March 2001
In This Issue
THE WEALTH OF BEING NATURAL - Dzongsar Khyentse RinpocheINTERVIEW
WITH NAMKHAI NYINGPO RINPOCHE
A WEEKEND WITH MATTHIEU RICARD AT SSRC
INTERVIEW
WITH VENERABLE TENZIN PALMO
NEWS OF THE PEACE VASE PROJECT
NEWS OF THE PEACE VASE PROJECT
Siddhartha's Intent, Southern Door, is currently co-ordinating the placement of the peace vases in the world's southern regions, including Australia, Papua New Guinea and the South Pacific area, as well as in New Zealand and Antarctica.
Most of the vases for Australia - about 90 in total - are placed in their allocated locations, or are awaiting placement and are with people who have local responsibility for them. The vases currently in the process of being positioned are in Perth, Geraldton, Kalgoorlie, Mt. Morgan, the Coral Sea, the Timor Sea, the Arafura Sea, Arnhem Land, Spencer Gulf, Queenstown, the Blue Mountains, Coff's Harbour, Bellingen, Nambucca - 14 in total. However, we are still looking for volunteers to help us place vases in the Tasman Sea, Joseph Bonaparte Gulf, the Gulf of Carpentaria, Thursday Island and Bathurst Island.
In Papua New Guinea not all attempts to arrange the 18 placements have been successful, as there is much upheaval in the area. But one Australian overseas aid volunteer has taken responsibility for four of the vases and was able to place one in Bougainville during his visit last year. (Read Phillip Miller's story in this issue.)
There are approximately 84 vases for the South Pacific region and five vases (out of 16) have been placed in Fiji. A further vase is in location there, ready to be placed. Two vases have been recently placed in Vanuatu, one in Samoa and one in Niue. Further efforts have been made to arrange transportation and placement with Australians working abroad, and this South Pacific region is the one on which we need to focus next.
All of the 18 vases for New Zealand have been placed and, of the 78 vases for Antarctica, 28 have been placed over the last 18 months. Other vases have been place in areas around the world by Australians travelling abroad. These include six vases placed in South America, four in the process of being placed in Turkey and one in Dili, East Timor. Plans are also afoot to place vases in Italy, Serbia and surrounding regions, and possibly Pakistan, Afghanistan and Argentina.
There are still many countries for which we have no co-ordinators (and would love to hear from people) including Arab countries, Iran, Afghanistan, most of Eastern Europe, Russia, Turkey, Central Asia (Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan), large parts of Africa, Cambodia, Vietnam and most South American countries.
Altogether the logistics of the project are staggering: just consider the size, geography and climate of places like Tibet and Russia and the religious fundamentalism and presence of armed conflict in other parts of the world. And yet, vases are being planted everywhere. People's devotion and commitment to peace leads them to do incredible things. We have just had 14 vases located in Tibet, Kashmir and Ladakh within a month. Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche himself put five vases in Iran!
The next major endeavour is to connect with local co-ordinators in those more remote locations, who can receive vases from India and take responsibility for their placement. The Siddhartha's Intent website has information on the project, which is co-ordinated internationally by Glenn Fawcett. If you would like to help us with this still enormous task, please contact:
*Glenn
Fawcett on sidswish@vsnl.com for
information about regions that require local coordinators.
*Kate Miller: katemiller@pnc.com.au
or Di Cadwaller on dicad@ihug.co.nz
for southern regions (Australia, South Pacific, Papua New Guinea and Antarctica).
*See the Peace Vase section of the SI website to obtain the e-mail
address for co-ordinators local to your region.
Kate
Miller
