Dark Continent

Then Prabhupad really put us on the spot: “It is not sufficient, some few people coming to the temple—you must go out, have samkirtan in the public places.” But as we jay-walked Ngong Forest Road [in Nairobi] and threaded our way through the Kibera slum towards Kamukunji Park, to conduct the first public samkirtan in Africa, even stalwart Brahmananda looked a little scared. Me, I was shaking like a leaf. I mean, yesterday I had seen a guy in a breechcloth walking down the street with a zebra hide over his shoulder, fresh blood running down his back. This was savage country, not long ago seized back from the British by the murderous Mau Mau. In the 1960s Jomo Kenyatta had launched his successful campaign to oust the Brits from this same Kamukunji park, and here we were, heading for the very “Freedom Tree” under which he rallied his people to fight. Would this work?