Thai Life in Phana

Just another quiet day in Phana

I have to thank the Oyster Band for my title today although their song was much more heavily ironic than this post will be. That's because it really was a quiet day in Phana and as it got dark here this evening I was thinking that nothing at all had happened. But on reflection that is not quite true.

The loudspeaker from Moo 9 started up really early today, about 5 a.m. it woke me and by the sound of it it had been going on a while. There is a special harvest festival being held at Wat Burapa in Moo 9 over the next three days and it started this morning.

By about 7.15 Pensri and I were out in the drive playing badminton, a daily activity for us and a source of entertainment for the busloads of schoolkids who go by between this time and 8 o'clock. My usual intense concentration was disturbed though by what I saw on the cables strung out along the far side of the road. I rushed for my camera and then rushed with it up the road, The result was poor but at least it is proof that I'm not just making all this excitement up.

Now something like this would not get a mention if I lived in Lopburi, but here it only happens about once a year. I suspect that it is the same elderly male that goes walkabout on the wires. He is heading home here but is still about a km away.  

As we were eating breakfast on the verandah (it makes us think we are at Southfork) a young woman came by and squatted down next to Pensri and asked her advice on some family problems she is having. I wandered off to my 'study' at the back of the house to do some work on an extended piece of writing I am currently busy with in an off and on sort of way. A friend of mine, a former illegal immigrant now made legal, came by with a gift of a large fish. We said we would have it for lunch and an hour or so later he was back with lots of vegetables for us to eat with it. While he was away a friend of Pensri's came by with a ripe papaya from her garden. So that was a bit more lunch for us.

Pensri went off to do some photo-copying and while she was away another annual sort of traveller went by on a bicycle. I'm not easily fooled so I knew straight away that it was Santa Claus. Except, of course, that it wasn't. Because I caught a glimpse of a very neat leg emerging from the red robe. You shouldn't be in my blog, I thought, get back, get back to  where you once belonged Mrs Claws.

Lunchtime came and the fish was one I had never had before, The flesh was similar in colour and texture to a trout but it was a much chubbier fish (though I have never eaten chub) and a bit oily for my taste. Good though. And the papaya was sweeter and jucier than many we buy.

A couple of hours after lunch we were both on the verandah again, this time I was having a foot massage from the woman I met at the community day recently. A man from Wat Phra Lao committee came and talked us into donating towards moving the crematorium a bit further west. At the moment they need money for land-filling, 200 Baht a truck-load.  He had a big accounts book with him and took a long time telling us who had paid up so far and how much. So he put us down for 5 loads and we paid up. We don't much like their reasons for moving the crematorium (more room for the stage when they hold the annual festival) but on the other hand it will be moved further from us, so on balance it's to our advantage.

A couple more visitors. Ajarn Kanet, headteacher of one of Phana's schools, came round to talk to Pensri about the school reunion they are organizing together. Then, just after I had finished my foot massage, another ajarn came round to collect some proof-reading I had done of some work sheets he had prepared for his English classes.

And finally (but I can't really be sure of this for at least another hour since it is now 8.30 p.m.) Mr Arporn came round, coughing badly. Yesterday he was coughing worse and took himself to the district hospital just before dusk. He took a short cut from his house through Don Chao Poo, the local forest and monkey sanctuary. On one of the sandy tracks he came across a python, about 6 metres long and as fat as his admittedly skinny thigh. He didn't have much time to be frightened but he managed to be and accelerated past it because he reckoned if he had braked he would have stopped right up next to it. He also mentioned that it was lucky he wasn't on his bicycle becaue it doesn't have any lights. I don't actually think pythons are a danger to fully-grown humans but I didn't want to spoil his story. And I may be wrong. I definitely wouldn't hang around to put my theory to the test.

People used to talk about the python in Don Chao Poo but a couple of years ago the monkey population started to increase and it was assumed that the python was no more. It was a defunct python. Etc, etc, etc. I met an Englishman a couple of years ago who lives about 75 kms away. He said that he used to have a Burmese python but it grew too big so he put it in a box and drove it to Don Chao Poo where he released it, hoping it liked macaque monkeys. So I just wonder ...

I am also wondering whether tomorrow will be another quiet day in Phana. We shall see.

 

Allegations against Monk

The other day I visited a temple near a small town about 45 kms from Phana. I had heard that it had a small viharn containing two statues of a monk who was a follower of the famous Isan meditation master, Ajaan Mun Bhuridatto. 

 

I am always interested in the variety of Buddhist temples in Thailand and the extremes of architecture and atmosphere that you can experience in them. This was definitely at the austere end of the spectrum. There was no main viharn, no preaching hall, no famous image. The ubosot (ordination hall) was very plain inside and out. The door was locked but the window shutters were open. Inside there were no murals, no columns, no ceiling ornamentation. The compound was very large and there was a huge number of tall, old trees giving plenty of shade. There was a school for novices (124 of them) with a big welcome sign in English and about three classes of younger novices were in session. Some novices were using the school library to read daily newspapers and the wall outside the library featured news of the death of former PM Samak and photographs of him. Along one side of the compound wall there were several two-storey buildings to accommodate the novices. There were also two special little buildings, one a resdience and the other an office. This was because this temple is where the Chao Kana Changwat (the head monk of the province) stays.

There was a surprising number of cars and pick-ups and a mini-van parked in the shade under several of the trees. It isn't unusual for there to be vehicles like this in a temple, but there didn't seem to be anyone around except three old ladies sitting at a table in the deserted outdoor canteen for novices. While I wandered around the grounds and visited the school, Pensri went to sit with the women. It didn't take her long to find out what was going on.

A meeting was going on between the Chao Kana Changwat and a delegation of supporters of a small forest monastery not far away in the same amphur. There was only one monk (a 20-year monk, 42 years old) staying at the temple and there were also three middle-aged women, one of them his aunt, who also stay there practising meditation, though they are not mae chee. Allegations had been made in writing that the monk was 'too strict' and requests made that he be removed from the temple. There were also allegations that he had misbehaved with one or more women.

The allegation of being too strict arose from a few people who had borrowed money from the monk, or from the temple funds. His strictness took the form of ASKING FOR THE MONEY TO BE REPAID. Now it is not uncommon in Isan for loans to be requested and granted with both sides knowing that there is little or no chance of repayment, though nothing is said to this effect. But this would not be the expectation in the case of money borrowed from a temple. Asking for repayment causes  loss of face, possibly to both sides. As for the allegations of sexual impropriety, they are easily made against a solitary monk. In this case it would seem that they only arose because the monk had been so strict about the money. He certainly wasn't wise to lend money in the first place, though if you were being charitable you might say he was being helpful.

The people Pensri spoke to, and seemingly all the people who had come for the meeting (there were about 60 of them), all supported the monk and wanted him to stay. And that was the outcome of the meeting: the monk was allowed to stay. However, when his supporters had all left, he was still in conference with the Chao Kana Changwat, so perhaps some form of pennance, or at least some good advice, was coming his way.

A few photos of the temple. The wat gate already suggests austerity in that it focuses on the Buddha's teaching, the wheel of the law and the two tudong (wandering) monks on either side. Also the lack of bright colour is significant.

 

This small viharn was specially built to house the shrine to comemorate the revered monk who spent years wandering with Ajaan Mun. The local people decided some time ago to comemmorate him here, perhaps because he settled here in his old age, or perhaps he was originally a local person.

The walls of the lower section are of brick roughly covered with stucco. The interesting thing is that these walls do not reach the ceiling and the windows have no shutters, so it is very cool and airy inside. This inner building is the original, the viharn is just an open-sided sala built over it to provide protection from the rain and sun.

 

The shrine room is also very simple and relatively uncluttered.

 

Behind the viharn is the ordination hall and these two animals were being sheltered on a kind of veranda behind the hall. They were covered in heavy-duty canvas patches, stitched fairly roughly. I suppose that they were waiting to be covered with concrete or stucco of some sort.

 

This was a very interesting temple to visit, and the 'goings on' there on that day made it even more interesting.

 
   

 

 

 

Tetsaban Phana: Tod Kathin Procession to Wat Trimit

The Tod Kathin procession from the market place in Ban Phana to Wat Trimit in the amphur was a long  and noisy one. Few people saw it, perhaps, because although the route is a direct one, it doesn't pass many houses. Between Ban Phana and 'the amphur' (as it is always referred to) there is quite a lot of empty space, including the large area where the Tetsaban is currently constructing the new market and bus station.

 

All dressed up and quite a long way to go.

 

Where all the noise came from:

 

For some people, a procession is an easy ride.

 

Others have to put their best foot forward.

 

They have reached the District Office (the amphur).

 

Some people just can't help dancing.

 

Nearly there!

 

When you reach the temple, you then have to walk around the ubosot three times in a clockwise direction.

 

A temple has to have no fewer than five monks in residence to qualify for a Tod Kathin. This one only just made it.

 

What it is all about: presenting the robes.

 

One of the monks must have said they should help themselves:

 

And that really is the last Tod Krathin for this year. But the night before this the Tetsaban arranged 4 hours of entertainment at the market place, so I'll be putting some photos of that in my next posting.

 
 
 
 
 
 

 

 
 
 

 

 

Tetsaban Phana: Tod Kathin 2552 / 2009 Day Two

The second day of the Tod Kathin organised and sponsored by Phana Municipality began very early back at the market place. Nine monks were invited to chant and receive offerings of food there.

 

The mayor's father requested the five precepts and made the formal offering to the monks:

 

 

 

The abbot of Wat Don Kwan sprinkled holy water on people as a blessing.

 

 

 

The monks were requested to accept donations of food and paraphenalia.

 

 

The mayor poured water during their acceptance to transfer merit to the ancestors of Phana.

 

 

Latecomers were not too late to leave a donation.

 

 

And then the procession formed up. They had about 2 kms to walk to Wat Trirat in the amphur area. These two young women always find themselves at the front of Tetsaban Phana parades. It can't be easy keeping in step with each other as they carry the banner between them.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 

  
 
 
  

Tetsaban Phana: Tod Kathin 2552/2009 Day One

Tetsaban Phana organised their Tod Kathin to take place right at the end of the month following Awk Phansa. The presentation of new robes was to be made at Wat Trirat, a wat in the amphur that is hidden behind Samarkee School -- the school that is now run by the Tetsaban. The ong kathin was set up at the market place in Ban Phana and throughout the day (October 29th) people came to make offerings. As always these were scrupulously recorded.

 

 

Monks from several temples in Phana were invited to chant at about 4 pm. The mayor was leading the ceremony so he lit the candles on the shrine table.

 

The Chao Kana Amphur was invited to give a dhamma talk. He is quite a young scholar-monk who became head of the amphur group of monks two years ago. He is abbot of a temple in a village called Ban Sao Rik, about 6 kms from Ban Phana. It houses a large school for novices which I plan to feature soon.

 

 

The chanting followed his teaching. I didn't follow his teaching, but he spoke in Lao and there seemed to be quite a few jokes in with the more serious parts, and his audience / congregation seemed to appreciate it all.

 

Here are some of the people of Phana listening to the chanting:

 

 

Tetsaban workers were giving out drinks of cold water throughout the cereomonies:

 

When the chanting had finished they also served food:

 

Every month the Tetsaban gives a pension of 600 Baht to every one in their area who is over 60 years old and not receiving any other pension. In other words, they do not give these pensions to retired teachers, civil servants, police or military. The law states that Tetsaban can give pensions at their discretion but as far as I can tell, very few actually do so. The current Tetsaban administration make much of their policy to provide for people 'from before the cradle to the crematorium' and I will be saying something about this in a later blog. 

On this occasion, the distribution of pensions took place on this first day of the Tod Kathin, which of course is a good way to make sure some of the people stick around to the end!

 

 

 
 

And then it was time for the entertainment to begin. For the next four hours, from 6 pm to 10 pm, we were entertained by young and old people from Phana, and just a few people brought in specially from outside. But that will have to wait for a later posting.

 
 
 
 

 

 

 

 

More Tod Kathin in Phana

 We went over to a temple in a small village where our friend Mae Chee Kalaya was one of the sponsors of a Tod Kathin taking place the next day. This is Mae Chee Kalaya, a lovely woman who went to school in Phana with one or two of Pensri's younger sisters. She had a good career in the Ministry of Commerce, I think, and spent several years abroad working in Thai embassies, so her English is excellent. Her children are grown up and have children of their own and they fully supported her decision to leave married life behind her a few years ago to become a nun. She doesn't spend all her time here in Phana. Mostly she stays in a community of Mae Chee somewhere north of Bangkok.

 

 

There is very little of the wat and the abbot told me that it had only been established three or four years. It has a lot of ground, mostly still covered in trees, with about eight small kuti for the monks. Mae Chee Kalaya has a nice little kuti which her children had built for her. Other than that the only other building is a large sala, at present no more than a floor, a roof and the beginnings of some walls. I had been there once before when the abbot was installed as Chao Kana Tambon, that is the chief abbot of the tambon group. At that time a Buddha Image had just been installed and I think it is one of the most beautiful I have seen. I like it because it looks very plain, but in fact it is more special than the usual glittering image. It is carved from a huge stone of some sort, possibly a kind of soapstone. The carving was done in Saraburi but I'm not sure whether the stone also came from there.

 

 

 

 

An ong kathin is always set up, either at the sponsor's home or less usually at the wat, as here. A rectangular area is marked off by fruit, baskets and seemingly assorted odds and ends like brooms. A gong is always featured. People who are going to contribute offerings bring them to this place. When it is set up outside a wat, it is always dismantled and taken in procession to the wat to be presented along with the robes which are the main idea of this festival.

 

 

 

These women were busy making their ornate contributions and it would have made a good photo, but because I asked permission to take one they immediately stopped work, stopped laughing among themselves, and arranged themselves and their 'work' as you can see: 

 

 

 

Another feature of all kathin (at least here in this part of Isan, but I guess everywhere) are pennants showing four creatures: a crocodile, a turtle, a mermaid and a centipede sort of thing. I have always wondered what their significance was, and the abbot explained. They represent millionaires who never practised generosity, never took part in kathin. Re-born as these unlucky creatures they see a kathin procession and ask to be part of it so they can gain merit and perhaps be reborn into a better life.

 

 

 

 

 

 
Well, the kathin season lasts for a month after awk phansa, so it is very nearly over for another from that when I got up! This evening, though, there will be singing and dancing at the old market place, so I hope to be there for that.year. For me there is just the one organised by Tetsaban Phana still to come. It started this morning when people went to Wat Trirat in the amphur to feed the monks at breakfast time. I saw people coming back

 

 

 

Wild Orchid Conservation at a Thai Forest Monastery

Earlier this year I visited a wat in Khon Khaen Province and a recent post on My Thai Friend reminded me of it. I was on a bit of a tour around Isan and this was just about the last on the list of places I had planned to visit. To a certain extent I was a little disappointed because I had read that I would see hundreds of orchids there. It's true that I did, but what I had not expected was that there would be just the one species. But still, this was not an orchid farm but a forest monastery which had conserved the species that was already growing there.

This helpful notice was just outside the monastery:

 

This notice was less helpful to me because I am illiterate but I love this version of the Thai script:

 

And here are two of the orchids:

 

 

Beautiful, aren't they? But we don't need photos of all 4,000 of them to get the idea.

Over at My Thai Friend (here) (then search: Dan Singkhon) you can read about wild orchids for sale at a border market in Phrachuap Kiri Khan Province.
 
 

 

Tod Kathin, Kathin, Kathin ... in Phana

The Tod Kathin season is already in full swing and in small towns like Phana the coming weekend is likely to see a final burst of activity.  This is because of the long weekend starting with King Chulalongkorn Day on the 23rd. Long weeekends are when 'exiles' from rural areas like this return home to their families and roots.

Each wat with at least 5 monks in residence is entitled to benefit from one robe presentation (Tod Kathin) each year. Originally that is all it was, the presentation of a new set of robes to one monk nominated by the abbot. Nowadays, and for some time past, it has become a major source of fund-raising for the temple, a major source of merit-making for lay people, and a major source of economic activity for the makers and sellers of Buddhist supplies and for local construction companies. Oh, and it is also a major source of sanuk for everyone who takes part.

 

Wat Phra Lao was the first of Phana's temples to benefit this year. On 9th October a so-called 'mobile' kathin was organised by a Bangkok family who originated in Phana. They came with their friends and colleagues and were supported by the few distant relatives they have here. I imagine that raised quite a lot of money but don't know how much.

 

On 11th October the family who live just up the road from us held a Tod Kathin at a wat in a village about 2 kms from Phana. We are neighbours but unrelated, so our contribution to this one was small. My own contribution was mainly to give up lots of sleep (see my recent post 'Sleepless in Phana').

 

Next up was a 'united kathin' at Wat Burapha. This one was a bit unusual, at least in my experience. There were 4 different contribution patterns, if I can call them that.  The aim was to raise money to build or re-build the pavillion used for cremation ceremonies. The crematorium at Wat Burapha was the first in Phana and the facilities are very much in need of renovation. One individual, an uncle of the abbot, offered 100,000 Baht. Another family living near the wat pledged to raise at least 120,000 Baht. The wat committee invited people to make individual pledges of 500 Baht per unit (ong). Other people, mostly those living close to the wat could of course join in by making any donation they wished -- those would be samller than 500 Baht. The total raised was 580,000 Baht, so there must have been a lot of 500 Baht ong and small donations.

 

My photos on this occasion were not very good but I will include a few anyway.

Here is Pensri posing in the garden before we set off to Wat Burapha.

 

Donations were registered in separate books for units and other donations.

 

Not only money is offered on these occasions. Many of these small pillows will be given away by the monks on subsequent occasions.

 

 

After the ceremony concluded and I was outside talking to the sandal man (previous post) one of the monks came out with plastic bags of fruit which he hung on the gates of houses in the neighbourhood.

The nest sequence show people enjoying giving to the temple.

 

 

 

And the abbot (whose mother brings him food before noon every day from her house just down the road) was very generous in his thanks. He has a good sense of humour as well as being a 'scholar monk': Phra Maha Jantee is his name. The monks also distributed auspicious souvenirs of the occasion to all the lay people.

 

Coming up is a united kathin at Wat Don Kwan on the 21st, a tetsaban organised kathin for Wat Trirath on the 29th, which will include the bong lang orchestra and dancers from the Tetsaban-sponsored Samakee School. On the 23rd the family of one of Pensri's uncles is holding a kathin in Ubon and lots of her cousins will be coming for that from all over Thailand. On the 31st another kathin in Ubon is being organised by a school-friend of Pensri's. They were at school together more than 50 years ago! These are just the ones we will be involved in! I'll maybe post some photos when it's all done.

And while I was writing this we were visited by an old friend, another who went to school with Pensri. This was Mae Chee Kalya, who is one of the organisers of a kathin in a village just outside Phana (but in the amphur) which is being held on 24th. I hope I can do a post about her because she is an interesting woman and the wat where she stays when she is in Phana is an interesting one too. So there's a bit more kathin to come.

 

 
 

 

 
 
 
 

Fewer than 180 Monks feasted in Phana

180 monks were invited to a ceremony in Phana a couple of weekends ago and so were we. We only received our invitation the previous evening when the organisers -- two good friends of ours -- realised we were back in Phana. We did not entirely understand what was going on but knew that 180 monks had been invited to chant and eat at a new wat on the edge of the town.  Our friends had booked a table for six people in our name and we were to offer 600 baht. We could invite four people to join us, of course.

It was a somewhat unusual occasion but not the first that supporters of this particular monastery have arranged. The monastery was only founded a few years ago. It is in a forested area right on the western edge of Phana, opposite the secondary school Phanasuksa. There is one large wooden sala with a wide verandah in front and about ten small kuti where the monks stay. There is no viharn as such and no ubosot.

The precise nature of the arrangements only gradually became clearer once we got there. It wasn't until the ceremony had finished and the last people (us) were about to go home that I found out why Ajarn Deem was carrying a blue briefcase the whole time.

The sala was crowded with people, there were more out on the verandah, and many more sitting outside under the trees. Under a temporary pavillion to one side of the sala 30 red tables with white table-cloths had been set up. Apparently we had sponsored one of these tables. The monks would eat there after they led us through taking the five precepts, agreed to accept our offerings, chanted, one of them had given an extemporised sermon and they chanted again. Another feature that made this occasion unique in my experience was that all the usual 'old man' duties were performed by women: asking for the precepts, making the formal offering, and so on.

 

 

People who take food to the wat to offer to the monks usually eat there too. On most occasions the food is first pooled and then shared out among the monks. What is left over is then redistributed to the lay people. That is what happened on this occasion. In addition, though, the villagers who live around the wat had bought and cooked enough food to feed the 180 monks they had invited.  I understand that they spent about 10,000 Baht on this. On top of that, people who had brought food also made cash donations according to their means, usually ranging between 20 baht and 100 Baht but there are no limits set at either end of the scale. But our sponsorship of 600 Baht was effectively a 100 baht per person donation.

 

The monks and novices took quite easily to being feasted at tables. But by my calculation there were only about 130 -140 monks present, so there were empty tables and more food than was required for the monks. Added to that is that monks are always given too much and they never finish it all. Their practice is that they stop eating when they have had sufficient. I only wish I had the self-discipline to do the same!

 

People waited patiently and in good humour for the monks to finish eating. It is customary courtesy for lay people to wait until the monks have finished, and also so that excess food can be redistributed.

 

The food was distributed to the monks' tables by  boys and girls from Phanasuksa School. They then cleared the tables and helped villagers to redistribute what had been left over plus the food that had been brought in by lay people. There was plenty for everybody, and again people mostly sat in groups of six, most on the ground but some old-timers like me at tables left empty by absent monks.

 

Everybody seemed to enjoy themselves a lot. Apparently this wasn't the first such occasion that the village supporters of this monastery had arranged. It won't be the last, either, because altough they raised about 60,000 baht above their expenses on this day, they still have some way to go to complete the two gateways. Two days later the workmen returned to continue work on the first one. But of course after the gateways it will be the viharn, and so on until the little kids here this day are well into adulthood themselves.

 

And what was Ajarn Deem carrying that briefcase for? When she opened it she pulled out several class registers and the boys and girls from Phanasuksa lined up and had their names checked against it. They had looked like happy and willing volunteers (which I am sure they were) but they were also fulfilling an assignment as part of their religious and community studies programme.

 
 
 
 

 

 
 

Preparing for the end of Buddhist Lent in Phana

It will be the end of  Buddhist Lent (awk phansa) on Sunday and in Phana the celebrations will be held at Wat Burapha this year.

People have been making preparations for some days now despite several other things going on to distract them. One of the things that people have been asked to contribute towards is a draw or raffle. So they have been taking items to the wat as offerings. Doubtless the same people (Pensri and me included) will be buying the tickets on Sunday and might even win back what we donated. Here is how far the draw prizes had reached by Friday afternoon:

 

Back in April, at the Wat Phra Lao annual fair, I won a basket made of green, stripped bamboo. I stored several things in it while we were away in UK and put the basket under the stairs. When we came back my things were in good condition but the basket had been almost completely eaten by some small insects that are otherwise harmless but they love bamboo! Well, everything is subject to impermanence, isn't it. Even so, I think I'll go for something plastic if I'm a lucky winner again this year.

The monks and novices who have been in residence at Wat Burapha since the beginning of phansa are busy about the wat compound getting things ready. For many of them this must be a relief because they were taking exams earlier in the week.

 

 

The draw won't be the only opportunity to make a donation to the wat. These alms bowls, one for each day of the week, will get their share of notes and coins. You are invited to put a donation into the bowl representing the day of your birth.

Preparing for the celebration had to be postponed for several days because of the heavy rain which went on without stopping for two days and two nights. We were on the edge of Tropical Storm Ketsana, which thankfully passed us by on Thursday evening. Anyway, I'm sure everything will be ready when it is needed on Sunday morning. Somehow, despite the way that arrangements for this kind of event seem disorganised and chaotic, everything always is ready, and everyone will have a thoroughly good time.