Gouranga
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Gouranga
A Gouranga installation on a railway bridge in Leicester.
Gouranga, or Gauranga, is said to originate in the
Hare Krishna religious movement, whose founding father, Shri Krishna Caitanya
Mahaprabhu, was also called Gaura, or Gauranga. In popular culture it is
accepted generally as a word meaning simply 'be happy', although the literal
Sanskrit translation is 'light/golden-limbed'.
Stickers bearing the word Gouranga or stating "Call out Gouranga and be
happy!" have been appearing on bridges over motorways and railways in Scotland
and the North of England. It has also appeared on public buildings over recent
years, and stickers and fridge magnets with the phrase have also been handed out
by "monks" at music festivals throughout the UK, such as Glastonbury and
Download.
Background
Caitanya Mahaprabhu (Gouranga)
The literal translation from the original Sanskrit language means "Golden (Gaura)
Limbed (Anga)" referring to Caitanya Mahaprabhu's golden skin complexion.
Within Gaudiya Vaishnava tradition it is said that whoever hears, reads, or
speaks the name "Gouranga" is blessed with "amazing fortune" and happiness due
to Caitanya Mahaprabhu's extraordinary saintly nature.
Caitanya Mahaprabhu was born in Mayapur, West Bengal, in 1486. His activities
and teachings are described in detail in the book "Teachings of Lord Caitanya"
and the multi-volume "Sri Caitanya- caritamrta." (See also Srimad-Bhagavatam 11.5.32.)
Pronunciation
The Urban Dictionary has an audio file giving the correct pronunciation of
the word Gouranga:
[1] [ˈgurəŋgə]
The C in Caitanya is pronounced like the ch in cheese.
Sometimes the secondary title Mahaprabhu is also added, meaning "Great
Master".
Other Theories on the Origin of Gouranga
1) It is the name of a bridge building company in the North of England
2) The makers of
Grand Theft Auto (video game) created the craze to publicize the first game
in the series
3) A clothing company started it as a publicity stunt
4) Recently, in a video
meme World Giant, an extension of Frank Shepard Fairey's André the Giant street
art
campaign, claimed responsibility for Gouranga.
Email and ICQ spam
A spate of
spam
emails have also appeared, and are sometimes known simply as the Hare Krishna
spam:
Subject: Gouranga
Call out Gouranga be happy!!!
Gouranga Gouranga Gouranga ....
That which brings the highest happiness!!
When the
International Society for Krishna Consciousness was contacted about the
emails, there was no reply from the organization, but an unknown person
responded independently and described their motives:
Hello Joe,
I am just very enthusiastic person, who wants everybody to be happy.
:)))
The spam can be blocked if desired by filtering out emails from the address
NitaiGouranga@aol.com, which, while fake, is used consistently for this purpose.[2]
The same happened on ICQ, so seen on 4th of December 2005. ICQ # 209142623
with the Profile "Username: Gouranga, female, 21 years, located in Ghana" sends
the message
Call out Gouranga Be Happy...
Gouranga Gouranga Gouranga
That which brings the highest happiness!
to random ICQ Users and does not further answer to ICQ messages sent back. It
is possible to protect oneself from this by moving this user to the ignore list
or by not allowing messages from unknown users (ICQ-options). Remarkable is that
the three exclamation marks are now replaced by three dots. The person who
received this did not catch the IP-address of the ICQ-user 209142623. With the
IP-address the location of the spammer could possibly be revealed.
Gouranga in Grand Theft Auto
The word is involved in one of the many politically incorrect
easter eggs in part one of the video game series Grand Theft Auto.
The game displays the text "GOURANGA!" whenever the player runs over a group
of Hare Krishnas, who are occasionally featured as pedestrians. A related easter
egg in
Grand Theft Auto 2 is the "ELVIS HAS LEFT THE BUILDING!" message, displayed
when the player runs over a group of Elvis impersonators.
Notes
External links
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This guide is licensed under the GNU
Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.
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