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… :)

Czechs are attacking the EC!

Ноябрь 14, 2009

This was it: the very first country weekend in the EC! Friends from the Czech Republic came to spend two days in the autumnal Europe Center to use and run the place in a way that every country decides for itself.

When the idea of the country weekend appeared a few months ago, we already had a good feeling about it because it is a great opportunity to spend some time here. The country weekend is based on the chance that everybody can arrange the programm, time, food etc. here. So the Czechs came with a bus of friends to prepare famous traditional dumplings for everybody, to make two meditation sessions a day, to listen to lectures of travelling teachers, to throw a party and to take care of the kitchen and all the things in the house. So everyone got a taste of life here and enjoyed the villa, the gompa and the nature around.

The country weekends are no closed events, everybody is welcome to be here and to get a feeling of the style how different countries do the things. After this first one, many more are coming up: Slovak weekend, Italian weekend, Swiss weekend, Russian week etc.. You can just check our EC calendar.

As we all know the very good tool on the way to enlightenment is to leave the own village and travel to different countries and break a lot of concepts. And if you cannot travel everywhere – just come to the EC, the whole world comes by here anyway!

72 hours meditation with Sherab Gyaltsen Rinpoche

Август 11, 2009

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.

The Second Transmission Weekend

Май 12, 2009

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!