Wednesday 21 December 2011

My Brush with Vaishnavism

A Hare Krishna devotee waylaid me on Oxford Street the other day.
He had a stack of books with the title Bhagavad Gita. I was looking at these in passing and wondering how come they were so thick (the Bhagavad Gita is a slim volume), and this proved to be my undoing. Because he caught me eyeing the books, and before I knew it, I was in his power.
The conversation was a short one, for I prefer to give religious recruiters a wide berth.
Hare Krishna devotee: Can I ask you one question?
Me: Please excuse me. I am in a bit of a rush.
And I melted away into the crowd of shoppers.
I need not have said, “I am in a bit of a rush,” and in fact I wasn’t in any rush at all. Nevertheless, I thought if I’m rebuffing him out of hand, the least I should do is give him a reason to feel superior.
But for three days now I’ve been wondering what his one question was. The revenge of the Hare Krishna is truly insidious.

10 comments:

R said...

Uff. Someone forced an 'Indian Yoga- very spiritual' book/pamphlet on me yesterday.
I like ISKON but. Good food :D

La Figlia Che Piange said...

The thick Gitas have lengthy religious type introductions from religious type peoples and have about ten lines per page on thick paper.

He would probably have asked you if you'd read the Gita.

Anonymush said...

Can I ask you one question?

pangolin said...

^ he he!

Tommy said...

Devotee: Can I ask you one question?
Me: You already have.

relativelytruthful said...

just came in to say that i thought about them at work a couple of days back, and your bananas are really growing on me.

Sarbajeet said...

Last week, this homeless guy stopped me on Fleet Street and said "You're a very fortunate man. Do you know why?" Like you, I wish I'd stopped to listen.

Sroyon said...

@Riddhi: True. But this devotee had no food to offer, only a question.

@Spin: Surely, it had to be something more profound than that!

@Tommy: That is a lawyer line. :)

@rtf: That sounds vaguely suggestive.

@Sarbajeet: Hmm, this seems like a new Strategy. We need to watch out.

new age scheherazade said...

My Class 8 history teacher would have said "You can", then waited until he opened his mouth, and said "...but you may not."
Also sigh, I just read through all the new posts and feel very sad for some reason :(

Sroyon said...

Waiting until he opens his mouth. That is a touch of genius. :)