Ringu Tulku was born in Eastern Tibet in 1952.

A professor of Tibetan studies for seventeen years, for the last five years he has been teaching at Naropa University in Boulder, Colorado.

He is the director of seven meditation centres in Europe, the United States, and India, and he travels and teaches extensively in Europe and the United States.

He lives in Gangtok, Sikkim in India.

Rinpoche teaches in warm and fluent English.

During my time as a monk in retreat, I had the dream of facilitating a gay and lesbian Buddhist group.

I am happy that despite many twists and turns since my emergence, this is one dream that has come true. The group has grown from strength to strength and takes place weekly at Kairos in Soho.

In April 2005, the group's guide, Ringu Tulku Rinpoche, a highly acclaimed and respected Tibetan Buddhish Master and our group guide, was invited to deliver teaching in London and has been doing so annually ever since.

Ringu Tulku Rinpoché is a master of the Kagyu Order. He is warm, humble and very approachable and when I asked whether he would be prepared to guide the group, he replied that it would be 'an honour'. I felt mightily honoured myself. As far as I know, the KiS group is the only explicitly gay and lesbian group under direct guidance of a Tibetan Buddhist teacher.

Ringu Tulku Rinpoché has trained in all schools of Tibetan Buddhism under many great masters and took his formal education at Namgyal Institute of Tibetology, Gangtok and Sampurnananda Sanskrit University, Varanasi, India. He has served as Professor of Tibetology in Sikkim for seventeen years. His doctoral thesis was on the Rimé (non-sectarian) movement.

Since 1990 he has been travelling and teaching Buddhism and Meditation at universities and institutes worldwide, participated in various interfaith dialogues and authored several books.

He also founded Bodhicharya, an international organisation that coordinates the worldwide activities to preserve and transmit Buddhist teachings, to promote intercultural dialogues and educational and social projects.

He is an immensely popular teacher and very busy and it is extremely generous of him to offer his support and guidance in this way. He is happy for people to take the teachings and test them rather than accept them at face value, revealing I believe the value and preciousness of true teachings.

A dream became a reality and made room for bigger dreams and better days.

Dirk de Klerk

Dirk has been facilitating the Buddhist meditation group at KiS, as a volunteer, since January 2004 and has been a meditation volunteer since KiS first opened. He is an asset to the organisation and KiS is extremely grateful to him for his dedication and support.