EC Blog Archive for the ‘SITE PROGRESS’ Category

Only five weeks to go until the 2nd International Summer Course with  H.H. 17th Karmapa Thaye Dorje, H.H. Shamar Rinpoche, Sherab Gyaltsen Rinpoche and Lama Ole Nydahl, things are getting up to full speed at the EC. The atmosphere is more relaxed than last year, but there is still plenty to do and both pro-craftsmen and helpers are needed. So, check out the ongoing activities and if you would like to come and join in, please contact us at: join@europe-center.org. Everybody is very welcome!

The construction team has been working rapidly for weeks building up the brand new “Baucafé” on the meadow next to the villa, over-viewing breathtakingly beautiful Alpsee lake. And although until now it “only” consists of wooden beams, windows and a roof, it’s already a wonderful place to spend an evening with friends from all over the world who have come to help — chilling out quite romantically in the straw after a day of meditating and working together.

But there’s a lot more fun and activities going on: the road is being fixed, wood is taken from the forest and being prepared and stored, the garden is getting more and more beautiful, the roofs and chimneys have to be repaired… and in the villa’s basement, the new “lounge” is being refurbished and should be ready for the Summer Course as well.

And if all this wasn’t already enough — the statue exhibition in the villa is a big success with the Immenstadt public. A lot of visitors from town and surroundings come every Sunday to take part in the guided tours  and thereby make their own connection with Buddhism and the Europe Center.

This is, of course, all just besides the extensive building-up of kitchen, dining tent,  gompa tent and the infrastructure for the Summer Course itself. So be spontaneous — just get a few of your Sangha friends into a car, onto a bus or train and come to support the build-up phase if you can. We’re looking forward to seeing you!

By admin

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

Due to the condition of some of our trees between the villa and road, it was decided that a selection needed to come down. The up-side of this is that the view from the villa and land above to the lake is much improved. So last week some contractors, under Jürgen’s watchful eye, felled many of our trees and now we have enough wood for several different projects.

By cristina

To remind all the changes we always try to document how the place looked like and how does it look now. These before and after pictures seem to be quite impressive, don´t you think? The statue in the main hall, the roof, the barn, new bathroom, Lama´s flat and of course the weather changes…

By klara

The work is going on really fast. Let´s check it out - before and after…

The main house

The summer course eating tent platform

The future dormitory

The future welcoming and exhibition area

The summer course water system

The Gompa

The new roof of the second house

The dining room

The future café

The second house backside roof

The winter and spring

By klara

Czech students had amazing opportunity to go to EC and work here. We organized collection called ,,Good impressions for everyone’’. Working people gave us money and masseurs gave massages in the Brno center and all money supported our journey to EC. We are so happy to be here and participate in this wonderful project. We are having great time and lots of joy together with people from Europe.
Except us arborists (treeworkers)from Czech republic and Germany came and we all together took care of garden and forest. We were cutting branches of trees near the house for their health and keeping the good shape. Also we cleaned the forest and built the fence against the cows. It was hard work but everybody enjoyed it. We are so happy to be here and do things together. Everyone who has a chance to go here and join activity does something that will benefit all.

By cristina

By cristina

Monday morning main activity in the EC was our great hall renovation: Walls were vacuum-cleaned, holes carefully filled, surfaces gently caressed and finally covered in 2-3 layers of original paint. All done by Beate’s “Dream Team” of happy, dilligent women. After work, the good people of Immenstadt went to visit the good people of Schwarzenberg on extension of a generous sushi invitation from Michaela and Gabi. The evening offered plenty of raw fish, stories, laughing and dancing. In recent days, Bernhard from Garmish has continued work on the hall bathroom, the road construction trucks slowly move ever further up the road and Patricia, Alex and Thorulf’s rooms are closer to perfection thanks to our “apartment hero”, Marco. At the present moment, the hall is soon ready for removal of foil and felt and another great working weekend is coming up. Our beloved Klara and Roman have had to stay in Czech Republic for at little while longer, but to our great joy, their beautiful faces joined in on Skype last night.

So a lot is going on inside and outside and we will have the perfect frames for our activity here for a very long time into the future. But as Lama Ole says; “In this company we sell only one product and that is human development”. And as work goes along, there is a continuing flow of human exchange and discovery. People meet, talk, feel each other and realise new things. All with great openness and as family and this all the time expands our minds and brings us even closer. For example Rafal finding great inspiration from hearing stories from Verena about her and Jürgen’s meditations in most of our European retreat centres, Beate reading the draft of An Ja’s book of her life story and getting to know another human being better, and our soon-to-be-parents of two babies Philip and Mirjana sharing their story of how it all happened and the joys (and rearrangement of bed room to fit in the new residents) of bringing new life into the EC.

All our Kagyus are truly connecting, touching and impressing each other here. We get closer to each other, constantly discovering new human qualities and great richness. Everyone contributes with deep power, wisdom and experience, and in this way, our international mosaic starts to work. This deep level of wild and meaningful human exchange - also on the secret level - is what will really secure our future together.

By Martin