Smile of the Beyond
Walk up the hill from the Parsons Boulevard F train station and you’ll pass a squat, triangular building festooned with orange signs proclaiming “End fascism,” “End colonialism,” “End misogyny” and more. The next storefront overflows with plants, their waxy leaves pressed against the windows. Outside, a huge parrot sits in a cage. It’s as if this entire stretch of Jamaica has made a pact to stay wonderfully, delightfully strange.
Once past this anomaly—actually a barbershop called Cutty’s, where Knicks players go to get designs shaved into their heads—you’ll spot a line of sky blue storefronts up ahead. That’s when you’ll know you’ve reached Smile of the Beyond. Opened in 1972 under the auspices of Sri Chinmoy, an Indian spiritual leader who lived and meditated here, Smile of the Beyond comes across exactly as its name would suggest: a brighter, happier, healthier version of the city’s well-worn coffee shops and greasy spoons.
Yet while newspapers breathlessly proclaim the demise of the diner, this one is still going strong, not despite its location but perhaps because of it: “The heart of our clientele is the traditionally African-American community in Jamaica,” explained the manager, Scott Schuetzler, over a plate of chilaquiles, rice and beans. “Now it’s becoming much more diverse. We’re even getting customers from the airport,” he says, referring to nearby JFK. “People get off the plane, Google ‘vegetarian food,’ and find us.”
Menu items at Smile of the Beyond, which started life as an ice cream parlor, range from traditional diner dishes like pancakes and omelets to the salads, grain bowls and tempeh stir fries now commonplace in Manhattan and Brooklyn, but still rare in these parts of Queens, classified as “food deserts” for their supposed lack of healthy dining options.
The café is steadfastly vegetarian, Schuetzler explains, because “Sri Chinmoy believed eating meat would disturb your consciousness,” but this was before veganism became widespread. “Clearly there are issues with [animal processing] in today’s world,” he added, “and we also support the vegan community.”
The diner’s sky blue interior matches the building’s continuous façade, also home to a gift shop and health food store run by Sri Chinmoy followers. One wall is plastered with joyous abstract canvases, painted in the late-1970s to mask damage from a fire next door; just a few of the thousands of works of art Sri Chinmoy produced over a lifetime. In these dots, speckles and swirls of color, like mystical Rorschach blots, you can choose to see birds, plant life or the vibrant colors of local street murals.
You can also appreciate how Sri Chinmoy, who died in 2007, approached everything he did—be it visual art, music, poetry, meditation or fitness—with a dedication that would put today’s iPhone-wielding hordes to shame. One of his enduring accomplishments takes place just a mile away: the Sri Chinmoy Self-Transcendence 3,100-Mile Race, an ultramarathon in which participants repeatedly circle a single Jamaica block, covering nearly 60 miles a day for 52 straight days. The objective, the website says, is to “set new world records and gain spiritual insights.”
If this sounds like a bit much for the average visitor, Schuetzler also mentions the free meditation sessions offered regularly at a nearby center. It’s quite possible that, after devouring the vegetarian steak burger, one of the diner’s original items, you could choose to set off on a daunting long-distance race course, or simply settle in for a silent hour of self-discovery. Both would be equally welcomed and encouraged by the devoted staff of Sri Chinmoy followers at Smile of the Beyond.
Cutty’s
Smile of the Beyond | @smileofthebeyond
Sri Chinmoy Self-Transcendence 3,100-Mile Race
