EC Blog Archive for the ‘INTERNATIONALITY’ Category

By the Slovak sangha:

“Only a week after Valentine’s day, our hearts are beating fast again. Not only did we have the chance to take care of our amazing Europe Center and help its wonderful residents & team, but we also had a chance to fall in love with the place, if it had not already happened a long time ago. 

Slovak cooks cooked healthy and delicious international meals, as well as less healthy but even more delicious Slovak specialties. Besides eating, we meditated a lot and listened to Dharma lectures by Slovak traveling teachers. Saturday evening was dedicated to the history of Diamond Way Buddhism in Slovakia. One could learn that DWB in Slovakia was born only fourteen years ago in the hearts of karate kids, who got inspired by Lama Ole Nydahl. Instead of working only with their bodies, they started to work with their minds as well. We watched a short movie about Slovak Buddhist centers and an inspiring documentary about a journey some of the Slovak sangha made to Mustang. Later on, we enjoyed some social time together with many surprises…

On Sunday morning, we listened to the last lecture, meditated together and cleaned up after lunch. Some made new friends, some deepened old friendships, and some fell in love. This place is just magic. Coming here, it welcomed us with a huge hug of snow and leaving it, it waved us goodbye with rays of sun.”

By meike

It is Sunday evening and the Europe Center seems completely deserted, despite the few people sipping tea, meditating, wandering around and napping after a long and intensive weekend. At least it feels like it, in comparison to the full house only a few hours ago when the Transmission weekend ended with a common meditation on the 16th Karmapa.

The subject - How I met the 16th Karmapa - presented by friends practicing Diamond Way Buddhism already around 30 years, attracted people from many countries. Not even the true Allgäu-winter conditions with half-a-meter of new snow every day, nor the fact that the provisory limited gompa was packed, would discourage friends to come.

The personal experiences, histories, never-before-seen pictures and videos we shared in the last 2 days brought us all closer again to the great inspiring teacher and yogi of Tibet, H.H. the 16th Karmapa. Through his openness to Western students and the power of his wisdom and joy, he planted the seeds for the rapid growth of the Diamond Way Buddhism in the West.

Even today, almost 30 years after his passing, the 16th Karmapa remains the essential source of inspiration and blessing that materializes in the ever growing number of DWB centers around the world. May we all be inspired by his example!

p.s.: many worked hard to make this event possible but the indisputable heroes of the weekend are all the kitchen-magicians and snow-fighters that made the roads and paths accessible. Thank you, friends!

By Martin

Last weekend friends representing the Europe Center in over twenty countries, so-called EC keypeople, came together to meet and work on topics like the role of the EC in the future and the new EC building project - the new big gompa and living space for residents and visitors. This unique event was opened by Lama Ole and Caty on Saturday morning and continued through the whole beautiful sunny winter weekend. More then 300 computers were connected via streaming from all over the world.

The Mittel-Rhein sangha hosted the weekend and Markus from Finland & helpers cooked. The conditions were all there to work, get inspired, make new friends and have a fun, or simply share a great and meaningful time.

Everybody was very much inspired by Lama Ole’s vision. The big wish is to build in the next three years a new gompa in the barn that fits the needs almost perfectly, a common kitchen on the ground floor of the barn and a new building for living next to it. The motto „Let´s do it again!“ is now in everybody’s hearts and we know we will manage again.

By klara

There are a few different ways of equipping the Europe Center with new and needed things.

Sometimes we find the original equipment in the “secret chambers” of the historic EC houses, or we buy inexpensive items in places like Hong Kong or India and have them delivered by our “flying Sangha” (friends working for airlines) or we get very generous presents from our Sangha friends worldwide. For example, you might see our beautiful new furniture in the architecture office. This very nice gift is a present from our friends and we would like to thank them for this!

There is always the possibility to donate a few practical things for the Europe Center - if you feel this extra surplus, please check the EC wishlist: http://www.europe-center.org/come-join/wishlist. Just  do not forget to check your plans with a contact person, otherwise we could end up with 108 hoovers…

By klara

By klara

The phowa course with Lama Ole ended on Monday morning with very good signs and already in the afternoon we could welcome Sherab Gyaltsen Rinpoche, a highly respected lama of the Kagyu lineage. Sherab Rinpoche started the 72 hours Chenrezig meditation and we are very happy to meditate in his powerfield of Maniwa: the one who encouraged others to recite the Mani mantra more than one billion (1,000,000,000) times.  Rinpoche and Lama Ole are regularly coming to meditate with people in the big gompa tent and more then 40 countries are simultaneously joining the meditation via streaming.

By klara

Beautiful, warm and sunny days made a great setting for the second transmission weekend. Many friends made their way to the EC on Friday to hear Matt Huddleston tell many interesting and exciting stories about the Karma Kagyu transmission lineage. With his English style he really brought the history to life.

Saturday, after an hour of Ngöndro practice, Pedro Gomez kept the gompa fully concentrated with stories of how H.H.the 17th Gyalwa Karmapa was found. Hardly anybody moved, not wanting to miss the beautiful descriptions and anecdotes Pedro shared with lots of humor.

In the evening Pedro and his wife Dorit illustrated the incredible stories with pictures and videos. Mäc (Matthias Weitbrecht) continued with more pictures and fact finding, complimented by Pedro, Michael van den Hoet and Caty. After the pictures the panel talked about how the 17th Karmapa controversy unrolled.

Then on Sunday, Michael van den Hoet shared his wealth of knowledge. Caty concluded the second transmission weekend with questions and answers and talked about how our modern and western style has been developing over the years.

Dear friends, even though this was only our second transmission weekend, it is clear we have established a strong EC tradition!

By lasse

International travelling teachers meeting took place in the EC last weekend. Around 50 teachers came from all around the world to meet, get to know each other and talk about different topics such as thankfulness, sangha, EC and also how to meet more often and how to deepen the friendship.

Whole weekend was full of inspiring talks how different people became traveling teachers, stories about interesting lectures one gave or memories of those who met with 16. Karmapa.

That three days were covered in a very nice atmosphere and it seems that this international TTs winter gathering will become an annual tradition.

By klara

On the weekend of 21-22 February, representatives from the cities, nominated as European Capitals of Culture, came together at the EC. The international workshop was joined by Austrians, Hungarians, Lithuanians and Germans, who represented Linz, Pecs, Vilnius, Rurhgebiet and Liverpool. We worked on the common vision of this exciting project, shared the experiences from different countries and presented our plans for 2009 and 2010.

The sanghas from the different cities will organize statue and thangka exhibitions, courses, public lectures and meditations, Buddhism and Science groups, film festivals and many other events. The main task of this project is to take part in the cultural life of Europe and to present our timeless values to society.

Our purpose has changed from not only participating in European Capitals of Culture projects to generally participating in European culture. Lama Ole told us that we should definitely take part in the cultural life of Europe, because we have something to offer that nobody else has.

You don’t have to be from the city who is nominated as European Capital of Culture to join. If you are interested write to us: info@diamondway-culture.org .

While all of this was going on the first floor of the villa, in the main hall on the ground floor, a small team of residents and friends were on their hands and knees, carrying out the painstaking job of scrubbing the floor clean with small brushes and olive soap. This was done three times over the weekend and Monday. The immaculately clean floor was oiled on Wednesday and finally sealed on Thursday. We hope you will all enjoy the transformation.

By ecteam

We have a new guest in the EC - smiling thangka painter named Tashi. Lama Ole invited him to EC when they met each other in Russia on the place called Elista. Tashi came last week and immediately started to work on his new paintings. He knows every detail by heart and if you ask him how many years he had to learn, he always smiles and replies: Oh, many many. Many many…

By klara