Ome, Asatoma, Sattoma, Sadgamaaya, Tamasoma, Jotyrgamaya, Mritiurma, Amritam Gamaya.

Ome, Shantay, Shantay, Shantay. Ome, lead us from the unreal to the real,

lead us from darkness unto light,

lead us from death to immortality.

Ome, peace, peace, peace.

Oam Shriyati Raja, Vivek Anandha, Sura, Sajitsukh, Svarauparupaya, Svami Nita Bhaarhaer.

Salutations to Swami Vivekananda.

Today, welcome to this very auspicious day, we are celebrating the 158th birth anniversary of Swami Vivekananda, especially here.

It's being celebrated around the world, but here especially, this center, we had the

proud heritage of having been founded by Swami Vivekananda himself.

This was the first Vedantah society.

After he came to the West in 1893,

the World Parliament of Religions,

and then New Yorkers, always enterprising,

they grabbed him first.

And they said, you come to our city and he start something. So that was the first

Vedanta Society, 1894. If you look outside, it says Vedanta Society of New York founded in 1894.

I often see people walking past, looking at it casually, then stopping and coming back and taking a look again.

1894? So many years ago. In this talk, what I shall do is,

Swami Vivekananda gave a talk, the real and the apparent man. And he gave this talk in New York,

in the Vedantia society. Not in this building, because this building we got a hundred years ago in 1920, but before that it was in different rented locations.

So it was a talk given in New York, and we shall reflect upon what he said in this talk.

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