Vrindavan, 2016.04.02 (AU, Dandavats): The Krishna Balaram boat festival, which is celebrated after Gaura Purnima, began yesterday in great joy. The sunken courtyard of Krishna Balaram Mandir is flooded to make a beautiful kund where the small Radha Shyamasundar deities are taken for nauka vihara, a gentle ride in their swan-shaped boat. They then glide to every corner of the kund to see their devotees and admirers, who are filling the ether with the sounds of the Holy Name.
The surface of the temple lake is completely covered by flower petals by artisans in a beautiful flower rangoli designs that mysteriously stay in place. This year’s design includes a huge lotus motif in rose petals with the ISKCON lotus-tilak symbol done in golden flower petals bordered by real floating open pink lotuses.
Seven-hundred kilos of flower petals were used to decorate the temple room and used by devotees to rain down on their Lordships that created a festival for the eyes. In total, over one-hundred thousand individual flowers were used for the festival decorations, taking sixty devotees about thirty-six straight hours.
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According to Gaur Keshava Das, the Prabhupad disciple who was temple pujari at the time, he was the one who organized the first boat festival in the Krishna Balaram temple in 1985 to coincide with Ramanavami on the 10th anniversary of the opening of the temple. The small Krishna Balarama deities had also just been installed at this time.
Gaur Keshav recounts that every day when the temple courtyard was being cleaned, the drain would be blocked by leaves or other things. This gave him the idea to block the drain off on purpose and have the courtyard flooded for a boat festival.
“At that time,” he recalls, “we took the new little deities of Krishna Balarama, and put them on a small makeshift boat. Then I went up on the roof and showered down roman candle fireworks.”
Over the years the festival has become a very grand and is one of the most popular occasions in the Krishna-Baralam temple calendar. This is one of several innovative and original deity festivals that were introduced by Gaura Keshava Dasji. He also began a Swan Boat Festival in other ISKCON temples also such as New Vrindavan in the USA. The festival can also be watched on the ISKCON Vrindavan Youtube channel. More photos on Facebook.
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