Dara Artrium Petit Surat Thani

... converge to learn and practice Buddhist meditation :) The retreat started with about 70 people but only about 40 lasted. I guess some people realize that 10 days of silent meditation is too much for them to handle. Quitting early was never an option for me. It took Anna a few days to get adjusted but by the end she was doing very well. She really got a lot out of the retreat which makes me very happy. I leave you with a chant:<br><br>Namo Tassa Bhagavato<br>Arahato<br>Samma Sambuddhasa<br><br>

... Monkey decides to invite its self onto our balcony, so<br>we both get uneasy and try to shoo monkey off &#8211; monkey growls so we<br>try to pull the big wooden doors shut as monkey runs towards Dean's<br>sock and almost gets it &#8211; by this point we hear Adrienne downstairs<br>laughing. Monkey eventually retreats from the balcony &#8211;<br>VICTORY!......then we see a hand appear at an open window on the side<br>of our room &#8211; AAGGHH!! Attack of the monkeys!<br><br ...

... 6 heures du matin, le train est arrivé à Surat Thani, nous sommes montés dans un bus qui nous attendait pour nous ammener au port. Les bus ici doivent être des vieux bus européens qui arrivent à bout de souffle puisque le notre avait des dessins de la Tour de Pise et de la Tour Eiffel. Même avec plusieurs centaines de milliers de kilomètres au compteur, pas de répis, tant que ça roule, tout va bien! L'attente au port s'est avérée être un peu plus ...

Aamulla herattiin junasta joka oli menossa jonnekkin sellaiseen paikkaan jonka nimea ei millaa muista. Juna oli vaan tunnin myohassa maara ajastaan. Hirvee nalka. Tultiin asemalle ni hirvee joukko ihmisia alko kyselee et mihin ollaan matkalla. Kerrottiin... Sen jalkeen meijat revittiin bussiin. Oli kuulemma kiire ku lautta lahtee. HYVA! Ei mulla ois nalka ollukkaan. Luvattiin kyl et laivalt saa ruokaa. Karvisteltiin noin tunnin bussimatka nalissamme Kumpikin omalla ...

... lodge where we'll spend a night (or 2) and see if the park opens for the rafthouse stay. I'm really hoping it will as this was one of the 'selling points' of the tour, along with the sea safari where we get to camp out on an island later. We arrive at the lodge and the accommodation is very cool... little jungle stilt houses dotted around and the guys next to us have an outdoor bathroom!

Hop Apres Bangkok direction le sud pour la mer et les iles. Je prends le bus de nuit a 5h du soir et c'est reparti pour toute la nuit. Les bus climatises a fond, je connais. Je me mets dans le sleeping bag mode chenille active et c'est parti pour une bonne nuit de sommeil. J'arrive de bonne heure a Surat Thani. La bas, on nous depose dans une agence de voyage et on nous dit d'attendre plusieurs heures avant de repartir pour Phuket. Soudain un ...

Yesterday morning at 8:00am, a man dressed in khaki driving an old rugged looking Land Rover picked us up from our hotel in Krabi and drove us north to the Khao Sok National Park for a two day jungle adventure with Siam Safari. Using the Earth Lodge as our "homebase", we spent the first day canoeing down a river and riding on the backs of elephants ...

... contraption and a huge chunk of animal fat to put on top. He then lit the contraption, brought over a kettle which I wrongly assumed was for a nice cup of tea and filled the resevoir type plate that went round the Wok bit with boiling water. So we added the noodles and veg to the water and the fish and meat to the top and within 5 minutes had a delightful meal of congealed noodles, soggy veg, burnt meat and raw fish. Undeterred we set ...

... All influenced my experience in it's own way. As you all well know, this was entirely silent retreat. From 4:30 pm on October 31st to 5:45 am on November 11th, I had no conversations and asked no questions from the groups of 80 people that were around me. The only times that I did make any verbal sound was saying the Food Reflecion out loud before each meal, and during chanting each evening. This issue was not at all a challenge and did not seems to stress me out at all. In ...

... it had been rainiing so iti was quite a lot deeper! So we had to wade into the river, and then climb down some steep narrows bits where the river was rellay fast, adn then at the bottom let go adn swim through a tunnel - it must have been chest height on someone very tall cos i couldnt touch the bottom! All this was done with torch between my teeth to keep it dry! There were 3 sections like this, and then we came out of the cave and floated into the sunlight :o) iit ...