EC Blog Archive for the ‘Internationality’ Category

From our Russian reporter: Most of our Russian group arrived to the Europe Center on April 31st but our journey started already a few days before in Berlin. There, as an unofficial start of the Russian invasion to the EC, we organized a party for the Big Moskovsky – the new Moscow Buddhist center project. It was our response to the Mila center party in December 2009 in Moscow.

At the EC, we were warmly welcomed home by the residents and soon after we received a direct transmission of how the center works and how to take care of the houses since we are in charge for its functioning during the whole week. Our Russian group took the responsibility for the cooking, the cleaning and taking care of the newcomers and guests. We also prepared and organize the program under the motto: Are you all Russians or what? This was the questions everyone who liked to visit our program this week had to answer while meditating, working and getting to know more about the Russian mind & culture.

Since the start of the week on May 3rd, we are exchanging a lot – the Russians made a presentation of the new center in Boyarsk on the Baikal lake and the new Moscow center and the EC team Beata explained about the history of the houses and presented what was going on at the EC last 12 months and what is planned for future. Marina Viller and Olga Komarova made a lecture about the 17th Karmapa Trinley Thaye Dorje’s tour through Russia in 2009. On Friday, one of the first traveling teachers in Russia, Tolek Sokolov, made a lecture about the history of Karma Kagyu Buddhists in Russia which has its roots in traditional Buddhist regions like Kalmykia in the 14th century.

But the Russian week is not over – there is still the whole weekend program, including a concert in Immenstadt, ahead of us! Come and join in!

The tone for the Swiss weekend was given among other things by the following message: “Dear all:-)) short reminder: bring a little bit of your favorite “schocki” with you to Allgäu for our friends from around the world “. We responded accordingly and as a result, on every table of the Europe Center, chocolate appeared as if it came from the horn of abundance.

The activity planning was prepared in advance. Each one of the bigger centers would take care of one of the meals. There would be lectures by our Swiss teachers: Anne, Markus and Matthias; the Swiss centers would present their projects; Amden would have a special presentation and Alain and Päddu,  our Bernese DJ’s, would animate the party on Saturday evening at the Bau Café.

But the Swiss can be flexible as well. The weather was gorgeous and roses, flowers and trees had to be planted! What else to do? The plan was dropped and we did what was needed to be done with a lot of pleasure.

The menus were typically Swiss. On Saturday evening the centers presented their projects and talked about their history: Bern presented its new G14 house; Basel, St. Gallen and Zurich talked about their newest plans. The friends from Luzern offered us “Vo Luzärn gage Wäggis zue” accompanied by a guitar and the typical rocking movement.

In the evening at the Bau Café the DJ’s Päddu and Alain, as well as our bartenders from Amden: Mona, Corinne and René animated the party with good music, drinks and fantastic Swiss “Bergkäse”.

On Sunday, big cleaning action, more planting and a video of the Swiss Stupas rounded the weekend up. It was a fantastic experience. We are all looking forward to repeating it again soon.

By the  Lithuanian Sangha

The first joint country weekend was a true success. The Lithuanian sangha is grateful to its Italian friends, who accepted and warmly supported the idea of letting  another  sangha co-organize a country weekend at the EC. We jumped the queue as usual and enjoyed it a lot.

The Lithuanian team arrived on Thursday night thanks to bank holidays back home. We enjoyed a nice relaxed Friday with a group trip to local roller coaster and waited for the Italians with a big Lithuanian dinner, which included 50 liters of red beat soup. The weekend continued with the Italian sangha arriving on Friday night, which one could recognize without leaving the room due to significantly increased sound level.

Together we listened to the lectures of Lithuanian and Italian traveling teachers,  presentations of Diamond Way Buddhism’s development in these two distant countries and enjoyed delicious Italian food. On Saturday night the Italians really proved they do it better, by presenting a real Italian trash party followed by karaoke show and tiramisu.

Two sanghas, that do not usually meet too often, enjoyed coming together and finding out new things about each other (for example where Lithuania really is on the map). And as it was said in one famous movie: “I think this is a beginning of a beautiful friendship!”

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.”

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!

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.

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… :)

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.

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!