Thai Adventure #1
Did I ever tell you about my new monk friend that's an ex muay thai kickboxing champion?
Before I start though, let me share with you my enlightening experience at my first Thai spa. Everyone must, at least once in their life, go to a free herbal sauna in Thailand run by a Buddhist monastery. Seriously. Not only can you zen out and be beside oneself, its a perfect way to detox from the snake venom your friend dared you to ingest the night before. Once at Wat Pho, one can change into a fabulous sarong before drenching yourself with dirty thai water head to toe, and then proceed into an 6'x10' oven-like sauna that's infused with citronelle, lemongrass, ginger, lavender, jasmine, and other indiscernible powders stored in colorful nameless glass jars. The walls of the sauna are built with robust CMU blocks, worn by years of mileage, with a single frosted glass square that allows that the faintest glow of natural light to seep in. Once in the dark cavern, the potpourri envelopes you, and before you know it, fierce beads gather and slippery sweat spills through your happy pores. A bit more time passes and your lungs begin to fill with a heavy vigorous air, your nostrils clear, and suddenly nirvana kicks in at full gear. Maybe not nirvana, but you are certainly struggling not to pass out from the lack of oxygen flowing to your now-mushy noodle.
Which brings me to the Monk. Across the road resides a group of monks that maintain the monastery and surrounding grounds. By some feudalistic law, every Thai man is required to go through monk-hood at some point in his life. Soontun, on the left, has been a monk for 12 years and counting, and before that, a muay thai champion for five consecutive years in the thaiboxing town of Patong. After befriending Soontun on our way out of the sauna, he invites us back for lunch the next day. That's how Alix and I found ourselves repeating Buddhist chants underneath the canopy of an obscure temple one random afternoon in Koh Phagnan. Upon arriving, the first thing Soontun did was give me a small key chain of a naw (a thai instrument), and he points to me and says, through his broken English, "You, music. You music." (I'm a musician by trade) Then he gives Alix a seashell windchime which, although wasn't the EXACT one she wanted, was a souvenir she's been meaning to buy for herself. It's strange and inexplicable, as if he had spiritual gifts and was flexing his ESP powers. He then offers to "bodyguard" us to Chiang Mai via train, and invites us to pick oranges at his family's grove in Chiang Dao. But the story does not continue and we did not meet with him again. He did, however, call our cellphone nonstop every few hours for the duration of our trip. Was that monkish of him? We didn't think so. We figured either a.) he's a psycho undercover that enjoys hanging out at wats or b.) he's painfully bored, or c.) he's spiritually gifted, but still painfully bored. Upon returning one of his phone calls, he hands his phone over to another man, who turns out to be a Dutch friend Soontun befriended as well. Apparently he received calls at all hours as well. So, final answer, b.) painfully bored.
I'm still not sure if I can classify my experience with the monk as mystical or mad. Alix thinks the latter, but I am not fully convinced. I have a feeling this is not the last I have seen of this monk. When we left, I found the little dog in the picture chewing up my shoes. Too bad the monk didn't see that coming.
Before I start though, let me share with you my enlightening experience at my first Thai spa. Everyone must, at least once in their life, go to a free herbal sauna in Thailand run by a Buddhist monastery. Seriously. Not only can you zen out and be beside oneself, its a perfect way to detox from the snake venom your friend dared you to ingest the night before. Once at Wat Pho, one can change into a fabulous sarong before drenching yourself with dirty thai water head to toe, and then proceed into an 6'x10' oven-like sauna that's infused with citronelle, lemongrass, ginger, lavender, jasmine, and other indiscernible powders stored in colorful nameless glass jars. The walls of the sauna are built with robust CMU blocks, worn by years of mileage, with a single frosted glass square that allows that the faintest glow of natural light to seep in. Once in the dark cavern, the potpourri envelopes you, and before you know it, fierce beads gather and slippery sweat spills through your happy pores. A bit more time passes and your lungs begin to fill with a heavy vigorous air, your nostrils clear, and suddenly nirvana kicks in at full gear. Maybe not nirvana, but you are certainly struggling not to pass out from the lack of oxygen flowing to your now-mushy noodle.
Which brings me to the Monk. Across the road resides a group of monks that maintain the monastery and surrounding grounds. By some feudalistic law, every Thai man is required to go through monk-hood at some point in his life. Soontun, on the left, has been a monk for 12 years and counting, and before that, a muay thai champion for five consecutive years in the thaiboxing town of Patong. After befriending Soontun on our way out of the sauna, he invites us back for lunch the next day. That's how Alix and I found ourselves repeating Buddhist chants underneath the canopy of an obscure temple one random afternoon in Koh Phagnan. Upon arriving, the first thing Soontun did was give me a small key chain of a naw (a thai instrument), and he points to me and says, through his broken English, "You, music. You music." (I'm a musician by trade) Then he gives Alix a seashell windchime which, although wasn't the EXACT one she wanted, was a souvenir she's been meaning to buy for herself. It's strange and inexplicable, as if he had spiritual gifts and was flexing his ESP powers. He then offers to "bodyguard" us to Chiang Mai via train, and invites us to pick oranges at his family's grove in Chiang Dao. But the story does not continue and we did not meet with him again. He did, however, call our cellphone nonstop every few hours for the duration of our trip. Was that monkish of him? We didn't think so. We figured either a.) he's a psycho undercover that enjoys hanging out at wats or b.) he's painfully bored, or c.) he's spiritually gifted, but still painfully bored. Upon returning one of his phone calls, he hands his phone over to another man, who turns out to be a Dutch friend Soontun befriended as well. Apparently he received calls at all hours as well. So, final answer, b.) painfully bored.
I'm still not sure if I can classify my experience with the monk as mystical or mad. Alix thinks the latter, but I am not fully convinced. I have a feeling this is not the last I have seen of this monk. When we left, I found the little dog in the picture chewing up my shoes. Too bad the monk didn't see that coming.
Labels: commentary, travel
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