My second day of my 2026 writing January 2

This reminds me of writing in the temple because that is the place I wrote and mostly in the morning, especially when I wanted to record my dream.  I don’t dream as much out of the temple as in the temple.  And every year in the temple they are clear dreams of Mom and Dad that I have written about in my writings at Wat Rampoeng. When I spoke at Dad’s celebration of life, I expressed that one reason I go to the temple in Thailand annually is that I always have visitors from close relatives who have passed on, mostly from my Dad.  The significant dream this year was a very similar dream to the one I had in February with the setting being in the home I had grown up in.  I found this so significant in many layers.  

I did not write as much this year in my ten days of meditation at Wat Ram Poeng and did not write at all at the second temple.  So I write now about my four day experience in the forest temple.  The second temple was in the middle of a forest outside of Korat Thailand.  I flew back to Bangkok the day after I left Wat Ram Poeng after spending one night in the hotel, a nice hotel I had found when I was there in February.  I returned to the Bangkok Patio where I have stayed since returning to Thailand over the last ten years annually with the exception of one year due to lack of travel from Covid. Bangkok Patio feels like a home because familiar faces greet me along with a familiar space.  The rooms are small apartments.  I spent one night there and had arranged for my regular driver, Hung Oui, to take me and my two friends, Courtney and Gi Gi up to the forest temple for our five day retreat.  

Courtney has facilitated mediation retreats, and weekly zoom dharma talks wherein I have been active for at least ten years.  Our group is one of my sangha groups, a group of people who discuss the dharma, the teachings of Buddha.  A few years ago he organized our sangha group for a pilgrimage visiting several prominent temples in Thailand.  This year he organized this retreat to Korat.  Only two of us from our group, Gi Gi and my self, accepted the invitation.  

After a six hour drive, more than it should have been with traffic getting out of Bangkok, we arrived at the temple.  The head monk, Phra Ajahn Prechet, greeted us and took us to our Kutis where we would be staying four nights.  A Kuti is a small hut where monks and nuns stay.  This temple had never had a retreat, it was a favor the monk had arranged for Courtney.  My kuti was a small room with windows on three sides and a separate shower and toilet with a separate door joined by a patio looking over a small pond.  Courtney said there was a mattress they used for when monks got sick so the monk offered this mattress to me since I was older.  It was only an inch thick on top of what everyone else slept on, a wooden bed frame.  My sleep was restful sleeping on my back.  This time unlike Wat Rampoeng, we did not give up our phones.  I was pleased with my lack of use of my phone, with a realization that continuing to limit its use outside of the temple would be a healthy practice. 

So our retreat began.  We met with the monk that evening as we faced him sitting on the platform where monks sat higher than us.  He told us what he projected our days would be like and asked for our feedback.  We would begin with a four o’clock dhama
talk in the temple followed by joining the monks for their morning alms around the neighboring community.  Normally, women did not follow the monks but he made an exception for Gi Gi and my self.  He explained that one meal a day was what he, the five resident monks and one nun practiced.  After a ceremony from the community presenting food they had prepared along with what the monks had gathered during their alms, we went to the kitchen area for our meals around nine am.  Ajahn Prechat had asked Courtney if we would like a second small meal delivered to our kutis before noon since we were not in the practice of eating so infrequently.  We all agreed that this was a good idea.  Our practice was what and where we chose, alternating between conscious walking and sitting as like at Wat Rampoeng.  It was easy for me to fall into this routine after spending my previous ten days at Wat Rampoeng.