A 21st Century Meditation Hall and Dana Meal at a Korean Restuarant

A 21st century meditation hall and Dana meal at a Korean restaurant.

On Tuesday morning I went to explore more of busy New York city.
Randol Stuart and his friend Kathleen came to see me on Tuesday morning to take me for a Dana meal. I had met Randol at Brian and Nicole’s wedding ceremony in Dundee few years ago. I met his friend ,who is a actress, in New York on Monday evening when we met for a cup of tea at an Indian Restaurant. After the meeting they suggested to Nicole that they take me to lunch on Tuesday..They came around 11.00am and we went to a nice Korean restuarent.It was a favourite of Kathleen’s, who had spent a year in Korea studying martial arts.
At the Anumodana Desana ( the blessing of the meal) I did some chanting as part of my blessing even though it was a very public restaurant. Kathleen and I compared monkey stories as monkeys are one of her many interests. Randol is a Christian minister but he really appreciated the blessing and offered me many opportunities and possibilities to set up a Vihara in his small town. He is also a drama director.

On Wednesday morning Linus came to see me and took me to his meditation centre. It was a very beautiful hall. I felt the good energy there. He said he practices meditation every day for at least a couple of hours. It is very different from Theravada practice but his intention and motivation is great. They have all the modern facilities to spread their Guru’s teachings(Enlighten Next). The guru is Andrew Cohen. Enlighten Next do live web casts on Thursday evenings.

He took me to Times Square which is a very bright area with huge TV screens and Digital colour commercial advertisements. I saw some of his fans come and greet him.
I wanted to buy an adapter for my camera and he kindly bought it for me. We had our lunch at the Rubin. Then we worked on rehearsals until 5.00pm.

I walked to the hotel and came back to the Rubin for the exciting evening ahead.