The story goes as follows: Rarely do we miss a morning japa walk in the pristine fresh air of the Belgian Ardennes. The neighbours and local farmers know us and we wave to them every morning, as they go on their daily duties. It is quite natural for us to see the pieces of land for sale around Radhadesh, what houses are for rent, and who died or who moved in recently. Sometimes, devotees from elsewhere contact us to find out if we know of any land or houses to buy.

It was February 2018, when a handwritten sign showed up on the gate of this land. We were in contact with one devotee friend, who was interested in buying land around Radhadesh to build an Ayurvedic centre there. We immediately contacted the owner for more details. The price was good, however our friend needed more time to think about it. 

In the meantime, we were looking for land where we could build our own warehouse. BLS stores about 100 pallets in Herstal (55km from Radhadesh) where we rent some space in a manned warehouse. We discussed on several occasions that it would be better to have our own warehouse closer to BLS that would facilitate us better in our daily organization. Every day we struggle with not enough space, so we started to look for land in the local business areas where the price of land is very cheap. The local authorities set up these places to encourage business in their area. We had applied to the industrial zone in Barvaux (just 10 kilometers from Radhadesh) and had an initial meeting with the responsible person who gathers all these applications - it took time for them to process everything. 

Time goes by and Visnu Murti goes to India and comes back in April. The "For Sale" sign on the land has disappeared, so we thought that it was sold. We also received a reply from the people rejecting our application, the reason being is that we are an A.S.B.L, a non-profit organization. Their aim is clear, they want to create local jobs and how can a small ASBL guarantee them this aim? We hang our heads down, "Oh well..."

More time goes by and suddenly we see that there is a new sign on the same land - this time it is from a real estate agency. The land didn't get sold as we had thought. It was clear by now that we will not be able to get a place for a warehouse in the business areas and thus we started to think about a property that is walking distance from our head office and that we could also include much needed space for our expanding Vanipedia. The size of the land allowed us to dream about nice gardens as well.

We called the agency who gave us an appointment to meet the owner and on August 26th 2018 (Balarama's appearance day) we signed a contract to buy the land. The final purchase with the notary took place on November the 11th, 2018. This happened to be the anniversary of Srila Prabhupada's disappearance day.

With Srila Prabhupada's and Lord Balarama's blessings the Vani Village and Vaikuntha Gardens project was set in motion. Now after 4 years of planning the build has started. Follow us on this journey.