Nick Nicolaides lives in the USA. He used to work as a photographer in Athens.

"Being in a retreat with Ven. Lama Dondrup Dorje was wonderful. What continually astounded me was Sifu's depth of knowledge in many disciplines. Sifu repeatedly stressed to us that what he required of his students was not ability or knowledge, but the observance of sincerity and reverence. Sifu is the embodiment of these qualities himself. He never seemed to be distracted or casual in his approach. So, while he was explaining about sincerity and reverence, he was constantly demonstrating these qualities himself. He also emphasised to us that we should approach all of life in this way. To attain a state of reverence and sincerity, Sifu explained that first one has to develop a quiet mind; that, as one's mind becomes more and more quiet, one actually begins to see things as if for the first time again, and so once again can begin to appreciate the wonder of life and nature; by practicing the form with reverence, the mind becomes quiet; as the mind becomes quiet, the rest will follow. So there is, in fact, no artificiality at all in this way.

On one occasion, Sifu was asked why he was wearing tinted glasses. In answer he removed them, and began to demonstrate a Taiji form. The whole area around him seemed to take on a totally new quality of quiet intensity and serenity. A distinctive yet subtle transformation came upon Sifu's face and eyes, and I realised that his features had become strikingly similar to a particular statue of Buddha I had previously seen in art books. I don't know why, but witnessing this event affected me very strongly. Somehow the thought came into my head that he was showing me the 'original Buddha face', if there is such a thing. Again, I don't really know why I thought this, or why, simply by watching what Sifu was doing, I was affected in this way.

One day at the retreat, Sifu was asked if he could help a dance teacher who had sustained a serious injury to his back during a dance class. I was there with Sifu when he went to help this patient who was leaning over the back of a chair in agony. Sifu stood a few feet behind him, seeming to direct his attention to the man's lower back. The atmosphere instantly became very quiet, but at the same time highly charged , similar in intensity to when Sifu had demonstrated his form without wearing his glasses . After no more than a minute, Sifu simply said, "OK, all done, let's go eat lunch". The patient turned around, eyes wide open in astonishment, and exclaimed, "What did you do?" He seemed too dumbfounded to add anything further, and marched off briskly to rejoin his friends, obviously feeling much better. Later on, I asked him what he had felt during his treatment. He told me that he had felt an intense heat throughout his lower back and then, before he realised, the pain was gone."