1. place your hibernate.cfg.xml file and the other xml file in your source folder in your project.
for example: if your project name is "hibernateproject" then you will find src folder in your project tree which is the source folder and is mentioned at the time of creating your new project in Eclipse.
2. for null pointer: check all .jar files in your projects classpath whether you have everything or not..
i am sure if you have done this then you dont have any problem..