Room Conversation , Los Angeles , 1971-06-29
Prabhupāda: So anyway, I was very much anxious to hear about Chidānanda. So he has written letter means he is not very bad.
Karandhara: Well, he was in the hospital. He was in the hospital and he got into a fight with the guard, I guess, and they arrested him for fighting and put him in jail for six months.
Prabhupāda: Fighting?
Karandhara: Yes.
Prabhupāda: But he is weak. With whom he'll fight?
Karandhara: Yes. It was actually very... We have a lawyer working on it to get a suspended sentence. We've got a lawyer who is trying to get him a suspended sentence, because he was sick, and he..., they had him taking drugs and he was weak, and he had been in the hospital for four months. Why they should put him in jail? He just got a little irritable.
Śyāmasundara: They mocked him. I think they mocked him for having this, and finally he couldn't take any more, and he probably hit the guard, so they threw him in jail for six months.
Karandhara: And in jail they won't give him anything to eat except... They won't give him a special diet, so all he can eat is just a little bit of vegetable. They have... The plate they give him mostly meat and a little vegetable. They won't give him any extra vegetables.
Prabhupāda: Yes? Where the jail is?
Śyāmasundara: Which jail is it?
Karandhara: County Jail, Los Angeles County Jail.
Prabhupāda: So we cannot send our prasāda there?
Karandhara: No. They won't let anything in. You can't even send books there. They won't let him wear his beads. They won't let him have his beads or anything, or his sacred thread. They took it all away from him.
Śyāmasundara: Can we go visit him?
Karandhara: We can visit, yes. Visiting hours on Saturdays and Sundays. I went there the Saturday before last, before I came.
Prabhupāda: So how is he there?
Karandhara: Well, he's doing all right. He says he chants and he prays.
Prabhupāda: Well, what can be done?
Karandhara: We're trying to see the minister there and get some books in to him. If the minister will allow it, we can give him books. Otherwise they won't let him have any books.
Prabhupāda: So you see, or else why this poor fellow should be given unnecessary trouble? What is this? Huh?
Dayānanda: Cardamom seed. Cardamom.
Prabhupāda: Oh. Yes. [devotees offer obeisances]
Prabhupāda: What is the price of a closet?
Karandhara: A closet? How big, Prabhupāda?
Prabhupāda: Not very big.
Karandhara: Maybe forty dollars.
Prabhupāda: Steel?
Karandhara: Oh, steel. Probably more than forty. Like a locker? A locker like this or a closet like this?
Prabhupāda: Closet.
Karandhara: Closet. Probably sixty or seventy dollars.
Prabhupāda: I don't think it is much.
Karandhara: We can get it. Six feet high?
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Śyāmasundara: A wardrobe for clothes.
Devotee: Like a chifferobe?
Karandhara: Made out of steel instead of wood?
Prabhupāda: Steel is cheaper?
Karandhara: No, steel is more. Wood is cheaper.
Prabhupāda: So steel is, I think, nice.
Karandhara: Okay. We'll look for it.
Prabhupāda: And one stove.
Karandhara: A small stove?
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Karandhara: Two burners?
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Karandhara: Okay.
Devotee: Jaya. Hare Kṛṣṇa.
Prabhupāda: Hare Kṛṣṇa. [end]