I got back from spending a couple weeks down at Lotus Garden for an event known as the Künzang Gongpa Zangthal.
For a description of the 'what', I'm going to defer to the text of
the Lotus Garden site:
"On August 28th, Kyabje Taklung Tsetrul Rinpoche (pictured at left) began bestowing the entire Künzang Gongpa Zangthal empowerments and continued until 12th September. Rinpoche is one of the greatest Nyingma teachers alive today and the foremost and principal holder of these highest Dzogchen transmissions which were discovered by the tertön Rigzin Gödem (1337-1408) as part of the Northern Treasures Tradition."
Now, unless you are schooled in Himalayan/Vajrayana buddha-dharma, you likely have no idea what the hell half of this preceeding paragraph was saying.
I'm going to give my un-official view as a participant. If you want the 'official' version (and you should), please go to the photo essay by the Loppon Rita Gross. For me, it started on Friday the 28th with me having to work a half-day from home and packing while cleaning our apartment.
Once I got out there, I walked up the hill to find what you see on the right.
Anyone inside the dorm building, I apologize if my nearly falling on the ground laughing woke you up. What you are looking at is the original lighting from the Dulles airport parking lots. A neighbor bought them years ago, intending to use them. They never got to. So, when the Lotus Garden residents started
asking around about lighting - since the Lotus Garden residents DO talk to their neighbors often (more on that later) - by auspicious coincidence, someone had these in a shed somewhere and was will to part with them for either dirt cheap or free (I'm not quite clear which - my mind couldn't hold some details like this). I agree that it was a very good idea to light the road between the dorms, the shrine room, and the main residence to make sure people can walk around at night without the risk of either hurting themselves or
unknowingly kill little crawling sentient beings. I just found the sheer amount of lighting to be a slight case of over-bombing.
So, I got to the men's dorm, which is a yurt. Yes, a yurt. This had previously been the on-land shop of dharma goods (much of it bought from my Frederick friend Linda at Tibetan Spirit) for participants to buy as 'Ratna Kosha in the round'. As a dorm (complete with wood floor), it worked out nicely. The only complaint was that the dome at the top was cracked, so it couldn't be raised to let heat out during the day. Once that is fixed, I am sure it will be useful for many years to come.
Ratna Kosha itself is now in a small building custom built by the residents of Lotus Garden before the start of the transmissions. Next to it is the (Ratna) Kosha Cabana, whose name is a little bit of a spoof of the cheesy Barry Manilow 70's classic 'Copacabana'.
The next day was the usual waking up wondering where i was for a second before going into my usually wake-up practice routine. Now I got to fins out who else was staying in the men's dorm. There was Dan, who I hadn't met yet. Michael B., who I soon found out was an old Penor Rinpoche student and a HUGE wealth of information and scholarship - as well as pretty cool guy. And there was Bosley from Boston (IIRC), who has already done a 3-year retreat. Sadly, he was soon to miss out on the entire experience after the first day.
That first day, after breakfast in the meal tents - which, for those who have been to Lotus Garden in the past, are now across the road from Deki Gyatso (the first dorm building on the land), where the old silo and the garage/machine shed used to be - the Big Event was the traditional opening procession of Kyabje Rinpoche and all the lamas, monastics, etc. on the land. And I do mean "all the lamas" - there were quite a few!
Everybody got dressed up in their best clothes - an old Trungpa Rinpoche-based tradition for empowerments that Khandro Rinpoche asked/told us to continue - and lined the road from the main residence (where all the Rinpoches, monks, nuns, and I'm-not-sure-who-else stayed) to the Shrine room.
I took my place in the lineup with my oversized umbrella my wife got me years ago which has proved itself at LG as a parasol nicely. I noticed a large gentleman with a red-and-white nagkpa* (like I know several excellent practitioners from the Frederick/Drikung Kagyu sangha to wear) shawl unfurled around him in line next to me, who said his name was Malcolm. I asked him his lineage. He said "I claim no lineage. I've studied with Nyingma, Sakya, Kagyu and Gelugpa." So I responded "Ah, so Rinme." "No, I wouldn't use that word for myself. That is another concept. I just say I am a Vajrayana Buddhist practitioner. Period."
OK, here was someone I was going to enjoy talking to for the next 2 weeks.
In the photo at left, is Acharya Malcolm and Michael B. are in the yurt discussi
ng some aspect of Tibetan history, that, while it was totally obscure to pretty much everybody else, they seemed to know like it was their family history! I think everybody who met these guys were impressed by their learning - and their senses of humor. I didn't know, for example, that Padmasambhava appears in historical records as an expert on irrigation, of all things.
As a side note, I really got a kick out of meeting so many people that were 'the
regulars' that are already part of what I call the 'Khandro Klub'.
Michael B. said that he was pleasantly surprised how many people were, like me, coming up to introduce themselves and ask him about himself. Apparently, in many sanghas, people are a lot more closed off and keep to themselves. I don't know about anyone else, but I just figure why NOT be curious about everyone around - especially for an event like the KGZ where everybody endured some kind of hardships to get the time away from their 'normal' lives and to afford to get to it.
Also, there where people of at least 14 different nationalities at this thing. That's a LOT of cool stories there. And yes, I did like the fact that with all the languages happening, it sounded like my wife's workplace (the IMF) :).
Besides, by getting these empowerments together, we are all samaya-bound brothers and sisters. It's said that we should now think of each other quite literally as vajra brothers and sisters. So, might as well get to know the family.
The processional itself has been described in detail by Loppon Rita Gross, so I won't. :)
On the 19th day of the 6th lunar month in the year 2138 of the Iron Tiger (August 28th, 2010), at 10:00am, the Künzang Gongpa Zangthal began at Lotus Garden with a traditional and magnificent procession that stretched from the main residence to the Lhawang Gatsal shrine room to welcome Kyabje Taklung Tsetrul Rinpoche with open and joyous hearts. Jetsün Khandro Rinpoche, Jetsün Dechen Paldrön accompanied by the senior monks of Mindrolling and the nuns of Samten Tse, lopöns of Lotus Garden, senior practitioners and members of Lotus Garden led the procession bearing offerings of incense, victory banners, the eight auspicious symbols, the seven royal emblems, flowers and silk scarves. The procession also included eminent visiting teachers—His Eminence Penam Rinpoche, Tulku Drakpa Rinpoche, Lodi Gyari Rinpoche, Anyen Rinpoche, Khenpo Gyurme Samdup and others who joined the procession, while several hundred practitioners who had traveled to Lotus Garden to receive the empowerments lined the road to welcome Kyabje Rinpoche who waved graciously as his vehicle passed them.
Sadly, that night around 2 PM there was a sad reminder of suffering and impermance in the yurt. I wasn't able to sleep with my back propped in a sitting position like I do at home, so I snored. My snoring apparently woke people up around 2 AM. I did too, and heard "Are you awake? I've fallen and hurt my back. I need an ambulance!" Bosley had slipped on wet grass outside the port-a-potties and landed on his back and cut himself. For any 60-something, this could be pretty serious. However, Bosley has scoliosis. This condition has made his body age much faster than usual. So this was VERY serious. Dan called the Vajra Team staff (who perform a similar role to the Desung and the Dorje Kasung in Shambhala, minus the military discipline trappings), and within a minute,sssssss was in the yurt, calling 911. Soon after, Judy Wolfer was also there seeing if there was anything she could do to help, and just having physical contact with him (and seeing if he could feel/move his extremities, which he could.)
When the ambulance came, Judy and Dan rode with him and stayed there for several hours. Sadly, he would not be coming back to Lotus Garden for the remainder of the event. People (including Khandro Rinpoche) were in frequent contact with Bosley during, though, and he was getting several visitors a day at the hospital.
I don't know what happened after the KGZ ended, though. If anybody does, please email me off-line.
What followed for the next 5 days was what is called 'oral transmission'. Essentially, this is when a teacher reads through the ENTIRE text. Kyabje Taklung Tsetrul Rinpoche, for 3+ hours at a time w/o a break, twice a day, would give the lung (reading transmissions) of Künzang Gongpa Zangthal.
You would think in Tibet, India, Nepal, etc. when this is given, there are hundreds of monks, nuns, and other practitioners sitting there very quietly in rapt concentration for the whole time, right? Wrong! :) I hear from folks who have been to these things in India that monks have rice-throwing battles during lungs, read anything, sleep, and even listen to their Walkmans and iPods!
In this case, Khandro Rinpoche said at the end that all the monastics were pleasantly surprised how we all actually did put effort into actually 'being there' while Kyabje Rinpoche read in a soathing voice over a thousand pages of Tibetan. It was especially impressive because the vasy majority of us don't really speak Tibetan!
The Office of Practice and Study provided attendees with some VERY helpful handouts explaining the history of the Künzang Gongpa Zangthal (including translation of what in english was over 30 pages of the text itself), of how to understand empowerments in general, and in understanding samaya. Khandro Rinpoche encouraged us to read these during the lung. Most of the people I saw there did. There were some people nodding off from time-to-time (myself included), but - especially around the outer edge of the shrine room, where people who had to sit in chairs due to medical reasons (including me - with my disks and back, I can't do 3 + hours sitting on a cushion anymore :( ), where the natural lighting didn't reach, it is understandable. I was one of the ones who was 'practicing dream yoga' too.
So, that was the pattern for the beginning of the KGZ. I found it was useful to go over familiar practice texts in that atmosphere to try to REALLY internalize them more.
On that Thursday, there was an open day so 1)Rinpoche could rest a bit - for an 80+ man,
reading 6 + hours a day had to be taxing! 2)WE could get a break, and 3) We could get a chance to pract
ice. The powers that be organized a 'field trip' to Luray Caverns. Apparently they wanted to take Tsetrul Rinpoche as well. So, most everyone loaded onto 3 rented buses (interstate-travel style buses, not school buses) It was kind of cool and cold - it is underground, after all. I have to wonder what he thought of this stalagtite thing which the guide called "the ice cream cone". It looks more like a stupa to me.
Into the next week, the empowerments themselves started. I will get more into those in part 2. But, until then, here are is a little footage for those who couldn't be there.
Now, one thing that I have heard about at events like this is strange meterological phenomena occuring. For example, When Penor Rinpoche died,THIS occured. and this. At the Künzang Gongpa Zangthal, this is what we got at one point:
There was to be more like this over the course of the transmissions.
Towards the end, Kochen Rinpoche arrived from Mindrolling. There was the traditional receiving line and khata(k) offering. For those who couldn't be there, here is what that was like going into the main residence.
When the Buddha statue at Lotus Garden was unveiled, there was a traditional line for people to offer a khata (white silk scarf) to it (with the understanding that what is really being done is offering not to the statue itself, but to both the Buddha that existed 2500 years ago and said "there is a way to get free from suffering, and this is it..." and to the Buddha inside YOU just waiting to be unveiled once the causes and conditions are in place). For those who couldn't be there, I left my camera in my hands while doing the khata offering and circumnambulating the statue, so you can get some feel for it.
End of Part 1...
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