| History About Us || History | Aims | Educational Trust Board  In the winter of 1973, the Venerable Namgyal Rinpoché visited New Zealand with about 85 of his students, mostly from Canada. They rented summer cottages around the shore of Lake Rotoiti near Rotorua (North Island) and held a 3 month meditation retreat. Afterwards, nearly 30 people liked New Zealand so much they decided to stay. A small group of people established themselves in Tauranga and began to give meditation classes. Another group led by Chimé Shore went to the South Island and began studies and teaching in Nelson and Christchurch. In 1974 the Sphere Group of NZ was founded and in 1975 the present site of the Wangapeka Study and Retreat Centre came up for sale and the Sphere Group bought it outright. At that time there were no buildings, no roads and only 3 or 4 grand old beech trees surrounded by a lot of sunburnt and wind swept gorse, tutu, and knee high bracken. With a great deal of enthusiasm and very little money, the initial road was put in, the main building, (made partly from rammed earth) was started, and 15,000 trees were planted. Over the years a great number of people, not only New Zealanders but many from overseas, have given freely of their time, skills and money, to build the centre you see today. In 1977 with the main building nearly completed, Chimé Shore went with a core of Sphere Groupers to Perth, Australia where he established the "Origin Centre". In 1980 the Sphere Group invited Tarchin Hearn to come from Canada to retreat and to teach. His first visit saw many classes and retreats and the finishing of the building of the main accommodation block. In 1982 on his third visit he became a NZ resident and at that time established an ongoing summer programme. Since then there have been an increasing number of courses and construction of new facilities has continued, funded totally by donation. In 1983 Namgyal Rinpoche's teacher, Ven. Sayadaw U Thila Wunta from Burma visited, and the Pagoda was built. After years of effort, the Wangapeka became a Charitable Trust in 1986. At that time, the name Sphere Group was changed to The Wangapeka Educational Trust. Click here for the printfriendly version of this page About Us / Program / Teachers / Treasury / Buddings / Images / Links / Books / Stay / Contact Us / Members
Sarva Mangalam - All is Blessing
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