Blessed by Srila Rupa Goswami’s japa beads.
Nanda Kumara Das: one of my duties as Srila Prabhupada’s servant was to wash all His cloth, including His beadbag once a week… that required touching His beads to transfer them into a new beadbag, and every time, it felt like they were charged with spiritual electricity… one day I asked His Divine Grace if they were the same beads His Divine Grace Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakur had chanted on, and He said… “No, this is my second set… the original beads my Guru Maharaj chanted on were stolen on a train”
I was also blessed by Srila Rupa Goswami’s japa beads… in the early days in India during a time I was not traveling with Srila Prabhupad, I went to live in Vrindavan without asking permission from the temple authorities in Delhi… although there was not an established temple yet, we had temporary temples in dharamshalas and various places we were given to stay… I went to the Goswami in charge of the Radha Damodar temple and asked if I could stay in Srila Prabhupada’s rooms in exchange for cleaning the many samadhis of Vaishnava saints that were there, including Srila Rupa Goswami’s samadhi and bhajan kutir…
He readily agreed and for several days I got to sleep on the stone floor next to Srila Prabhupada’s bed, with all His original paraphernalia in the room… cooking pots, papers, and writings, medicines He had made, like Bhaktivedanta’s Pathyamrit… I started with Srila Rupa Goswami’s samadhi, where His original chanting beads were on an altar inside the samadhi… I crawled in on my hands and knees (so appropriate to have to do it that way) and got to pick up His beads to clean the altar… I had a similar experience of power and an electric-like charge when I touched them… years later, someone stole those beads too, as they had with Srila Prabhupada’s beads…
Three days into it, I got a telegram from Srila Prabhupada in Bombay telling me to come there immediately… I was sure I was going to be heavily chastised for being too independent, but when I got there and went into Srila Prabhupada’s room to pay my obeisances, He smiled and said… “Oh, you are here… very nice… we need you to be the pujari for our Cross Maidan festival later this week.”… no sauce, all love and forgiveness… Jai Srila Prabhupada!