A Sumptuous Treat

Barcelona July 13, 2004

When Amma's children learned that Amma would appear at the 4th Parliament of World's Religions, in Barcelona, Spain, devotees from all over Europe made a pilgrimage to listen to Amma deliver the final keynote address.

No one was quite sure what Amma would do after her speech. Apparently some devotees suspected Amma would do something, as very quickly a large line formed outside a hall that was a likely site for an event with Amma. All at once Amma approached the hall with a flock of her children following close behind. Without any formalities, Amma sat down and began receiving all those that had come to see her.

As Amma was giving darshan, she asked many devotees if they had eaten. Almost everyone replied that they hadn't. They had all been attending the programs at the Parliament of Religions since early in the afternoon with no break for food.

At one point during the darshan, two of Amma's children, Paul Sharma Lavan, who do most of the cooking on her European tour came for Darshan. With great concern Amma expressed to them her desire to see her hungry children fed.

Amma told them that many of the devotees at the program had not eaten, and then she asked them if they could cook some food for the devotees. It was close to midnight and the thought of whipping up food for more than 1000 seemed unlikely. Probably noticing that the gourmet cooks were not sure as to how they can feed thousands of hungry mouths within an hour, Amma came up with a quick and simple menu.

However, all the stores in Barcelona were closed. Nevertheless, it turns out that the hall where Amma was giving darshan had been used by the Sikhs who had come to participate in the conference and who had been serving free food all week. So then Amma asked if there was any food left from the Sikh kitchen preparations. It turns out there was only enough food for 150 people - pots of dhal with tofu, rice, jilebi (an indian sweet), roti (unleavened bread), some pasta and pieces of apple. It seemed as though there was no hope to feed everyone.

Before they began serving, Paul and Lavan brought a sample plate to Amma. While Amma continued hugging everyone, She very sweetly instructed the exact portions for each dish to be served so that no one would go hungry. It took several tries for the cooks to get it all correct.

Then something unexpected happened. Amma instructed the cooks to have the dinner plates ready for her, that she would come to the food line. Although delighted to hear Amma's words, they were confused about what Amma meant as it was clear darshan wouldn’t finish till very late. Additionally, she had arrived from the United States in the morning, delivered a keynote speech, was giving darshan late at night. Surely she would need to rest before returning to the United States tour. It was unthinkable that Amma would come and serve food after such a long day.

Amma's mysterious request to have meal plates ready for her became clear as soon as darshan ended. Amma stood up and went straight to the serving area. Amma's children in Europe have never had the opportunity to eat food offered from their Guru's hands and now they received a blessing that perhaps they had longed for only in their dreams. Amma served every single person until about 2:30 am. The sheer joy of joining in this spontaneous evening with Amma brought tears to many devotees.

Amma, like any good mother, wanted to make sure none of her children went to bed on an empty stomach. She personally served plate after plate to everyone in the hall. Most of the adjustments she made seemed arbitrary. She didn't want the food to run out, nor for there to be any waste. Little did any of us know that Amma was checking the amounts, that she was calculating to make it possible to serve more than 1000 people from food meant for only 150 people.

Through this beautiful time with Amma, she was showing us how she is both our Mother and Guru. She was constantly joking and playfully passing the plates to everyone, but every few minutes she would stop, and walk over to one of the pots and instruct the server to give more or less of the item.

As the last people came up to take their plates, Amma was scraping the bottom of the pots with her hands to distribute the last morsels of food to the last of her hungry children... no hungry people without a plate... no waste. Good calculations.

After having given so much to all her children throughout the day, it seemed there was no more Amma could do. Everyone's heart was overflowing with the love Amma had given that evening. Chokingly one of Amma's children from France mentioned "I had seen Amma feed balls of rice to a few people on the video and wondered if I would ever get such an opportunity. Today Amma gave me a whole plate of food with her own hands."

Before Amma finally began to leave the hall, she asked everyone, "Is everyone ok? Everyone happy?" Almost everyone responded with wide smiles and tears of joy.