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WORLD  Curtailing European Tour BY GOKUL INDIA, Oct 2 (VNN) — Sri Sri Guru Gaurangau Jayatah! Dear friends and devotees, Dandavat pranams. With great sadness, the European devotees wish to inform you all that the European tour of His Divine Grace Srila Bhakti Ballabh Tirtha Maharaj, originally scheduled to last through mid October, was curtailed due to the unforeseen terrorist events and plans of impending war that have occurred over the past week. Maharaj landed in London at 12:30 PM (London time) on Tuesday 11 September, only 1 1/2 hours before the notorious attact on New York City. Within hours, GOKUL in London had received dozens of emails and phone calls from Indian devotees begging Srila Gurumaharaj to return home. Although greatly disappointed, the European devotees agreed that the European tour should be cut short, allowing Maharaj's householder disciples who had escorted him from India to return to their families, some of whom live on the Pakistani border. Large scale cuts in the amount of air travel within Europe (about 1/3 of the flights have been cancelled), as well as huge delays due to increase in security measures, were also some of the influencing factors. The feeling was that the longer the devotees waited to return home, the less certain we could be about the reliability of travel. While Maharaj expressed no concern whatsoever for his own personal safety, he graciously decided to ease the concerns of the devotees. After leading an intense Nrisimha kirtan in Lekkerkerk, Holland (near Rotterdam) on Wednesday night, Maharaj and his party left for Delhi from Amsterdam on Thursday 20 September at 1:30 PM, escorted by a tearful assemblage of European devotees from the UK, Holland, France and Germany. Maharaj spent 11-17 September in England, and then 18-20 September in Holland. This also included a Nagar Sankirtana through the streets of Brighton, on the coast of Southern England. Next week, GOKUL will be sending photos and highlights of some of the highly relevant and deeply moving classes that were delivered during those days. Wishing you all well, we remain, Vaishnavdasanudas, GOKUL <http://www.gokul.org> UK  Comment on this storyContact VNN about this storySend this story to a friend
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