Video of the Buddhist ceremony opening the Manjushri Dharma Center in Pacific Grove.

According to his bio, Buddhist teacher Khenpo Karten Rinpoche was born in Nangchen, Tibet, in the Himalayas, in 1964. He studied formally in a monastery starting at age 12, then with two masters for eight years, followed by five years at a hermitage with another teacher. In 1996, he left Tibet for India to meet His Holiness the Dalai Lama, who advised him to teach others Buddhist practices.

And that's been his mission in Hong Kong, Singapore, Burma, Taiwan and Nepal. He set up teaching centers in South India, Malaysia and New York. The most recent one just opened in Pacific Grove. 

There, he and supporters founded the Manjushri Dharma Center, a Dharma center of Buddhist spiritual teaching and practice. 

There is a website. It lists events like Tibetan Uprising Day, which was commemorated locally March 10 with a rally at Windows on the Bay, and regular Amitabha practice with Rinpoche on Mondays (with pianist Michael Martinez accompanying prayer and chanting), and meditation on Wednesdays (7-8pm) and Saturdays (10-11am). 

It also tells us that Rinpoche, who earned political asylum by the U.S., will be traveling through June. 

The center opened May 31 with an interesting (maybe even transfixing) ceremony performed by Rinpoche.

"Robert Pacelli provided this nice video of our House Blessing with Rinpoche on May 31," writes Heidi Feldman in an email on behalf of Rinpoche.

In the video, Rinpoche, through a translator, welcomes anyone of all religions. He recites chants. He blesses the house (which is also his residence) with water first, dipping a pine bough into a bowl of water and tossing sprinkles on the house and the people present (and, maybe inadvertently, on a barbecue grill).

There's more to the ceremony, which he conducts wearing a kashaya monk's robe and cool shades. It is below. 

It's an interesting recording of an ancient spiritual practice amid the sights and sounds of modern traffic and power lines, a clearing of space in the mundane to make a little room for the profound.