Hati Parade!

Mayapur has 2 resident elephants--Vishnu Priya & Laxmi Priya.  Their seva is as follows:
Every Saturday evening, from the end of Kartik to Gaura Purnima (during the winter months), there is a Hati (Elephant) Parade.  Uttsav murtis of Radha-Madhava (Deities) are brought out and placed upon an elephant amidst ceremonial chanting and kirtan led by the gurukula (spiritually based school) boys.
They are paraded around the Mayapur campus and everyone can walk along with Them.

Some background: The hati parade started from the following event:  When the devotees were at Kumba Mela (a HUGE spiritual festival in India) with Srila Prabhupada, they noticed that important people were being paraded around on elephants.  They said to Prabhupada, "We should put you on an elephant!"  He responded, "Why do I need to be on an elephant?  Better to put Sri Sri Radha-Madhava on."  Thus, the Hati Parade began.

The video & pictures below will explain better than I am---check them out!

 This is the beginning, when the Deites are paraded out of the temple and placed on the elephants.

 

parading by Srila Prabhupada's samadhi

Beautiful rangoli (a specific Indian art form) lines the path.  This piece is done using flower petals and colored powders.

Before the Hati Parade started, the elephants were brought out daily to practice their roles in the parade.  You can just walk up to them and pet them.  They are very gentle and sweet.  They look right in your eyes and you can immediately see their intelligence and sense their awareness.  They'll lift their trunks to you and give you a sniff.  When you lovingly greet them and give them a pat, they sometimes respond with a gentle caress on your head with their trunks.  

Here are some pictures from when the elephants are out for their practice times

Nitai won't quite pet them--he did at first, but one of the elephants tried to "pet" him back with his trunk...from then on, Nitai prefers to be right next to them, but just out of "trunks" reach...