- The most important thing that the temple does
is to connect people.
So, not only during the difficult times
but also during times when there is
need for community to be together.
(gentle music)
- Deepak, your tea is ready.
- Do you want chai, Dad?
- Sure, yeah. - Okay, I'll give it to you.
- You wanna have chai?
- I'm Deepak Kulkarni.
- And I'm Sujata Kulkarni.
We've been married for the last 24 years.
I am the social one.
- And I'm always pontificating (laughs).
- As an immigrant,
there are so many challenges
and there are so many things that are so new to you.
- Radha Madhav Dham is one of the oldest
Hindu temples in Austin.
- When you find something like Radha Madhav Dham
so close to your heart,
it just gives you hope.
It just took me right back to my hometown
and you know, sitting with my family.
I think that's when I found my home
away from my home.
We attended events as a visitor for years
but we were not as involved
until our kids were born.
Making sure our kids are connected to our roots
was something that got us into doing volunteering
at the temple.
Two days before Valentine's day,
we had the freezing temperature.
- We never expected for the storm to be this big actually.
We've been in Austin for close to 30 years,
never seen anything like it.
And once on Sunday, the power went off around 2:00 AM.
We really felt,
you know, how severe it's gonna be.
- Because we don't wanna get cold, right?
- Uhum.
- We woke up feeling a little cold, right?
Because obviously there was no heater running.
- I think by about 6:30 AM or so,
the entire house was kinda freezing actually.
We were all wearing three, four layers
and sitting in the house right in front of the fireplace.
- Taking turns.
Monday night was pretty brutal for everybody.
Next day, everybody woke up
just not in a good mood. (laughs)
- We were cold, we ran out of all the firewood.
It was huge when the temple called us.
(indistinct)
- Typically, it takes about 25 minutes
for us to get to the temple,
and that journey took us probably two hours.
It almost seemed like a
dystopian movie. - Yeah.
- But once we reached the temple,
there was a huge sense of
relief. - Relief.
We are here.
It was just like a joyous moment for everybody
because we've not seen each other for such a long time,
not stayed at the temple for such a long time.
Just to have the warmth (laughs),
I think that was,
that was sufficient for the kids.
It's just a true blessing, you know,
for us to be in that environment,
be able to be so close
to God
and spend such difficult times
in such a beautiful way.
- Yeah, perfect.
- Finally, Friday afternoon,
we ended up leaving and coming back to the house.
Power was on, everything looked good.
We had a sense of relief
That things are (laughs)
getting back to normal after four days.
- There we go,
that's what it's supposed to look like.
- We kind of realized how privileged we were
to have the temple as a central place.
- One of the things that being at the temple teaches you
is compassion.
It wasn't just our family,
there were so many families that they reached out to.
- This is sort of part of the Hindu faith where
we trying to help anybody.
They don't have to be Hindu,
they don't have to be...
They could be anybody.
It's just a humanitarian thing.
If we have a very simple concept
of humans helping each other,
that spreads across
to make the world a so much better place.
- Oh, this is (inaudible)
You have to give it to everybody.
It's the faith and the comfort that you have
that yes, we have the power above all of these
that takes care of you.
I think that gives you the strength to fight.
(calming music)