Ayya Vīrañāṇi began to practice meditation in 1979. In 2003, after several years spent working at the Insight Meditation Society in Massachusetts, USA, and training in in the Thai Forest tradition, she began a four-year period devoted to intensive practice in the Burmese lineage of Mahasi Sayadaw. She took permanent ordination in Burma with Sayadaw U Pandita on New Year…
Andrea Huber is a Dhamma teacher and MBSR trainer (the mindfulness-based stress reduction method developed by Jon Kabat Zinn). She is originally from Austria and trained at the Institute of Mindfulness and Stress Reduction of Dr. Linda Lehrhaupt in Bedburg, Germany. She has a solid experience of Vipassana meditation according to the tradition of Mahasi Sayadaw, having practiced for long…
Ariya B. Baumann left her career as a music and dance teacher in favour of her deep yearning to understand herself and the world. Based on her many years of practice, twenty-one of them as a nun in the Burmese tradition, she now lays a strong emphasis on the practice of loving-kindness (including mettā chants) as a basis for the…
Bhante Gavesi is a Malaysian Bhikkhu who is currently based in Penang. He was ordained by the late Sayadaw U Pandita of Panditarama in Myanmar in the year 2001, where he practiced for more than one year, coming back for some Vassa (annual three months retreat) in the next years. He has led several retreats in Penang, Kuala Kubu Bharu,…
Gautam Verma is a Vipassanā meditator of Indian origins, and has been practicing for many years under the guidance of distinguished Dhamma teachers, besides doing long periods of solitary retreat. He’s been collaborating with Pian dei Ciliegi as a translator during interviews with English speaking Dhamma teachers. He’s been an assistant of Bhante Bodhidhamma since 2017, from whom he’s been…
Hannes Huber is an experienced Austrian Dhamma teacher. He began meditating in 1985 with Godwin Samararatne from Sri Lanka and has a long experience of retreats in the Mahasi tradition with Ven. U Pandita and Ven. U Vivekananda, who authorized him to teach. He faithfully reports the teachings of this tradition while offering an approach accessible to the Western mentality,…
Henrich Dahm’s dhamma journey started in 1989 in Nepal, when he was introduced by Sayadaw Jhanapurnika, a senior disciple of Mahāsi Sayadway, to Vipassana meditation. Since then, he has practiced and explored different meditation techniques under the guidance of distinguished teachers like Sayadw U Pandita, Sayadaw U Janaka, Ajahn Buddhadasa, Ajahn Dtun, Thich Nhat Hanh, etc. His practice took a…
Jean-Marie (“Jan”) de Wurstemberger’s beginnings as a Buddhist student lie in the tradition of Tibetan Buddhism, in the mid-nineteen-nineties. His teachers at the time included Lama Zopa Rinpoche and the Dalai Lama. In a conversation Lama Zopa one day advised him to “above all, just sit”. Soon after, the unexpected encounter with the Theravada monk and experienced meditation teacher Bhante…
Phd. from the University of Bologna, has a training in Yoga with the Kaivalyadhama Institute S.M.Y.M. Samiti – Lonavla – India with: Dr. Porrovecchio, Dr. Shrikrishna, Dr. M.L.Gharote, Dr. Vijayendra Pratap. Member of the International Association of Yoga Therapists, he has been teaching for 25 years,and has been a counselor for the City of Turin in activities for handicapped people…
Sayadaw U Uttarañāṇa (U Ottaranyana) was born in Myanmar in 1949. He passed the higher examination in scriptural studies and was awarded several prestigious titles. From 1984 to 1986, he resided at the main Mahasi Meditation Center in Yangon as a practitioner and then as a meditation instructor. In 1992 he was awarded the academic title of Mahāganthavācakapaṇḍita for his…
Sayadaw U Vivekananda started training under the Ven. Sayadaw U Panditabhivamsa in 1988. He is a resident teacher at Panditarama Lumbini International Vipassana Meditation Center in Nepal, where he has taught insight meditation and Brahmavihara meditation since 1998 and internationally since 2000, guiding meditators in English, German, French and Burmese. Dhamma talks given by the Ven. Sayadaw U Panditabhivamsa at…
Sayalay Bhaddamanika began practicing under Sayadaw U Pandita in Myanmar in 1974 when she was 19. She ordained as a nun in 1999 with Sayadaw U Pandita as her preceptor and began teaching meditation in 2002.Sayalay is currently based in Nepal, residing and teaching at the Panditarama Lumbini Meditation Centre alongside Sayadaw Vivekananda, and spends several months each year leading…