Dhammadipa Arama

Dhammadipa Arama is a Buddhist monastery and college in Batu-Malang, East Java where 50 monk/nuns in training come to stay for 4 years without going home. During the school breaks they all go on Vipassana retreat. Its also where lay people like myself can come to study Vipassana with Bhante Khantidharo, who is almost80 and studied with Mahasi and U Pandita in Myannmar. Having previously attended 2 retreats at Dhamma Java, the Goenka retreat center here in Indonesia, this was my first extended experience with walking meditation, noting and following the breath from the stomach rather than the nostrils.  I was on retreat there for 14 days and it a pretty intense experience, very challenging, inspiring and rewarding.. I became very intimate with pain as enemy, teacher, companion.

Below are some observations I wrote for Ines, my wonderful online teacher from IMC that I have continued to work with since taking the online course (highly recommended)

General Observations:

1. Dhammadipa Arama is a monastery and a Buddhist college housing @50 monk/nun candidates. They stay there for 4 years, don’t go home and during school “holidays” do Vipassana retreats.
2. The head monk and founder – Bhante Khantidharo is almost 80 and studied with Mahasi and U Pandita in Myannmar.
3. Bhante emphasized continuity of mindfulness too – walking from place to place was done like walking meditation and eating was also done mindfully.
4. Watching  Bhante bow was very inspiring – he looked totally absorbed and mindful.
5. Students had interviews every other day with dharma talks on the other days.
6. Bhante (understandably) is a traditionalist with a monk/lay dichotomy. Lay people’s duty is to support the monks/nuns through dana and don’t have the opportunity to do good deeds like monks/nuns do since they have families to support.
7. Bhante emphasized the Kalamma Sutta – not believing but finding out for yourself thru experience. Yet for me the whole Buddhist cosmology seemed to be based on belief and not something verifiable through meditation.
8. Bhante emphasized urgency and effort since death is always near and inevitable.

Personal Observations:

1. Initially I wasn’t able to sit for 1 hour w/o moving. I had difficulty doing so at the Goenka retreats. This was very frustrating and I couldn’t sleep the first night.
2. The next day I could differentiate pain into distinct and separate sensations which could also be separated from our negative reaction the pain. This realization was really inspiring. From there I had the experience of pain as a sensation being totally neutral – without any inherent “pain” and being entirely separate from my reaction to it. When I reacted I could feel the “pain” starting to hurt and when I controlled my reaction the hurt would recede. Then later I had the experience of tuning in or out the pain sensations by increasing focus on the object of concentration – breath. Amazing…
3.  Dukkha. From pain I discovered that dukkha is my reaction to pain or to any other sense stimuli. React and there is clinging, suffering, and pain. “Noting” I could neutralize and prevent a reaction or thoughts from arising by quickly returning to the breath. At a certain point I was able to do this smoothly – time passed effortlessly, I felt light and free.
4. Acceptance. From dukkha I had the realization – although not a new understanding, that accepting what is without wanting/hoping for anything else is freedom. Not freedom to do anything, eat anything or move position but to accept as fully as possible what is.
5. Fear and no self. The Bhante talked about anhatta but I was afraid to let go more. If I let go of thought – who would I be? I had this discomfort/suffering and had a realization that I should just let go, there was no me, that “I” am a process like everything else unfolding around me. I felt great relief and freedom.
6. From there I had the short and difficult to explain realization that I didn’t have to even focus on sensation/reaction or self/no self, I could focus on nothingness. It felt black and negation. This did not last long though and did not repeat.
7. Bhante had me doing 2 step walking meditation and then pausing, noting and returning to the breath. This needed a lot of patience and at times I had strong rejection/aversion but also felt great acceptance.
8. Strange experiences. About 1/3 into the retreat while sitting I felt my arms break into fragments and become gaseous, then intense tingling and heat. The pulse in the back of my head and between my eyes was throbbing and thunderous.  Strong sensations in body and head – like a storm. These sensations continued with some variation while sitting and then while walking I felt like I was really light, floating, colors intense, field of vision shaking and being off balance. Strong sensations in arms – tingling then stiff and hard. Later while sitting I would feel footsteps, tugging on my sleeve even though no one was there. I saw a white object out of my peripheral vision which moved to center and disappeared. I often had very loud ringing in my ears. Once I sat almost 2 hours and my left arm started shaking uncontrollably and very strong contractions up my neck to the top of my head. I saw red then everything went pitch black as if every bit of light had been sucked away. Wracking sobs emerged and after awhile everything passed. I didn’t open my eyes or move my arms/legs and after finishing I felt very light. Bhante was dismissive of all of this saying they were “noda” or stains.
9. The last third of the retreat the strange experiences went away except for the tingling and heat and ringing. What was left was observing the breath and accepting.
10. At times I felt able to very precisely focus on the breath as the object of concentration even feeling my intestines all too clearly. Very clear and penetrating. Other times fuzzy and slippery despite attempt after attempt to latch on. Mostly concentration through strength – determined to focus. Other times I could take a softer approach being more discerning but often felt in danger of losing focus.
11. I also had the feeling of extreme fragility of life – only breath to breath, nothing more. No guarantees that the end of one breath will be continued with a new breath.
12. I had the sense of fruition – of understandings ripening and maturing and dropping from the tree when they were ready. I felt vastly increased confidence in the “path” and that I am on it. I felt inspired and energized and a deep sense of commitment. I felt really scientific – like the body is the laboratory and that I could verify things directly and experimentally. Tremendously inspiring and exciting.
13. My noting is still less than gentle and if thinking felt like a shout of warning – THINKING, THINKING, THINKING rather than a label.

Below are some photos of the place, my little hut, the drum they beat to wake us up at 2:30am, the different meditation halls and the Bhante and me... I usually meditated in the wood structure shaped like an octagon in the middle of the lily flower pool.... It has no walls and the water birds would sometimes climb up and walk around, other times it would rain and be very windy.

Teenager in Training

Not quite sure what is going on here either...

Lying Meditation

Not quite sure what is going on here.
The last time I remember falling asleep in parks was in high school...

WE SHARE THE MOON

WE SHARE THE MOON
I look up at the moon,
and my heart feels you,
although a million miles away,
watching this same moon.

from a card I gave someone long, long ago but more recently from: http://www.travelerstales.com/carpet/show-one-carpet.tcl?id=31

"Precious" and reflections on sameness and difference

These past 2 days I have been home sick with the flu and watched dvds to entertain myself. One was the movie “Precious” which was pretty disturbing. It reminded me of when I had been a community organizer in the Bronx for a couple of years way back in the very early 90’s before coming to Indonesia.

1921 Morris Ave was one of the first buildings I was given to organize. It was a city owned building which meant that due to extreme neglect or debt the city had taken ownership of the building from the owner.  At first it was just an address on a folder in a stack of folders I had been given. Inside the folders were very sparse notes on building conditions and some tenant meeting attendance sheets.

I was acutely self-conscious walking on the side streets of the neighborhood. At nighttime I was more anonymous but honestly I was scared sh*tless seeing people lined up to buy drugs and the flashy sports cars zooming up and down the streets with the cops choosing to stay on the main streets unless they came in force to surround and raid a particular location. The “good” people in the neighborhood I knew just would not be out on the streets at night.

Following community organizing principles I “doorknocked” all the doors in the building which meant introducing myself as a new organizer from the neighborhood organization, trying to get a sense of what people felt were the important issues and try to get them to commit to attend a tenants’ meeting in the lobby later that week.  I met a lot of people since many of them were not working. There were a lot of single mothers and also a number of people who were obviously crack addicts. Knocking on each door I could hear what was going on inside and the reaction to me coming. Loud music, yelling, strange and strong smells were amplified by my fear, discomfort and desire to prove something, that I could organize and move these people towards change.

The first meeting was surprisingly well attended.  I was excited to see so many people young and old, African American, Latino, and even one white lady. I felt the possibility of unity and change in the air.

I tried to pull out the issues that were on people’s minds and make connections to the general situation in the building, hoping to build a common agenda. But the meeting quickly spiraled out of control. Some people were high, others had brought bottles to the meeting, they were exhilarated with the opportunity to vent, and then suddenly they were angry, unfocused, and ranting. In the midst of this chaos this little old Irish woman came up to me, hit and started scratching me. She thought I was a representative of the landlord and went on this 10 minute diatribe denouncing me and the landlord.  Everyone thought this was pretty funny and the atmosphere simultaneously sobered and lightened up.

On the way home after more than a few beers of my own I had the chance to reflect. Being young, idealistic and thickheaded I told myself it was a great experience while in my gut I dreaded going back.  But go back I did. Almost every day I went back and doorknocked each apartment in each of my buildings getting to know the residents.

My leaders in 1921 Morris turned out to include “Dimples” who was taller and larger than Precious but with one leg somewhat withered and bent making her gait fragile and lopsided, highlighting an unexpected vulnerability in someone so big. I asked her why people called her Dimples and she broke out a wide, sweet smile complete with a surprisingly adorable dimple.

There was “Wanda” who stuttered uncontrollably, always reeked of alcohol and usually had a 40 oz bottle of malt liquor nearby. Wanda’s apartment was a mess and her two young boys seemed sullen and lost and she would berate them fiercely for seemingly small infractions. The other residents told me that the boys’ father had frequently and severely beaten Wanda and that’s why she stuttered. Sometimes she would be so incredibly lucid, present and beautiful. Other times she would be lost in worlds I could only guess at. 

There was “B.K.” a Latina lesbian living with her partner and two boys. B.K. was a former heroin addict who was taking methadone. She was hard to keep up with and I don't know how well I knew her past a certain level. She would seemingly nonstop watch pirated VHS horror movies and ask me to watch with her. Since she was quickly elected the president of the tenants’ association I would often keep her company and sit in her kitchen as she brewed and drank strong coffee and we discussed recent developments, strategy etc. We'd also gossip and she'd share stories of past relationships. I'd share my long distance relationship woes which meant intermittent and at times sustained celibacy. 

I would spend a lot time with all my tenant leaders but with these women from 1921 Morris Ave. I developed close relationships. I’d come with a yellow pad full of notes about what I wanted to talk about, the prep work for an upcoming building meeting, trying to make connections to issues in other city owned buildings, neighborhood meetings on crime etc.  But looking back what these women really wanted was someone to talk to, someone to just be there and listen. I think they attended at least half of the meetings to humor me, so that I would feel good, like I was getting something done. Believing in the possibility of change was something that would not come easy to them.  The greatest help I could give was to be present. To listen and hear their stories of the lives they had lived, the struggles and difficulties.  Surprisingly accompanying their stories was much laughter, lightness and openness. Sometimes I would come in the middle of some household drama and hear yelling and banging from outside the door but they would still invite me inside and after sitting for awhile some incredibly complex and tragic story would emerge.  I was shocked by the tenderness and intimacy in their stories and the sudden anger or rage that would emerge if a child did the wrong thing or asked for attention.

But I have come to realize that there was no action that Dimples, B.K., Wanda or anyone else in that neighborhood did that I am also not capable of. No feeling, no anger, rage, pain, blame towards self and loved ones that I am also not capable of feeling or manifesting. The transparent self justification, running from pain, denial, and addiction is part of the sameness we share as human beings. Oppressor/oppressed, victim/abuser, exploited/exploited all inseparable turning in on each other and transforming into the other like some yin yang of suffering. Along with the light there is the capacity for darkness and we share this equally without exception.  The older I get and the deeper I look inside myself the truer this is.

Tenants would often offer me food but I really didn’t feel comfortable accepting because I knew their resources were limited. Sometimes though they would bring over food to the office when they knew I was there working late. This I gladly could not refuse. In one building – 1985 Creston Ave., we had a really successful rent strike and during the height of the conflict I was like a celebrity. People would often bring food or snacks to the office.  This was in a building that was mostly Latino and my Spanish was minimal. There were more intact families here and the men played a more visible and stable role in families and the tenant association. There were also far fewer drug apartments with open sales of drugs than in 1921 Morris. The first tenant meeting there were only four people. I remember translating what I wanted to say into Spanish and reading off my yellow pad in their lobby. But persistence made up for lack of skills and I kept coming back and kept talking about tenants’ rights in incoherent Spanish. I would doorknock for every meeting and eventually some more people started coming. Then someone even started translating for me which I took as a sign that they actually wanted to hear what I was saying. Then folks started talking to each other, in rapidfire Spanish, passionately and at length. About what I had no idea. Next thing you know the rent strike was on.  Since the landlord refused to come to any meetings we found out where he lived in Westchester, N.Y. and a whole bunch of tenants went to picket in front of his house and flyer his neighborhood. We got the city to take the landlord to court and the judge took away control of the building and gave it to a not for profit housing company to bring it up to code. The landlord was written up as one of the 10 worst landlords in that year’s Village Voice and I was quoted in the article. Heady stuff for a young organizer set on changing the world.

But it was like living and working in a pressure cooker. The problems were horrific and relentless. Without meditation I had no way to deal with everything and had no way to separate work from the rest of my life. I was constantly caught between how things were and how I wanted them to do be. I was frustrated seeing how elusive tangible change was. Where was the revolution? In the 2 years I was there I had become one of the senior organizers in the coalition of neighborhood associations and was supposed to be heading an area wide effort to organize city owned buildings.  I had seen tens of staff come and go and this included young, white college educated idealists, as well as African Americans and Latinos from the neighborhood or similar neighborhoods and young college educated and idealistic people of color like me. I had very close and strong relationships with my tenant leaders and had started to bring them onto the board of the neighborhood association of which I was the lead organizer and staff director. But I was young, my blood was hot and I decided to leave.

A sense of sadness and immediate distance is what my closest tenant leaders greeted my news about leaving with. I promised I would still come visit them and for awhile I did and sitting in their kitchens or living rooms it quickly felt like old times. But soon I was on to the next great adventure – Indonesia. I left because I wanted to and with a good education and no family responsibilities at the time I could.

After a few years while visiting the U.S., I came back to visit the old neighborhood and my old friends at 1921 Morris Ave. With me were 2 friends, husband and wife, white, very decent people from the program with which I had gone to Indonesia with. The neighborhood had changed quite a bit, become more stable and cleaner. Yet I felt the need to establish how dangerous the neighborhood had been as if my “street credibility” was in question. 1921 Morris was totally different too and I tried to find someone I still knew. B.K. was there. She told me Wanda was gone, someone else's daughter had been shot to death and Dimples had died of AIDS. B.K. took a look at my white friends and immediately asked me why I had come back, if I wanted to show off to my friends, as if this was some tourist sight. Cutting words that wounded me, but revealing more than a little truth.

Reflecting and remembering I feel a lot of sadness and regret. Not that I left but how my leaving exposed how fundamentally different our fates and lives could be. The priceless freedom of choice, to decide to leave and do something else, to shape my life the way I wanted it to be. That difference was an unbridgeable one.

May Dimples know she was loved

May Wanda and her boys have found a better place in life

May B.K. and her loved ones be happy

May I always cherish what they shared with me

May I remember our essential sameness no matter how different our lives may be

here's an article from the NYT on The Obesity - Hunger Paradox in places like the Bronx. Surprising but true and not only in the Bronx. Indonesia's poorer neighborhoods have a similar phenomenon.

I would like to acknowledge inspiration for this post from a post by Erica at Urban Refuge: http://urbanrefuge.ning.com/profiles/blogs/not-a-cholo and another post by Maia at Jizo Chronicles: http://jizochronicles.wordpress.com/2010/03/14/harmony-of-difference-and-sameness/ as well as influence from numerous others from the surprisingly vibrant and lively Buddhist blogger community. Thank you!    

Please Call Me by My True Names

Don't say that I will depart tomorrow --
even today I am still arriving.

Look deeply: every second I am arriving
to be a bud on a Spring branch,
to be a tiny bird, with still-fragile wings,
learning to sing in my new nest,
to be a caterpillar in the heart of a flower,
to be a jewel hiding itself in a stone.

I still arrive, in order to laugh and to cry,
to fear and to hope.

The rhythm of my heart is the birth and death
of all that is alive.

I am the mayfly metamorphosing
on the surface of the river.
And I am the bird
that swoops down to swallow the mayfly.

I am the frog swimming happily
in the clear water of a pond.
And I am the grass-snake
that silently feeds itself on the frog.

I am the child in Uganda, all skin and bones,
my legs as thin as bamboo sticks.
And I am the arms merchant,
selling deadly weapons to Uganda.

I am the twelve-year-old girl,
refugee on a small boat,
who throws herself into the ocean
after being raped by a sea pirate.
And I am the pirate,
my heart not yet capable
of seeing and loving.

I am a member of the politburo,
with plenty of power in my hands.
And I am the man who has to pay
his "debt of blood" to my people
dying slowly in a forced-labor camp.

My joy is like Spring, so warm
it makes flowers bloom all over the Earth.
My pain is like a river of tears,
so vast it fills the four oceans.

Please call me by my true names,
so I can hear all my cries and my laughter at once,
so I can see that my joy and pain are one.

Please call me by my true names,
so I can wake up,
and so the door of my heart
can be left open,
the door of compassion.

1989

-- from Call Me by My True Names: The Collected Poems of Thich Nhat Hanh, by Thich Nhat Hanh

from: http://www.poetry-chaikhana.com/H/HanhThichNha/PleaseCallMe.htm

The Wrong Kind of Green

Johann Hari, The Nation

Why did America's leading environmental groups jet to Copenhagen and lobby for policies that will lead to the faster death of the rainforests--and runaway global warming? Why are their lobbyists on Capitol Hill dismissing the only real solutions to climate change as "unworkable" and "unrealistic," as though they were just another sooty tentacle of Big Coal?

At first glance, these questions will seem bizarre. Groups like Conservation International are among the most trusted "brands" in America, pledged to protect and defend nature. Yet as we confront the biggest ecological crisis in human history, many of the green organizations meant to be leading the fight are busy shoveling up hard cash from the world's worst polluters--and burying science-based environmentalism in return. Sometimes the corruption is subtle; sometimes it is blatant. In the middle of a swirl of bogus climate scandals trumped up by deniers, here is the real Climategate, waiting to be exposed.

Johann Hari's piece "The Wrong Kind of Green" takes mainstream environmental groups to task for selling out their principles, often in exchange for money from the worst polluters.

Link: http://www.thenation.com/doc/20100322/hari