A Very Naropa Day

Wednesday morning, the 18th, I went to Juniper Cottage at Naropa University to meet with the University Archivist, Tim Hawkins. The Naropa Archives, with a grant from the federal government (don't ask me which department or agency of the government) has done an amazing job reformatting 2,000 hours of audio in the writing and poetics department. Tim showed me their audio lab and we spent quite a lot of time on line looking at their material online at archives.org (I think) Lots of opportunities to collaborate with the Shambhala Archives, Legacy Project et al. Tim also introduced me to the Special Collections Librarian who was cataloging CDs in the Audio Recovery Project of the Shambhala Archives (Naropa is participating in that). In the afternoon, Tom Hast, Larry Mermelstein and I met with Naropa President Tom Coburn to talk about the legacy projects at Naropa to celebrate their founder, Chogyam Trungpa, and how the CT Legacy Project can help to support that mission. A member of the Naropa development staff also attended. It is remarkable how Dr. Coburn is "raising the consciousness" of the Naropa community and the Boulder and international academic communities, vis a vis Chogyam Trungpa, his role at Naropa and his role in American academia and scholarship. We also talked about the upcoming Ocean of Dharma conference. Last night was dinner with Ken Green, together with Tom Hast, Larry, and joined by Walter Fordham. We touched on how the Naropa conference needs to encompass the larger community of Chogyam Trungpa's senior students. As with any first venture, there is much room for growth nad improvement in the conference. I hope it will grow significantly next year. Those present at dinner resolved to have a party, er...discussion, Friday night after the keynote address by Diana Mukpo to bring together senior students of Chogyam Trungpa, whether they are "officially" part of the conference or not. If you are reading this and would like to attend, you just need to call Ken and he'll tell you the password and secret handshake, as well as the location of the party.
Today ELEPHANT magazine is interviewing Diana Mukpo, who arrived last night. I'm off to join that stream. Many streams crossing in Boulder this week. I hope we will have lift off!