Forty years after it was founded, New Vrindaban is still a long way from the utopia Prabhupada envisioned. Yet followers stick around and find strength in the community of believers they’ve created. New Vrindaban may not yet be a failed experiment — just a community in a mid-life crisis.

“There’s nowhere in this world where you can escape difficulties,” Chris says. “You can’t just come here and live in the temple and think it’s like blissful heaven — because it’s not.”

Devananda agrees. The few followers left at New Vrindaban are like fish, deep in the open water, he says. While storms on the surface roll the waves and toss boats, the fish below keep swimming on and on and on, oblivious to the tempest above. Like those fish whose mouths open and close, rhythmically, hypnotically, Hare Krishna followers chant. Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna. Devananda says that he’d like to get a maple-syrup operation started at New Vrindaban. It hasn’t happened yet.

“We’re just trying to keep our one temple from burning down,” Chris says.

For four decades, Hare Krishna followers have struggled to keep New Vrindaban afloat. It remains to be seen if the community will make it through its mid-life crisis.