Lopön Urgyen Tenpel studied for 10 years in the Sangye Yeshe Shedra at Ka Nying Shedrup Ling and is now one of the philosophy teachers at the Rangjung Yeshe Institute. This year he is teaching the Uttaratantra Shastra (Eng. Sublime Continuum) according to the commentary of Jamgön Kongtrul Lodrö Thaye. The following is a short […]
Category: Studentlife
In our “shedra”, these days are the busiest. We are about to finish the semester (only 2 more weeks to go!) and just today we finished the Annual Fall Seminar, where we received teachings from Ven. Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche and K. Phakchok Rinpoche. Annual Fall Seminar During the seminar we spend all day –from 7:50 […]
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My Favorite Class
My favorite class at the Rangjung Yeshe Institute was the philosophy class, which was very interesting. I experienced as I was in nirvana at that moment while listening to the Lopon. I compared every teaching with my own life, certain facts just matched with my own life. I was very lucky that I got an […]
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Back Again
“Wooow! Here I am back again! And I will go for the second year!” This is what I thought last week when I found myself lying once again on my back-breaking Nepali mattress inside my tiny student’s apartment that I had swapped for my fancy German two-and-a-half-room-apartment one year before. At that […]
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Dilemma of a Life Time
The first time I came to Kathmandu one year ago, I was on my way back from China. At that time, my plan was to stay for a month in order to learn some Tibetan. Here’s a lesson I learned quickly. Plans change. My first impression of Boudhanath was that I could eat a variety […]
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Reflection
After arriving in Kathmandu late summer 2009 to begin my studies at Rangjung Yeshe Institute up until this day quite a lot of events have taken place – externally as well as internally. Just the fact that one is now living in a country among people with a completely different culture, different habits and so forth […]
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Globalized experience
We had been studying over a semester at RYI when we received an unexpected proposition: to acquire a Salsa dance voucher, an opportunity to take regular lessons for one month in a Latin American dance studio, here in Kathmandu. We agreed and very soon, we were in possession of a creased piece of paper, which had […]
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Trees Are Trees
A famous Zen master once said, “while practicing in the path, initially the trees are trees, the mountains are mountains, and the oceans are oceans, but at some point the trees are no more trees, the mountains are no more mountains and the oceans are no more oceans… and finally at the end of the […]
You have probably noticed that living in Nepal is somewhat different from living somewhere in the civilized world. Aside from the usual things you need to take care of – such as finding dwelling of suitable size and cost, in Nepal you need to solve many other issues. For example, over half of the year, […]
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Home Sweet Home
“Where are you from?” How many times this question has been heard and will be asked again and again, by total strangers or new friends. How many times has it taken long seconds to answer. And how many times the reply was not satisfactory. Sincerely, I don’t know where I am from. This question has […]