In the Monastery

Oh we westerners. Take away dinner for a night, and suddenly we're grouches. Take it away for two and suddenly we're plotting insurrection. Take it away for three...and suddenly, wait...we don't mind?

Such is the tradition in the Doi Suthep monastery. No eating after noon. Pretty much the rule of thumb through the Buddhist monastic world. It takes some getting used to, makes one realize how conditioned to the dinner bell we are. Sort of like dogs. Dogs that have to wear the white of a novice the entire time they are in the temple. I feel like Barry Gibb. Natalie looks a bit like his brother Andy.

All things being equal, it is a positive three nights we spend at the monastery. There is much walking meditation. Much sitting mediation. Much thinking about dinner.

The monks are kind. We never do learn the name of our teacher. Funny, they never ask you your name, beyond the form which you fill out at the beginning. Never refer to you by name. Never give their own names. Perhaps the idea of labels is an unnecessary complication. Maybe they are just a little frazzled by all this sitting around and doing nothing that they have forgotten to ask.

The monks are lovely, easy to smile. We Western seekers of course come with unrealistic expectations. They must certainly be paragons of austerity, these monks. True holy men that can levitate and have never had a negative thought cross their mind. They can see the universe in a grain of rice or in the orange lint they pull out of their belly button. And yet...

There are satellite dishes here. Atop the monks' quarters. Some of the monks suck rapturously at cigarettes as they shit-talk with the others. One of their cell phones goes off during chanting.

This is largely because most are young monks, here only for a short time. I think it's fairly obligatory for young Thais to do at least some time as a monk before moving on to the rest of their lives. Perhaps we could look on it as similar to Catholic school in the States. A few will come out priests, a few will come out sex-and-drug addled reactionaries; the rest will come out somewhere in between.

The older monks are the ones that have opted to stay on, commit to the faith. They don't seem to smoke. Maybe they're better at hiding it.

The message overall is a simple one: calm the body, calm the mind. Serve as a sort of traffic cop to all the unruly, discursive thoughts in your head. Do this by concentrating on your breath. Letting other thoughts slough off, fall away. Not taking the 'bait', as it were, when a thought comes up. Rest in the subverbal lands of your psyche. Be content with that...

...anyhow, oops...swerving into the metaphysical here...

At any rate, we left there happy to have participated. Happy to have seen the inner workings of the monastery. Will it change our lives? In all my wisdom (somewhere around a one-rating on the 1 to 100 Holy Man Wisdom Scale), it seems to me meditation is not a silver bullet, a one time panacea, but rather an ongoing and neverending practice. A way, if I may be David Carradine-in-Kung-Fu about it.

Learn to chill. Learn to not beat yourself up in those silent spaces. Be nice to others.

And...

...once you shed your white garb, head down the mountain into Chiang Mai, find the biggest noodle stand you can, and eat a couple of dinners each.

Which is precisely what we intend to do.

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