Over SUN, over the ocean

Preamble

Probably you saw the videos in the right frame. Not so nice movies - they mercilessly make you face the reality. I am not a fan of ostrich-politics when it comes to animals, in the same time I know that people usually have a hard time with confrontations like this, like seeing such movies. So I put there a warning. But if you are brave and strong enough, you can have a look and see what is happening around us. It is terrible. I am putting these up because I want to call the attention to what humans(???) do to our animal-brothers, who cannot speak and cannot defend themselves, who cannot express their pain and fear. Protect the animals, our helpless little brothers and sisters, and contribute to their protection by not wanting their fur out of mere fashion!

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Summer Uni has finished last Friday. It is somewhat hard to believe - this one was a bit more tough than the previous years', probably because we had to deal with some new things, with a lot of courses with very prominent lecturers (like e.g. George Soros).
I have more than two months of continuous overtime and "work-likea-dog" period behind me, but the payment I got for all the extra work makes it easier to loosen up after this hectic period. The money I got is just exactly enough to cover the expenses of my trip to Japan, with the accommodation fee included. I had a little worry over not being able to pay the full fee but now it seems that luckily I will be just fine.

The trip is almost here, we are leaving this coming Sunday, but suddenly one more guy canceled his travel. Albert has been preparing for the trip enthusiastically for almost a year and now his boss said that they signed some important contract so he cannot allow Albert to go on holidays. In spite of his previous approval - as he knew about and approved Albert's holidays since the first time he heard about it. I dunno, but is it proper to call him d...head now? Anyway, I told Albert not to worry too much, he can still go later alone or with somebody else, and tried to comfort him with the thought of we can never know why this unexpected turn was meant to occur. I told him about His Holiness' words: "Not getting what you want is sometimes a wonderful stroke of luck."
So now Peter and I will go. Two of us remained from the initial seven :-)

I still need to go and change money tomorrow, insurance is already done. And I also need to go and see the doctor to ask for some strong tranquilizer. I know it's laughable for most of you but I am so very much scared of flying that it is simply crazy! And the more I fly the worse it is. It is supposed to work the other way around! Even today I came home with a terrible cramp in my stomach because the Sunday travel came to my mind - lunch almost came back. And it is just Monday - what will happen by Sunday?? I badly need those pills to knock myself out on the plane.
Please, please send me good and supporting thoughts!!!

I'm so hot!

Oh, yes, I am, indeed! What? You say I was overconfident? :-) well, I know that sometimes I tend to be like that but this time I meant it the right way. We are sweating like a horse, it is so hot here. This weather is completely abnormal, this past week it was over 40 Celsius ever day, today it was 42. The heat wave has arrived about three weeks ago and it is getting worse every day. Or maybe it is just us who cannot deal with it. On Thursday and Friday I almost passed out on the street due to lack of oxygen. Okay, it maybe had something to do with that I gave blood on Thursday - I was called up the previous morning, they needed my type of blood for a surgery. They say it is a rare type: B Rh -

I was like a lunatic after getting rid of almost 0.5 litre.
But the good side is that I got a paper which proves that it has been my 30th blood donation, so I do not have to pay "visit fee" which you normally pay for the doc or for the institution every time you go there (even if it is just a control check-up), and in case I needed to lay in a hospital, I do not have to pay the daily fee, which is the food, beddings and the basic nursing "services". Kewl.

Also, since I have this rare blood type (according to them) I volunteered to be a bone-marrow donor, in order to increase the survival chances of those who have the same blood type. Not sure tho that I will meet all the requirements. I was born with a liver disorder, which is basically that my old blood is being demolished slowly. In everyday life it does not mean any change, I just have to be careful with greasy food, I do not even have to take medication or such. But it is enough to defeat this aim of mine. We will see. I will be examined for it when I next time go and give blood again. In about 2-3 months if nothing happens.

It is good to know that others can also benefit from my body, not only me.

Looking back and inside

I have not put down too much about my life recently. I think it is because of two reasons.

One of the reasons is that I did not really have time for blogging. Summer Uni keeps me incredibly busy which means that I work 10 hours minimum daily (sometimes even more) plus working on the weekends too, both days. Since about the end of May I have been working every weekend as well, except for maybe one weekend when we held the annual birthday festival of His Holiness the 14. Dalai Lama.
This crazy period is expected to last for about three more weeks and after then I can relax a bit. I will have about 3-4 days to regain my strength and "recharge my batteries" before I leave for Japan in August. 4 more weeks to go. Huh, time is flying by really fast.

The other reason for not writing anything constructive is that I did not feel like. I feel that now I am at the stage of turning and watching into the "inside", kind of digesting things. Definitely a lot of things have happened around me lately but there are so many things that happened, I have so many thoughts about these, and my thoughts are evolving so quickly, that I simply think that it is unnecessary to keep expressing myself. Whenever I arrive to a "milestone" tho, I stop, look back and evaluate the journey that is behind me (and report what is to be reported :) ).

If you want to have a "report" for now, see how gracious I am, here you go :)

- No training for two weeks. The guys are in summer camp and after then I.R. is on holiday. D. needed help with preparing for his test so the two of us met a few times outside of the regular trainings as well and I helped him correcting his mistakes and checking if he new all the required stuff. He is the one with the movement coordination problem. Now I got an sms from him that he passed the 10 and 9 kyu tests. He sounded very happy - I am glad that I could help at least and the belt around my waist actually had some use.

- Finally 3 of us will go to Japan. I suspected that the number will significantly drop. I witnessed so many determined promises, like "Yes, I will definitely go, of course". And when it came to actually bringing the sacrifice for the aim, there were sudden immovable objects in the way. I understand it of course, as I have been there, too. But I realized that these huge objects will always show up. It is only your decision whether you can overcome them or not. Everything is only as important for one as much s/he wants.

- I've read a great book, The Path of the Bodhisattva, written by Shantideva. It is a brilliant book. It really makes you think about things, pulls you back to the ground and makes you go as soft as the butter. It gave me so much inspiration for practicing the Dharma, that when I finish work in the evening I can hardly wait to get home and sit down to practice, and when I go to sleep I can hardly wait for the dawn when I can wake up and continue with meditation again.
In the evening I do Shine (the practice of let' say, letting thoughts go) and recite Sangcho Monlam, which is an inspiration-prayer for developing the proper behavior, especially for those who took the Oath. It is all together about 30-40 minutes.
In the morning I wake up at 4.45 , after the "bathroom-project" I start at 5.00 with a "Tara meditation" which lasts for an hour and then I still have 10 minutes to dress up and leave for work (breakfast is in the office). So it is not a supportive schedule for workers but everything has a price. I wanna get out of this endless miserable wheel and also there is so much need to make yourself useful for others, so this little inconvenience is really worth it, it is beyond any question.

- Finally, Csabi is in Mongolia and he will return on Thursday. He sent a cool pic that I try to insert here. It looks like he really feels at home there :-) My savage horseman :-P

Life is fragile

I have recently found a great vid on the net about the importance of using the safety belt in the car. It won 8 prizes in Cannes.
Great video indeed, have a look here.