you spread the mantra all over the Western world.
Harikeśa: Yogeśvara has many pictures of this. I saw all of them once.
Prabhupāda: He is good collector.