The Bazaar and 'I need this Store'

Shortly after I joined the Centre, one of the Manhattan disciples held a tag sale in her apartment to raise money for the Aum Centre, as we were then known. The sale raised over $300, which was quite successful, since there were only a few disciples at this point and only disciples (and seekers) donated and bought the sale items.

I suggested having a tag sale at my yoga centre, which was in a large house in Westchester. Guru liked the idea, so I solicited donations from my yoga students. They, and their wealthy families, responded generously. To make it more attractive we called it a ‘bazaar’ instead of a tag sale and we served homemade food.

Merchandise flowed in, everything from a mink coat to a blue sapphire ring, as well as lots of nice less-expensive items. By the end of the day we had quadrupled the amount raised in the Manhattan sale. Needless to say, Guru was delighted. He hinted that perhaps we could do it again soon.

A few months later we held our next bazaar. The well-known guitarist Mahavishnu John McLaughlin and his friend Larry Coryell came with their wives and gave a concert while volunteers brought all kinds of delectable prepared foods to sell. Guru was so happy with the results that he said, “Could you not have one every month?" And so we did—one Sunday a month, with the help of quite a few yoga students, many of them former hippies who had become disciples. There were so many workers on bazaar day that we set up a cooking crew to prepare meals for everyone.

People worked on setting up and pricing items all day Saturday, the day before the bazaar. A few of us worked right through the night. If we sent someone out on a late errand, we had to check on him if he took too long, only to find him “meditating" fast asleep in his car.

As for the pricing of the items for our sales, we were all pretty clueless. However, sometimes, looking over the prices that had been put on some items, my intuition would kick in and I would decide that this price had to be higher or lower—mostly higher, because everyone had the selfless tendency to give the stuff away.

One day I came across a long necklace of rough dark green beads on an ordinary piece of string. Someone had marked it 50¢, but I had a feeling that they might be semi-precious stones in the rough, so I changed the price to $4.50. At the end of the bazaar they were still there. Then, following another flash of my intuition (intuition is the other meaning of my name, according to Guru), Rupantar offered to take them into the city to be appraised in one of the auction galleries. The beads turned out to be real jade and he came back with $1300! It would be a boon to have my intuition work like that more often, but fortunately or unfortunately it is something sporadic, over which I have no control.

Don't rain on our bazaar!

When I told my students about an upcoming bazaar, they said, “But it’s supposed to rain!" The weather turned out to be cloudy, but otherwise just fine. I soon found out from those surprised students who had not come because of the bad weather that it had rained everywhere except on our bazaar.

Story by Rijuta: Periodically, Sarama had held bazaars at her home so around March 1970, we had the good fortune to help prepare for and participate in one. Bazaars always required much planning and Sarama relished this because she was serving her “Gurudev" in a unique way.The day of the bazaar arrived. Many of us had worked hard to prepare for the whole day’s festivities. We had entertainment, lots of food and many surprisingly good items for sale. Guru honoured us by being present for much of the afternoon.

At the end of the day, I was stationed at the front door to say ‘goodbye’ to our guests. On his way out, Guru stopped by and said, “So this is Carol …„ and blessed me on the head. I was surprised because I wasn’t familiar with this gesture, and least of all did I expect to be the recipient of the feeling of so much love.

I held in the tears until Guru departed, then ran up the stairs to an empty room and tried to compose myself and figure out what had just happened to me. When I discussed the experience with Sarama, she suggested that Guru’s blessing might mean that I had been accepted as a disciple.

I asked her how she knew this, because I had not even requested to become a disciple. She explained that her name means ‘intuition’ and this was her strong feeling.

After a couple of days I asked Sarama to find out if I was accepted as a disciple. Shortly after my question was asked, I received a definite "YES!" In this way, Sarama’s friendship, care and hospitality changed the rest of my life, for I had now become a disciple of my soul’s eternal friend, Sri Chinmoy.

A pioneer divine enterprise: I Need This Store

After a few months, the basement was loaded with so much merchandise that I said to Guru, “There is so much left-over stuff in my basement that one of the disciples could open a thrift shop and we’d have a steady income for the Centre." Guru’s response was, “Wonderful idea, Sarama. You will do it!"

As soon as I overcame the initial shock of being the “lucky one," I went store-hunting. I found a little empty shop on Main Street in New Rochelle, just a few blocks from our house. It seemed like the ideal place, but I didn’t see any heating system in the store. Well, there wasn’t any, but the owner of the building said, “Don’t worry about that. We’ll put in a blower system before winter."

Everybody came to work at the new store. Both yoga students and disciples continued to do selfless service. Many of the newcomers eagerly welcomed the opportunity for regular selfless service.

The store had a rotating schedule of volunteers, mostly from among my local students, many of whom had also become members of the Sri Chinmoy Centre. One of the neighborhood kids also pitched in from time to time.

After a major transformation, the likes of which we have become accustomed to by now, inauguration day finally arrived, and we eagerly awaited Guru’s announcement of the name of the store. He turned to me and said, “I hope you will like the name: ‘I—Need—This—Store.’ The ‘I’ in the name is the Supreme." I could think of nothing to say, as a thrill ran up my spine. I Need This Store was born!

A youngster who had been hovering about and helping us through all the construction was seeing Guru for the first time. He confided in me, “When I look at Sri Chinmoy, I feel as though my heart is being pulled out of my chest!" This young boy, who was about twelve years old, continued to spend a lot of time hanging out at the store after school. He was soaking up the “good vibes." I sometimes wonder what became of him.

Many of my students came from wealthy families who often donated very expensive belongings to the store. There were items like a gold cross on a gold chain, gold rings and earrings and other valuables. We felt that those items should not be on the top of the counter, so we kept them in an open box on a shelf inside the counter, behind glass. If someone expressed interest in any of the items, we took the box out to show them what we had.

One of the volunteers didn’t seem to realise that the expensive items were not on the counter for a good reason, so she decided they should be displayed more accessibly. Neighborhood kids used to come into the store quite often and one day, at closing time, the lady who was working in the store noticed a number of items missing from the box, which was on the counter.

The boy who had responded so deeply to Guru’s presence said that he knew who had taken the missing items. He also said that this boy, when he stole things, always carried them on his person until he was able to unload them. He said that he might be able to get the rest of the boys to help get them back. I asked him to bring the boys to the pizza parlor next door for a little talk. We sat at a table and I explained the whole philosophy of karma to them.

They must have been convinced, because they went right out, jumped the boy and brought back all the stolen stuff. He still had it all with the exception of the gold cross and chain, which he had already unloaded. An interesting aside on the young thief was that he was apparently the son of a New Rochelle police officer.

When winter came it was more difficult to get volunteers to come into the store. The owner never did put in the heating system that he promised. I felt that his partner simply didn’t want to spend the money. Our workers were catching cold and one even got pneumonia. Quite understandably, they were very reluctant to continue working there.

Moving from Bancker Place to Queens

There were more and more Sri Chinmoy Centre activities in Queens, and Sunil and I were driving down from New Rochelle at 5:30 A.M. for six o’clock meditations with Guru. Sunil, who lived in my house, would drive and I would sit beside him, poking him with my elbow whenever I saw his head nodding.

One day in September, 1973, I received a phone call from Guru: “It is time for you to move to Queens. Kindly sell your house in New Rochelle and move I Need This Store to Queens also." The next day I put my house on the market and went to Queens to look for a new home.

Breaking the Lease

The move would require breaking our five-year store lease. Since we had never received the promised heat, we had a good excuse for breaking it. When I told our landlord how many people had gotten sick because of lack of heat and that I intended to break the lease and move, he said, “Don’t worry—no problem." His partner was not so kind and understanding. When we moved out we owed $400 rent for the time that we had still been operating the store. We fully intended to pay that amount, but he was suing us for $900. I offered the $400. Rejected!

I rounded up a few workers who had caught everything from colds to pneumonia, and we marched into court, ready to testify. I know nothing about legal matters, but I decided to go in without a lawyer and just state the facts. We were greeted by their lawyer, who told us that our landlord had broken his leg and the court date would have to be postponed!

Fast forward to the next court date. I rounded up my crew again, and was greeted by the same lawyer as we entered. “I’m not handling your case," he said. “I asked to be relieved. You know they have already lost more money on you than they are suing you for.“ Soon the new lawyer appeared and informed me once again that—new excuse—this case would have to be postponed. My team was even more annoyed than I was and frustrated at the prospect of having to come in for the third time. As we were leaving, the lawyer cornered me and said, “You know, if you lose this case, it will cost you a lot more because you’ll have to pay the court costs as well." I gave him a big smile and exclaimed, “But we’re not going to lose!"The days went by and we heard nothing about a new date for the hearing. Then, lo and behold, I received a letter from the lawyer saying that the landlord would settle for $200! Was Guru behind this? Smiling, I quickly wrote out a $200 check, put it in an envelope, and mailed it before they could realise the favor they had done us! We never heard from them again.

I NEED THIS STORE in Queens

In Queens, the store was soon relocated to Parsons Boulevard (which by now should be renamed ‘Divine Enterprise Boulevard’!) in a store-front that had formerly been a butcher shop! The worst job of all was cleaning up a small room at the back, which was to become our jewelry room. It had been the room where they prepared the meat, and the meat hooks along the wall were surrounded by inch-deep layers of fat. Not a vegetarian paradise! I don’t recall who were the stalwart souls who undertook that job, but it was done to a T-bone.

Children are usually sensitive to Guru’s vibes. A couple of kids, a brother and sister, came after school and on weekends, hanging around and helping however they could, both before and after the store opened. Someone had made some button pins with Guru’s picture on them. The little girl wore hers all the time. One day she showed up without it and told me that her mother always borrowed it for bingo night, because it brought her good luck!

There was a big basement below the store, very handy for sorting and storing new merchandise.  I would stop by from time to time to see how things were going or if anything was needed. Once, as I was leaving, I remarked to the volunteer at the table, “It would be great to have a bell to signal someone downstairs when it gets busy upstairs.„ She heartily agreed. The store was big and it was quite impossible for one person to cover the three room-sized areas that needed to be watched. I returned to the store later and was greeted with a wide-eyed, “You won’t believe this!„ She said, “After you left, a man came to the door and gave me this.„ She held out a pair of bells, for upstairs and downstairs, along with all the wiring needed for connecting them. “He told me, ‘Here, you need this.’ "

One day the store received a little surprise package. Any package would have been a surprise, since I Need This Store didn’t usually get any mail. The package contained a nice wallet, which I recognized as having been for sale in the store. No note enclosed. A guilty conscience redeemed?

People donated quite a few paintings. We did not price them very high, but one painting with a somewhat battered frame gave me a strange feeling that it might be worth something, so I priced it at $60. A disciple from Europe bought it. I guess he knew more about artwork than any of us did. The next time he came to Queens, he told us he had sold it for $400! Well, at least the money stayed in the family.

We also had a donation of a guitar from Mahavishnu John McLaughlin. It sold for what was a good price in those days. I’ve been told that now it would be worth at least ten times as much!

The End of I need this Store

The years passed by—and the rent kept going up and up and up. Finally the owner of the building, who had probably amassed a nice sum of money from his job as head waiter in a fancy restaurant, said that he was taking the store back to open his own place. Guru asked me to find another site, but unfortunately rents had become astronomical by then. Reluctantly we decided that the era of I Need This Store had come to an end.