Hello All,
I hope you are all well and that England is providing you with a warm and sunny summer!
My time here is flying by and I am now well over halfway through my visit. The pattern here seems to be a period of intense activity followed by a short period of change and transition into another period of intense activity. I've heard that Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche called this sort of thing the great Zen monastic joke, lots of formalism and ritual combined with constant activity as a method to stun the ego into a state of numb surrender! Fortunately, we do get one free day per week.
Recent highlights have included a sponsored overnight walk for Cancer Canada. This was my first exploration into the local town of Cheticamp and proved to be good fun despite getting a soaking. They had a Scottish marching band, folk music and country and western (all night - urghhh!). We camped overnight and I got a good drenching during my period of the walk (the only rain all night). Thanks for all of your sponsorship, I raised about 100 GBP.
After this we had a busy time preparing for and looking after Karme Senghe Rinpoche, the nephew of Chogyam Trungpa. He was here for about a week and gave initiations to some of the tantric students and a couple of talks to the entire house. I had the opportunity to spend some time as one of his attendants, making him cups of tea and helping to serve his meals. The formality involved with this is quite astonishing, even his washing up had a protocol and required separate washing cloths and drying up towels. He seemed kind and easy going. A few of us spent an evening with him looking at some of his monastaries (he is the Abbott of several) on the internet. He laughed a lot and seemed to enjoy a joke.
We have also had a visit from Shibata Sensei a Japanese Kyudo (archery) Master in his late eighties. He was a very interesting character with some great stories about Samarai and Japanese culture. He gave a demonstration of Kyudo despite being quite frail. I enjoyed being his personal attendant for his two day visit. I was deeply impressesd by the loyalty of his assistant/partner Carolyn who made a real practice out of devotion and service.
We had a day out to Kalapa valley, the mythical home of the Shambhala royal court (like Bhante's New Society but with Kings and Queens). This is a beautiful valley with semi formal gardens, waterfalls, forests, rivers and some solitary retreat facilities. It is said that the (female) energy from this land feeds all the other Shambhala properties. I find this mytholigical/pagan aspect of Tibetan Buddhism fascinating. The land certainly has a great atmosphere and I found my day here made left me feeling revitalised. I was lucky to get to visit it again a few weeks later.
We are currently trying to find time in the evenings for softball practice. We are playing the local fire department on Canada day (1st July). We usually get thrashed apparently, this year should prove no exception, we are rubbish!
We also have the annual lobster release coming up this weekend, where we buy the final catch of the season from a local fisherman and release them back into the water. Animal release is a very traditional Tibetan practice (unlike vegetarianism, unfortunately).
Before then, three women who arrived at the same time as me are taking temporary monastic ordination this week. This will involve formal head shaving, ordination ceremony and robing. Should be fun. I've witnessed two Ordinations here so far and they involve a lot of rice throwing, usually with much gusto and enjoyment on the part of the preceptor in trying to hit as many spectators as possible.
Recent wildlife has included plenty of pilot whales (up to 10 in a pod) plus humingbirds and some very hungry black fly that remove chunks of skin and leave a nasty itchy lump for many days. Tourists are also being sited more regularly. We are on the Cabot trail, a very popular scenic route. The Abbey is open to tourists for a couple of hours per day. I have given three guided tours so far (the largest a group of 11), which has been enjoyable.
Keep in touch.
Love,
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