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Met a family friend of Ravi Shankar
31 May 2013
1.39am
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RedLennon
Whitewater WI
London Palladium
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5 July 2010
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I am not sure if this would fit better in the George section, so feel free to move it if need be!

 

My girlfriend and I went to the Mall of America in Minnesota over the weekend where we went into a shop called IRock.  It had a lot of band t shirts and some fun memorabilia such as coasters and glasses and stuff like that.  They had quite a variety of Beatles stuff and we were telling the shop owner, Jose, how awesome we thought the Beatles stuff was and that we were huge fans.  He told us that there was no way we were bigger fans than he was, and that he had all of their albums on mono and stereo, 5 of them signed by 3 of The Beatles.  This obviously peaked our interest greatly and I asked, “are you saying that you met them…”(my eyes grew big and my voice trembled slightly at this point)  He said that George had learned to play Sitar from one of his friends.  My girlfriend and I both said “You mean Ravi Shankar!” and he said yes, Ravi was very close with his family.  He then told us that When George was near the end of his life, he wanted to make one final trip to India, but did not want to stay at a hotel so he could avoid the media at all costs.  George ended up staying at Jose’s house for 2 weeks and Jose also picked up and dropped George off at the airport.

 

A couple of other interesting stories…

Jose asked George what his biggest regret in life was, and George said that joining the Beatles was.  It was always very hard for him to be overshadowed by the unstoppable force that was Lennon/McCartney.

When Jose still lived in India, he had a friend who managed a restaurant in London that the quarrymen had stopped at.  He told the Quarrymen that he played the guitar and then played a little bit for the Quarrymen and they were impressed. 30 years later, when George was on a trip to India he was with Ravi and Jose and George was telling them about a restaurant they had stopped at many years ago and there was a guitar player there who he was impressed with.  Small small world…Jose said I know exactly who you are talking about!  So George used Jose’s phone to call up the friend and George said “Hey *friends name* This is George Harrison , I am here with Ravi and Jose and wanted to see if you wanted to join us”    “I’ll be there in 10 minutes” replied the friend

Jose said that for as big of a Beatles fan he was, his wife was an even bigger one and had always dreamed of meeting The Beatles.  Jose asked Ravi if that was a possible feat.  Ravi said that if you ever come to America, give me one months notice and I can make it happen.  Years went by and Jose and his wife had finally gotten the money to go to America, and they decided the wanted to settle.  Unfortunately, something happened with Jose’s wife and she passed away shortly after they came to America so she was never able to meet The Beatles

 

As we left the store, we shook Jose’s hand and were nearly breathless at some of the stories we had just been told.  Especially at the fact that we just shook a hand who had probably shook George Harrisons before!!!

 

Sorry for the long story and post, but I am sure you fellow Beatlemaniacs will be able to appreciate it as much as we did

 

 

 

31 May 2013
5.37pm
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fabfouremily
Sitting in an English garden
Rishikesh
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What a brilliant coincidence! :D

Call me whatever you want to call me but I really hate to think that George regretted joining The Beatles. I know he later felt bitter about the entire 60s really but I still like to think that they all got over the arguments that the break up brought, and later remembered that they did in fact love each other once up on a time, and recognise that there was a part of them that still did. I don’t really want to think that George still felt like that even when his time became limited.

Moving along in our God given ways, safety is sat by the fire/Sanctuary from these feverish smiles, left with a mark on the door.

(Passover - I. Curtis)

1 June 2013
3.47am
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RedLennon
Whitewater WI
London Palladium
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I agree that maybe he didn’t regret it, he may have just wished that such a large majority of his time in his body was him being known solely as being a Beatle.  He was also very hopped up on pain meds at the time..but I guess we will never know

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