{"id":6688,"date":"2007-04-24T00:26:00","date_gmt":"2007-04-23T18:56:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/e.amritapuri.org\/blogs\/2007\/6688\/"},"modified":"2014-12-30T11:36:25","modified_gmt":"2014-12-30T06:06:25","slug":"happy-birthday-swamiji","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/e.amritapuri.org\/blogs\/2007\/6688\/","title":{"rendered":"Happy Birthday Swamiji"},"content":{"rendered":"

It was all started after midnight on Devi Bhava. Amritaswarupananda was sitting next to Amma\u2019s chair. Suddenly, a group of Amrita Vishwa Vidya Peetham students brought a bouquet of balloons and presented them to Swamiji, singing, \u201cHappy Birthday To You Dear Swamiji\u2026\u201d Today is Swamiji\u2019s 50th birthday, and they wanted to be the first to offer their best wishes. They also presented him with a sweet photo of Amma soaking Swamiji with a hose during a North Indian Tour a few years ago. Amma handed the balloons to Swamiji one by one and spent a long time talking and joking with him.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Several hours later, Swamiji came to sing the final bhajan set of the Devi Bhava. As soon as he sat down, an elderly French ashram resident (our resident Santa Claus) ran up to Swamiji and hastily garlanded him with a handmade necklace of sparkling heart-shaped baubles.<\/p>\n

Swamiji sang with tremendous heart and gusto, and when Amma was finished giving darshan, he got up from the bhajans and went to Amma\u2019s side. After a full prostration, he held Amma\u2019s feet for a long time and then began a pada puja as all the devotees and ashram residents chanted the Guru Stotram and Amma\u2019s 108 Names. Amma was looking at Swamiji with so much love and tenderness as he bathed her feet with rose water, milk, ghee, curd, and honey, and Swamiji performed the ceremony with grace and efficiency. After drying Amma\u2019s feet, he applied chandanam and kumkum, and then fed Amma with his own hand. In turn, Amma fed Swamiji as well. Finally, Swamiji prostrated again at Amma\u2019s feet, and, perhaps responding to some unspoken birthday wish, placed her feet gently on his bowed head. The scene was so touching that many of the devotees looking on burst into tears, one so much so that Amma reached out to console him and wipe away his tears. As for myself, I could only think, \u201cHere is a man who knows how to celebrate his birthday.\u201d It was also a symbol of what\u2019s right with Amritapuri, and with the organization Amma has created. Here was Amma\u2019s senior disciple, an impressive figure in his own right, choosing to celebrate his 50th birthday with an expression of matchless humility and tender affection for his Master.
\"\"<\/a>
After Swamiji stood up, some brahmacharis from the ashram\u2019s bakery brought two impressive, five-storied birthday cakes they had made for the occasion. Swamiji fed Amma a bit of the frosting and tasted it himself before dashing down the center ramp to return to his seat with the musicians, his head bowed humbly as he did so. A lone voice cried out, \u201cHappy Birthday Swamiji!\u201d and the entire auditorium erupted in applause and cheers.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The darshan was over. Amma stood up and showered flowers on the devotees who stood with outstretched hands. There was time for only one song\u2026what would it be? Amma Amma Taye\u2026what else? Swamiji and the other singers sang an ecstatic rendition of the traditional bhajan as Amma stood and cast her compassionate glance on each and every devotee in the hall before the doors closed in front of her.<\/p>\n

Vinay<\/p>\n

23 April 2007<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It was all started after midnight on Devi Bhava. Amritaswarupananda was sitting next to Amma\u2019s chair. Suddenly, a group of Amrita Vishwa Vidya Peetham students brought a bouquet of balloons and presented them to Swamiji, singing, \u201cHappy Birthday To You Dear Swamiji\u2026\u201d Today is Swamiji\u2019s 50th birthday, and they wanted to be the first to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6991,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6688","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ashram-diary"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/e.amritapuri.org\/blogs\/files\/2007\/04\/50swamiji-102.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/e.amritapuri.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6688","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/e.amritapuri.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/e.amritapuri.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/e.amritapuri.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/e.amritapuri.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6688"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/e.amritapuri.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6688\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/e.amritapuri.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6991"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/e.amritapuri.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6688"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/e.amritapuri.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6688"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/e.amritapuri.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6688"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}