Padme Samye Ling Monastery

Towards the end of August, I called a Buddhist retreat center and monastery upstate to ask if I could come up there for a few days to do a personal retreat. The woman on the phone was very friendly and excited. When I mentioned that I wanted to come up the following week, she told me that a revered teacher was coming to visit the monastery during those dates and that I was welcome to come up and get a blessing (empowerment) from him. Seemed like auspicious timing so I called my friend Kevin and asked if he wanted to come on a roadtrip with me! Here's a description of the event from their website:

"The Padmasambhava Buddhist Center and Ven. Khenpo Tsewang Dongyal Rinpoche are honored to receive His Eminence Terton Namkha Drimed Rinpoche at Padma Samye Ling monastery and retreat center to bless the Three Kaya Temple of Padma Samye Ling & bestow the empowerment of Guru Padmasambhava according to the lineage of the great Terton Taksham Samten Lingpa."