How I Got Kicked Out of a Temple Stay
Hey my dudes.
Ever since I watched Eat, Pray, Love some 10 years ago I have dreamed of the day I would be brave enough to travel to some far away land and learn about Buddhism and Meditation in a temple stay. I've read lots about them, and I've searched extensively to find one that was right for me (aka accepting of foreigners who are bound to make mistakes). I found my answer when I came across a place called Wat Pa Tam Wua Forest Monastery in Northern Thailand, near the border of Myanmar.
It is not the typical temple stay, and though the morning did begin at 5 am, it didn't include the mind-numbing amount of bows I had encountered when I did a stay in Korea in 2017. Wat Pa Tam Wua is a meditation temple, and teaches through walking, sitting, and lay down meditation. This is the schedule.
5 am: Wake up; practice meditation on your own in your Kuti (room)
630 am: Rice Offering to the Monks
7 am: Breakfast
8 am: Morning Meditation
1030 am: Rice/ Meal Offering to the Monks
11 am: Lunch
1 pm: Afternoon Meditation
4 pm: Cleaning and Chores
5 pm: Free Time
6 pm: Evening Chanting and Meditation
8 pm: Practice Meditation in your Kuti
10 pm: Sleep
Trust me, I know. Sounds tres strenuous. Seemed great to me with the only concern being that the last meal of the day was at 11 am.
Since my bus arrived from Pai at 10 am, we were just in time to (cluelessly) offer food to the Monks. Everyone seemed so pleasant, calm, and accepting as they bowed down, handing bowl after bowl to the men before us dressed in orange. Us new-comers were then sent off to change into our white clothes and prepare for the afternoon session.
The Dhamma Hall (where all events were held) was lined with square mats designating where we should take our seats to listen to the daily lesson from the Monk. The first day he talked to us about the 7 realms and how our "being" is born endlessly within these realms depending on the merits during each lifetime. I didn't retain everything from the 2 hours long lesson in broken English, but I do remember I don't want to be born again as a Greedy Ghost, or an Angry Ghost (two of the worst realms destined for bad people), and that being a Human isn't so bad after all. We then stood for our 40 minute veeeeeery slow-paced walk around the temple grounds. I likened it to riding a bike so slowly that you almost tip over. It was beautiful, in the simplest of terms. The Monastery is tucked between grand mountains, tall palm trees all around, with a distant sound of waterfalls, footsteps, and birds chirping being the only distraction. I spent so much time during the walk the first day thinking how grateful I was to have been allowed the chance to experience such a thing, and to be privileged enough to appreciate it. The first day was truly a lovely experience and though in the evening I spent over an hour chanting in 2 languages I didn't understand (Pali, the sacred language of Theravada Buddhism, and Thai), I did my best to follow along in the book given to us and to take in all of the positive energy flowing through the Hall. After stretching my legs, I drank a nice hot chocolate before returning to my kuti to sleep (at 9 pm).
Woken by my cutie, lovely Jimin alarm ringtone at 5:30 am, I felt pretty good considering I slept on a wooden bed. The schedule went as stated above, and I was feeling much more comfortable on the second day to follow through with the steps without looking to my neighbours to copy their actions. Morning talk, then meditation, offering, lunch... all good and well.
My friends from the bus and I decided that we would do our chore hour in the kitchen preparing food for the following day. Let me tell you, being mindful while peeling enough garlic for a meal to feed 100 people is not an easy task. While in the kitchen, the Thai ladies volunteering there as well told Kanda ( my friend) that her room was full of bad spirits and that she should not stay there for the evening on her own. Since I had plenty of floor space, I offered that she move her floor mat into my room for sleeping that night.
This is where the fun begins.
So, I had conveniently left out the introduction of Dr. P, who was the administration/ information manager for the temple who had self acclaimed himself as the smartest person within a 100 km radius. I am certain he is a very well educated man, and has studied the ways of Buddhists for quite some time, but when he was shouting over the guests telling everyone that he had stayed in the jungle by himself, with no food or water for 45 days I was in awe that I had met the Thai Bear Grylls... He was arrogant to say the least and spoke to others with very little respect despite the fact that we were all there to learn.
As I said before Kanda had moved into my room from fear of ghosts, and since she is such a lovely little soul she told Dr. P about it and he was enraged. Apparently we had broken the rules of the stay (untrue, since they were unstated) but he thought that we were undermining him and his authority. When Kanda told him of the current situation, he started to yell at her in Thai, but since it involved the both of us (and he was fluent) I asked that he speak in English so that I could also understand. He wasn't pleased by this, but I thought it was fair. He told me to leave, and to go practice "being a better person" in my kuti, and that if I didn't I would be forced to leave. I left, in order not to further upset the man in charge, and went to a nearby table to read and listen to the way he was treating my new friend.
When he started yelling at her, and she was crying, I went back to stand by her side to make her feel more strong. He was degrading, using his prior experience to shame us and make us feel as though we were unworthy students of the Monks at the temple. As a Buddhist, I expected more from him so I kindly asked him to speak to us with respect since we were adults there to learn and though we had perhaps broken a rule (unstated), we were willing to apologize and move forward with the stay. I know it sounds like a line that wouldn't come from my mouth as I tend to crumble under pressure, but I swear I said those exact words to him. He wasn't pleased by this either. He slapped my passport on the table and told me to check out and leave within the hour. Again, totally out of character, I softly pushed it back to him across the table and said "no thank you, I would like to stay until the following morning and listen to the lessons from the Abbot (head Monk) so I could 'be a better person'". He wasn't pleased by this either. Totally a his wits end, he gave me an ultimatum: take a badge of silence, or security would come and escort me from the temple. Again, very not Buddhist of him. With the badge, we were also told we would have to check out of my current room to move to room 46, the very room Kanda had moved out of due to spirits.
Friends, the date of this ghost fuelled situation was October 31st. If you think I was about to stay in a haunted room in a forest in the middle of nowhere in Thailand, you don't know me very well. I, to this day as a grown woman, quick-step up the stairs from the basement at 1 Pine Street. Instead of spending the night in a place that made a Thai woman cry just at the thought, we decided to double-break the worst, unspoken rule of the whole temple and bunk up with our other friend in her kuti. I'm sure Dr. P would have set aflame if he had known about it...
Our final 18 hours at the Monastery were absolutely lovely, and I really enjoyed learning from the happiest teacher in the most lovely of atmospheres.
Thanks Dr. P, for the fun story.
Thank you to Wat Pa Tam Wua for teaching me so many things about Buddhism, Meditation, and "how to be a good human".
Until next time!
안녕!