671111 - Letter to Mukunda from Ramanuja

Calcutta,

11 November, 1967

From Ramanuja

My dear Mukunda,

Please accept my obeisances. After making the trip to Cal-Cox Syndicate to see Mr. Banergee I have finely managed to get him to ship your tampoura. I may inform you that you will no longer have to pay in advance. Mr. Banergee has been kind enough to guarantee to Pan American that you will pay. The charge will be $125.00 Besides this payment, I have payed Mr. Banergee 85.00 rps. For his handling charges plus $20.00 for insurance. I have insured the tompoura for 1,000.00 rps plus freight so that if it is even scratched we will come out nearly $100.00 ahead. I hope it breaks. (*See above *claim open delivery) Anyway, besides these payments the tompoura came to more than the $10.00 you gave me to pay for same, plus packing charges. That is $20.00 for insurance, $10.00 for Cal-Cox handling charges and $10.00 more for the tampoura makes a grand total of $40.00. Actually it comes to a bit more but this is what I am charging you. I will decide later in what manner you shall make payment ; in cash or in shipment of goods. Yes, the tompoura only weighs packed, 8 kilos but they also charge by volume weight and figuring like this, the weight of the toumpoura comes to 32 kilos. Then Mr. Banergee set the weight as being 40 kilos so as to get the benefit of discount that comes in shipping packages that weigh 40 kilos and more.

That is if you ship under 40 kilos, the rate is 40 rps per kilo; if it is 40 kilos and more that you are shipping at the rate of 32 rps per kilo. So you can see that it is cheaper to consider the weight as being 40 kilos. Anyway the whole thing is uneconomic and shipping by sea would come to approximately 600 rps instead of 900 that it did for air. This same tompora will most probably arrive at about the same time that Swamiji does. And I may add that you can tell the girls that the sarees I bought for them will also arrive at the same time as Swamiji will carry them on the plane. Please be advised that we are doing all we can to get him off as soon as possible but this primative Indian government is putting obstacles in our way. The man who could have given Swamiji clearance for his P-form has just drowned so the clearance has to be made in Bombay. This is the delay.

Here in Calcutta we are having a lot of fun addressing different people. Swamiji makes Achutananda and myself give a short speech. I am becoming more and more expert at this. I think that he makes us speak in order to show the audience that we American Vaishnavas are for real. And also he wants everyone to preach Krishna Consciousness. Mr. Mullick is our host in Calcutta. He comes from a 500 year old aristocratic family and I may say that this same Mr. Mullick is a riot all to himself. It is very difficult to take care properly of Swamiji’s health here. For one thing it is a big thing to serve sweets in India and it is impolite to decline. Also we get all kinds of visitors.

We have not been able to go to bed before 11 O’clock and Swamiji automatically wakes at 3. In this respect the people here are very inconsiderate but if Achutananda and I ask them to leave, they will ask Swamiji if they should and Swamiji of course says no. Anyway his heart beat is a little fast and sometimes it is alarmingly fast, so I suggest that you get a good heart specialist to see him. You can explain how important Swamiji is and how poor a society we are. In this way the doctor may not charge so much. Please arrange for this doctor and above all make sure that Swamiji gets plenty of rest. You need not restrict visitors too strictly as if the company is good Swamiji seems to enjoy visitors. Please do all you can to get Swamiji’s beat to be normal again. His chariot needs to be fixed up so that he can remain on this earth for at least another ten years.

Your servant in Krishna

Ramanuja das

P.S. I still have to see Mr. Banergee on Monday in order to make final payments for insurance.