I just heard about this center and watched a youtube video: looks pretty cool. Anyone been there? If so, thoughts?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NqJX81fu5XM

Daniel

Hey Daniel

Thanks for posting! I haven't been, but I also like the look of the place. I had a Google around and found the following:

http://buddhisthermitagelunas.blogspot.hk/ - Their website, with address and phone and email details, as well as Dharma talks and various media. 

Oddly, they have a Facebook page where it seems to be all about giving blood donations: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Buddhist-Hermitage-Lunas/234906763205922

And this German retreat listing website (http://www.retreat-infos.de/page3/page18/page18.html) states the following:Sorry I haven't been, but I hope this helps!




 

I applied and they accepted me. They sent the following message first however:
I replied that I would definitely follow their technique if I came to visit, and they then told me I could come any time. However, I'm now looking to go on retreat at the Appamada Vihari Retreat Centre, as I prefer paying attention to the breath at the nose rather than the abdomen. I may be in Malaysia for a while though, so I'll consider the BHL for the future, and if I do go there I'll definitely leave a review.

Hi Daniel,

I was there for one month last July. The people who run the place are nice and the facilities are good. It is not as quiet as one might like though. There are plenty of donors visiting the place everyday and the environment can get rather noisy.

But for me the one major flaw of this center was the quality of the supervision one can get there. I can't really say that the current teacher, Sayadaw U Pannasara, is a good one. He's a very friendly and helpful guy but is not in my opinion a proficient meditation guide. The advice he gave me during the interviews was way too general and basic. I was in Equanimity during my time there and all he said was "Note 'knowing, knowing'" or "Note 'rising, falling, sitting'", etc. He just gave me tips about the labels I could use to note objects and told me to just ignore whatever I reported to him. One hardly needs a meditation teacher for that kind of advice. I felt rather lost during my practice there unfortunately.

I hope this helps.

Best,

Cem

Just to update this thread in case anyone is looking for info on this meditation centre:

The teacher at Lunas changes every year or even more often, as a monk is sent over from the Mahasi Centre in Yangon to take charge. But I agree with Cem’s assessment above in that the teacher who was in charge when I meditated there in Sept 2017 gave pretty much the same responses to my reports, despite being a different monk. On the other hand I heard from another yogi that the teacher he had there was very helpful...

In case anyone wants more detail, it’s all here on my blog:
https://placestomeditate.wordpress.com/2017/10/04/buddhist-hermitage-lunas/
(If link doesn’t work, please copy & paste.)

Thanks for the writeups. The photography on your blog is super crisp too! One thing to point out though, Kedah is a separate, neighboring state, to Penang (apparent in the address of the monastery, in Kedah Darul Aman).

Thanks Small Steps for bringing that to my attention! Fixed. All the best!