388 Sri Caitanya-caritamrta

The residents of Vaikuntha have brilliantly black complexions much more
fascinating and attractive than the dull white and black complexions found in the
material world. Their bodies, being spiritual, have no equals in the material world.
The beauty of a bright cloud when lightning flashes on it merely hints at their
beauty. Generally the inhabitants of Vaikuntha dress in yellow clothing. Their
bodies are delicate and attractively built, and their eyes are like the petals of lotus
flowers. Like Lord Visnu, the residents of Vaikuntha have four hands, decorated
with a conchshell, wheel, club and lotus flower. Their chests are beautifully broad
and fully decorated with necklaces of a brilliant diamond-like metal surrounded by
costly jewels never to be found in the material world. The residents of Vaikuntha
are always powerful and effulgent. Some of them have complexions like red coral
cat’s eyes and lotus flowers, and each of them has earrings of costly jewels. On
their heads they wear flowery crowns resembling garlands.

In the Vaikunthas there are airplanes, but they make no tumultuous sounds.
Material airplanes are not at all safe; they can fall down and crash at any time, for
matter is imperfect in every respect. In the spiritual sky, however, the airplanes are
also spiritual, and they are spiritually brilliant and bright. These airplanes do not
fly business executives, politicians or planning commissions as passengers, nor do
they carry cargo or postal bags, for these are all unknown there. These planes are
for pleasure trips only, and the residents of Vaikuntha fly in them with their heavenly
beautiful fairylike consorts. Therefore these airplanes, full of residents of Vaikuntha,
both male and female, increase the beauty of the spiritual sky. We cannot imagine
how beautiful they are, but their beauty may be compared to the clouds in the sky
accompanied by silver branches of electric lightning. The spiritual sky of Vaikuntha-
loka is always decorated in this way.

The full opulence of the internal potency of Godhead is always resplendent in
the Vaikunthaloka, where goddesses of fortune are ever-increasingly attached to
serving the lotus feet of the Personality of Godhead. These goddesses of fortune,
accompanied by their friends, always create a festive atmosphere of transcendental
mirth. Always singing the glories of the Lord, they are not silent even for a moment.

There are unlimited Vaikuntha planets in the spiritual sky, and the ratio of these
planets to the material planets in the material sky is three to one. Thus the poor
materialist is busy making political adjustments on a planet that is most insignificant
in God’s creation. To say nothing of this planet earth, the whole universe, with innu-
merable planets throughout the galaxies, is comparable to a single mustard seed in a
bag full of mustard seeds. But the poor materialist makes plans to live comfortably
here and thus wastes his valuable human energy in something that is doomed to
frustration. Instead of wasting his time with business speculations, he might have
sought the life of plain living and high spiritual thinking and thus saved himself
from perpetual materialistic unrest.

Even if a materialist wants to enjoy developed material facilities, he can transfer
himself to planets where he can experience material pleasures much more advanced
than those available on earth. The best plan is to prepare oneself to return to the
spiritual sky after leaving the body. However, if one is intent on enjoying material
facilities, one can transfer himself to other planets in the material sky by utilizing
