Dang Zang

Went yesterday to see Traleg Kyabgon Rinpoche at the new Kagyu Centre in Harris Park (see this earlier post.).

I will confess that in the days of the tiny centre mentioned in the previous blog post, I got off to a bad start with Traleg Rinpoche’s talks. I had seen him teach once many years ago in Hamburg, but that was short and long ago, and I couldn’t remember very much about it.

The format in the days of the tiny centre in Rozelle was to have a half-hour or so of shiné (silent meditation), a touch of “chanting” in English, and then about half an hour listening to an unedited recording of Traleg Rinpoche taken from some previous course. Now the thing is that TR has a somewhat hesitant – if that’s the word – way of talking, where he will often start a sentence two or three times before it is complete. At the time, 2006, I suspected that in the flesh this would not be a problem, and I can now confirm that from experience. I think it is because he thinks, and formulates his sentences, with a great deal of care; in the flesh feels as if it is within the bounds of the hesitations, ums, ers and corrections that we all make when we are speaking rather than reading off a page. However, at the time that the tapes were made he was also suffering from some kind of chest infection which multiplied the effect, and the final result was a recording that should never, without a great deal of editing, have been inflicted on the innocent public. The waiting for one false start or another to finally move through the sentence and make a statement became excruciating! It was therefore very pleasing to confirm that the tape was a very unfair representation of the reality.

So after a vacuum that persisted for some four or more years, there are now not none, not one, but two Karma Kagyu centres in Sydney. It will be interesting to see what kind of relationship develops between them. Anyway, here are some devotees relaxing after listening to the talk on mindfulness:

And here is evidence that some people were still not as mindful as they might have been:

After lunch at Sri Lankan restaurant Janani in Homebush (mmmm… and not a whiff of coriander, aka poison parsley, as far as I tasted) yesterday, we bought some Nag Champa in the Sri Lankan grocery store next door (treasure trove for all that ground this and parboiled that and yellow and red coloured this that and the other). Here is the box I got not long ago from our local Leung Wai Kee Buddhist Craft and Joss Stick Shop, shown with the new one underneath.

Top: Bottom:

Which is the fake that’s pretending to be the other one? If you look closely (you might have to click the pictures to get a large enough version to read properly) you’ll see even the warning messages have the same wrong grammar – and even wrong spellings!

All I can say for definite is that the upper one, with the hologram, has the familiar, heady, heavy perfume I expect from that kind of incense. The other one has similarities, but with overtones of the savage tobacco my old Uncle Len – may he rest in peace – used to put into his aluminium-stemmed pipe and smoke on a Sunday afternoon in the living room of that house not far from the Hagley Road.

Well knock me over with a tossed feather! When I came to Sydney it appeared that Traleg Rinpoche, whose main centre is in Melbourne, had a finger in the pie here, and was the main Kagyu big-shot for the area. But then the tiny centre closed, he never came to Sydney to give any teachings, and I came to the conclusion that he just wasn’t interested in Sydney. He does, after all, have plenty of other things on his plate. The only positive upshot was getting to know Gary:

(Doesn’t he look respectable?) But I was wrong – quietly, they have got a centre together in Harris Park, soon to open, and yer man will teach there this week-end!

The famous Chögyal Namkhai Norbu is in Australia, and started his tour with a week-end “transmission” in Sydney – I won’t go into details here, but if you are interested they have an effective web presence. I’ve had a few of his books for many years, but this was the first time I saw him or took teachings. I’m impressed, both by himself and by the organization.

But one thing was quite bizarre, though entirely personal. If you had known him, you might see a certain resemblance, surprisingly enough, to my father. In the flesh, in the right light and at the right distance – I was sitting a little off-centre at a distance of perhaps twelve paces – the resemblance is uncanny. For about half the time it seemed like my father was up there, having somehow grown a grey pigtail, acquired the accent of a Mafioso and gained a profound knowledge of dzogchen which he was now imparting. I don’t want to suggest anything mystical by this – but it did feel weird!

I heard a rumour (and the source was good, but it was just a rumour) that the Karmapa (by which, of course, I mean Orgyen Tinley Dorje) wants to have a fully fledged seat in Australia, and that the plan is for this (at least as far as the city is concerned, there might be somewhere else in the country) to be in Sydney. Could it be true? If it is, how come I am so lucky as to be living here?