Some slow days at last...

My mom and I came back from the Vipassana course outside Denver. It was good to see some old friends, and best of all to provide Dhamma service to one of my own parents! Being able to support my mom's meditation with actual service as well as metta-- how lucky! The weather was a little on the cold side, although it could just be with that heightened awareness you go deeper into it. There was much turnover in people coming for a day or two to provide service, but I found the kitchen experience to be quite smooth.

Now I am back in our small Colorado town, helping out with household tasks, arranging (read: trying to throw away) various personal effects, watching the local hummingbird battles outside on our deck, and preparing for an upcoming Teacher Training course I'll take in Chicago. Looking forward to taking some walks and hikes, bike rides and runs around the area, hope that the two hours of sitting will keep my mind fairly quiet and balanced.

They have done some really amazing work around the house, and every time I come the trees are bigger and some new ones have been planted, and some other projects have been completed. The back outside my room has been leveled and an entire hot tub has been added! There is also some nice stonework around. Here is a picture to see below:

Okaeri ne...

I had a lovely final dinner with Rupert, Rebecca, Patrick, and my friend Lauren who I studied with at University in Oregon and knew as well in Tokyo. I then slept for just a few hours, waking up at 3.30 am to have a morning sit with Rupert. With my bags hoisted, I walked to the bus, caught the tube, cleared customs and check in, and flew to New York while watching my first movie since my flight to Prague in June. I waited 5-6 hours at JFK, then flew to Dallas, and finally to Colorado Springs. The next day my mom and I drove back to Salida, where I am now, tired and bewildered and a little out of sorts and deflated as I usually feel upon returning to this country.

Here is a photo taken upon leaving Dallas of a very red sun burning into the horizon... no way a photograph could have captured how amazing this was...

Oh, and some photos are now online. To see some Prague photos, go to... http://www.kodakgallery.com/ShareLandingSignin.jsp?Uc=bjovs9y.23o0bz2y&Uy=rs66uh&Upost_signin=Slideshow.jsp%3Fmode%3Dfromshare&Ux=0

For Terezin concentration camp, go to http://www.kodakgallery.com/ShareLandingSignin.jsp?Uc=bjovs9y.a5is9mhm&Uy=-cmyqjd&Upost_signin=Slideshow.jsp%3Fmode%3Dfromshare&Ux=0

You can see them by signing in or by pressing the option to enter the album without signing in. I suggest viewing them via slideshow, otherwise they are so small!

Looking West...

It was a great time in the Northern county of Suffect and town of Saxmundon visiting Rupert's parents. But a notable story before leaving... I left his London flat Friday morning to be greeted by a summer rainfall, and to my surprise saw the streets entirely deserted with police line tape on either side, and police cars, men, and dogs behind it. I walked out rather confused until a policeman called me over. "A suspicious package has been delivered to the local Mosque, and we are taking it extremely seriously." Luckily evacuation of the flats turned out not to happen, and soon enough the police determined it was nothing dangerous. The neighourhood is wonderfully diverse, with a heavy population of Turks and people from the West Indies, and Muslims as well. I rarely see other Caucasions walking down the street, and the food is excellent!

The time up north was "positively lovely" as a Britisher might say, we "had a crack" and now I'm "knackered" (every now and again here I need translations of items into American English). It was nice to take a break from avoiding 18 foot long double decker English buses on London's midievel streets-- they've got to be the most confusing in the Western world! I went with Rupert and his roommate Rebecca (one of those rare Irish Jews-- whose ancestors probably knew mine back in Lithuania and Latvia), and another Irishman named Sean, with more friends coming later, as well as Rupert's brother Charlie on leave from his military camp. Being all meditators we had a pleasant (or as pleasant as it can be) group sit on the train, boarded a local train, and got off to await a passing storm before biking a few miles to the house and being greeted with cold homemade elderberry juice. There we stayed in a beautiful cottage whose rooms reminded me as being out of C.S. Lewis' Narnia series or Peter Pan. We were treated to some exquisite vegetarian food during our stay, sitting round a large wooden oval table in a beautful study/dining room with views of the garden and rows of books behind us.

The next day we had an early sitting and drove out to Rupert's father Philippe's boat. We took a slow ride away from the dock and got off at a shingle beach, crossed it on foot and beheld the sea. We went back to the boat, got off at the pier, and took hold of the bikes we had brought with us all the way from London. On beautiful country roads we passed farms, many wild rabbits scurrying into bushes, castles and churches, fields and fields of crops-- many wheat, and had a brief encounter with some pigs as we tried to discern their peculiar habit of chewing rocks.

After a few hours we ended up at Rupert's mother's house, where we were treated to another splendid meal and in a splended garden, after which a bout of fatigue descended and seemed to wash over everyone. With great effort we managed to rouse the crowd and take to our bikes again to take another leisurely ride home, making it about 50-60 km in total.



We collapsed in bed and had a solid sleep, another great breakfast and set out with sore bottoms to walk to the ruins of an Abbey from the 12th Century. Rupert took us foolishly on a "public footpath" that lead through barbed wire fences and into patches of thistles and stinging needles and ultimately into someone's backyard. The Abbey was impressive in scope and size and beautiful and tragic in its ruins. We walked through the site and on a grassy field played an hour or so of frisbee, the juxtaposition of this lighthearted fun on such a ground being quite interesting. After a brief ride to the beach to walk the dogs (who also gathered stones in their mouths in order to encourage them to be thrown), we took the train back to the City, having another group sit, and then went out to again brave the 18 foot double deckers after having a very jolly dinner at a Vietnamese restaurant. Everywhere you go in the world the City and Country distinctions seem similar in many ways, and this was no exception.

Now I am finishing last errands today (email and the purchase of English tea) before heading back tomorrow. I may leave the house as early as 4 am and brave layovers in NYC and Dallas before arriving late in Colorado Springs. The next day I'll be back in Salida, and the following day my mom and I will attend the last half of a Vipassana course near Denver. Then it will be a slight rest...

London etc.

Fast forward a month and greetings again from London. I am staying with the very dynamic and renaissance man Rupert Taylor, my friend who I will eternally be grateful for his role in introducing me to Vipassana meditation while in Japan. I am staying in his flat in Northern London, who he shares with another Irish meditator and which is leased by a German AT. After just a day braving the noisy streets of Milan, I am counting my blessings at having landed in such a wholesome environment :)

Sometimes meditating can feel like you're walking up a path that has withered away to a hard and steep rock cliff edge and there is no where to proceed to ahead, and yet despite this (illusionary) hopelessness, you stumble along far enough until you see the very easy entry way between two boulders and just like that you're out of it. This continually reminded me the importance of viriya and, as the title hints at, sampajanna.



But for now, present anecdotes first. I took two very tense flights from Milan two days ago to get here that involved traveling ticketless and standing in a chaotic security line where a British couple got in a shouting match with some West Africans for asking them to hold onto their bags, making connections with only minutes to spare. London is still struggling with its recent terror, with entire subway lines shut off, police everywhere, often hollering out directions for this or for that.


My first full day in London, yesterday, I was given a mission to take the bus to Waterloo station, secure a chained bike with a flat tire, change the tire (or tyre) and ride it home (the bike, not the tire/tyre). All went well until one stubborn bolt wouldn't come off, as hard as I pulled in sitting in the park across from the river Thames and Big Ben. I found a bike shop and they got it off, and in an alleyway hastily (and clumsily) tried to put it back together. I was doing a horrendous job, and an old Italian man passed by and with few words took it back apart and then together again with quick and able hands, refusing my plea to take him out to lunch for his help. I then navigated the medieval city streets (and pass the fascinating Financial District) to get back to Rupert's flat, exhausted, black, and bleeding (and nearly charged £30 for riding on the sidewalk instead of the madenning narrow streets).

This weekend we'll take some trains to the countryside and ride around on our bikes, staying with Rupert's family. Next week it's return to Uncle Sam!

The Italian center

I was happy to see my friends Ed and Junko from Japan were the Assistant teachers for this course. I arrived a day early, so spent some time doing some clean up around the center, and admiring the sensational view that, during the course, only the women are able to appreciate. (Once the course started I felt a tinge of jealosy, but it passed fairly quickly with observation :)

The Satipattana course is a special course for old students only, that involves comparing one's own meditation experience with a famous sutta the Buddha gives in the town of Kuru. The atmosphere is excellent and students work very seriously. From the very beginning, even Day 0 before the course begins, one can feel a marked difference in the calm pervading. It is really wonderful motivation to sit a long course. For me, these eight days were a very nice kind of summary of the previous courses in Massachussetts and Switzerland, where I wasn't really able to settle down into the more subtle points of the technique. I was able to really benefit from this, and I hope to have some more sitting opportunities very soon to build on this-- it is so difficult to keep these subtle awarenesses away from this concentrated environment. "It is a hard path, really, a hard path" I kept thinking during this course, and by the end, I remembered how amazing it is that this practice leads to real inner purity and peace. This is the actual product of all that time on the cushion, though only direct experience can confirm this.

After the course I stayed a day or two longer to chat with Ed and Junko and sample some more of those pasta dishes. I also took a small trip with a friend to try to find some gelato in a nearby town. A word on gelato... I had first had this seven years previous on my last visit to Italy. I completely forgot how this tasted during this time, but felt that I was never able to find ice cream since that could compare. Just before going to the center, I had a cup, and was blown away by how good it was! So after the course ended, we found this very small town where old men and teenagers alike stopped and stared open-mouthed at the new arrivals, and found some home-made gelato in one restaurant. Funny, after so long of training the mind to observe objectively, it was totally impossible to roll in the pleasant sensation and craving this very good gelato was trying to induce... the whole world is maya :)

I got a ride and took the train to Milan, wanting a day by myself in the "real world" before my flight to London. A nice walk around the city, seeing the impressive Duomo cathedral (with Latin chanting in the background) and a castle, but as usual, it couldn't compare with where I had been within...

The Swiss Center

I took the train from Menningham and after a couple changes arrived in the beautiful Swiss village of St. Imier. Carrying my heavy load (no pun intended) I made it to the cable car station that took me up the mountain to Mont Soleil, and Dhamma Sumeru. The center basically consists of one very large old European style hotel, housing the kitchen, dining rooms, meditation hall, male and female residences, office, showers, and teacher's residence. The first four days I succumbed to illness and the weather got so absolutely frigid that I was wondering when it would snow, and the heating system actually had to be applied. I had a real mound of blankets on my bed!

Slowly I got better and was able to take on more server responsibilities in the kitchen. Our crew consisted of a smattering of nationalities: Belgian, German, Swiss, Slovenian, and a mad Frenchman whose antics still crack me up as I think back. The food was of a gourmet quality-- too good, I think-- with things like fresh salad dressing and dessert made daily.

After the course ended most of the server crew drove down the mountain into the valley of St. Imier, and hiked up the peak of the opposite mountain. It was a beautiful stroll through the alps, past the musical notes of a myriad of cows wearing giant-sized bells round their necks each emitting a different chord (students at the center are treated to this for the full ten days!) , and nice to be in such a relaxed and fun atmosphere with people you've been working hard with to cook and clean for ten days. After this a few parted ways to return home, and others of us returned to the center to do some preparation for the coming course.



With much planning and decision-making sankharas coming up, I ended up leaving Thursday for Italy. I took one of the most beautiful train rides of my life to the Italian border. I had to sneak looks through the window to enjoy it, for I was sitting next to an Italian girl from Sicily who had been living for some time in Switzerland, and spent most of these many hours going detail by detail into all the problems of the Swiss people and their land. From hearing her I found myself amazed the two countries still have amicable relations.

I arrived in Milano greeted by sweltering heat and overwhelming crowds. I boarded a train for Piancenza that was equally hot and overcrowded, the whole scene looking so shabby and startingly different from the exact neatness of the Swiss train. I sat next to an Indian man dozing with his shirt off. I found the bus that meandered into the Italian countryside, on which one young man had an increasingly animated conversation on a cell phone with what sounded like his girlfriend, dirty looks back by the passenger having little effect. When he finally got off(a young girl waiting by the side of the bus), the bus driver slapped him and yelled something at him-- welcome to Italy.

And so arrived at the Italian center a day before the Satipattana....

Deep in Bavaria

I had a nice 12 hour plus train ride to get deep into Bavaria and have been staying with my friend Cathrin the last couple days. It is my first time to see real Germany since my only previous experiences were Oktoberfest, a few hours in the Frankfurt train station, and RUN LOLA RUN. It’s also been nice catching up from six years ago. I got to see Cathrin’s family and we went to a nice restaurant overlooking a lake last night, eating very good traditional German vegetarian food (maybe a contradiction, yes, but no so great as in Czech).

Then today we walked around some small towns, ate more very good German ice cream that I am sure is the cause of some stomach trouble but it still worth the price regardless, and ended up playing beach volleyball for several hours and mixing sunburns with sliding dives with sands and for a little while I was sure someone had put slivers of glass with the sand. I was on the losing side both times (at least I think I was, I never did understand the score, but it is was much more inconvenient to have to guess which German words meant “I got it!” and which meant “It’s yours!”, so I usually hazarded an incorrect guess and either went bumping into my teammate or passively watched it fall in front of me). To my delight for the several hours a small portable stereo blasted “PLAYIN’ WITH THE BOYS” on repeat for the duration of our game. This was nicely in the spirit of having seen Russian MiGs earlier in Czech. What can be next one can only guess— a bald cigar chomping train boss blowing smoke in my face and threatening to send me to Siberia, a dorky sidekick who follows me around and makes bad jokes, well, it can’t be anything to do with "YOU’VE LOST THAT LOVING FEELING” because that’s old hat from New Orleans.

Anyway, I am off to Switzerland tomorrow to serve a ten day Vipassana meditation course so it will be some time before I make another post. I really can’t wait… but am trying to be equanimous as well :) Once you get a taste of what it’s like to let go and leave it to nature, nothing else will do— I guess you kind of stop looking for new and greater things to hold on to :)

When I get a chance, I will post some of the Slany ceremony’s photos… did you know that after the crash, several Czechs living in town delivered wreaths to the American victims and were later arrested by the Nazis… then, the Communists wanted nothing to do with paying homage to any American war heroes, so all the materials were kept in hiding until after 1989…

And here are some photo pages from my time in Morocco...

http://community.webshots.com/user/alcmorocco, http://community.webshots.com/user/2alcmorocco, http://community.webshots.com/user/3alcmorocco

And some from SIT and elsewhere...

http://community.webshots.com/user/joahmcgee, http://community.webshots.com/user/joahmcgee2