It’s been 2 months since I visited my friend Paiboon in the forest monastery of Wat Pa Don Hiay Soke, and I’ve finally finished the video interview I filmed with him there. I hope you enjoy it.
It was a tremendous learning experience for me, personally, spiritually, as well as technically. I’ve always wanted to visit with Paiboon again ever since I first visited him in 2007. I’ve had the idea of filming an interview with him for some time, to let Paiboon’s friends back in Singapore see how he’s doing and to see a little of what life is like in the forest monastery.
Somewhere along the line, during filming and editing, I realized that the story could be better served by concentrating on the content that was more universal, rather than simply personal, and more people could hopefully benefit from hearing Paiboon speak.
There was a wealth of material I didn’t use, but don’t worry that it’ll go to waste. Paiboon and I have something else to take care of that – something even better, but it’s been delayed due to the floods in Thailand, so the announcement will have to wait.
I haven’t filmed and edited a video since my student days in 2000, so please forgive the errors in the video. I ambitiously took on the project with a Canon 7D, a professional camera that even the pros need to know how to use to get the best out of. I also had to relearn an editing app from the ground up. Working only on the weekends and weekday nights I had free added to the long time it took for me to finally finish. Read More →
I returned home on Thursday night, after spending five days with Phra Paiboon in Udon Thani (Phra is Thai for ‘monk’). My original goal for this visit was to shoot a video interview with Paiboon, to show his friends back home something of his life as a monk. While I knew I would grow creatively during this trip; learning new things about videography and story-telling, I didn’t expect to gain so much more spiritually as well.
Coming Soon
I got to spend a lot of time with Paiboon, talking with him about his life as a monk, Buddhism, and life in general. I learned so much it’s going to be hard to summarize it all, but I’m going to try and write those lessons down over the next few weeks. Quite a lot was captured down in the video interviews, which I will edit into two versions; one will be a shorter trailer for those curious about Paiboon’s present life, another a longer version containing Paiboon’s talks on Buddhism.
We also recorded three 30 minute interviews for Thai radio in English about practical Buddhism for city life, and I hope we can get the permission to share those online.
Buddhism & the Blues
Many think that Buddhism is a religion, and while it can be, the core of Buddhism is a non-religious, pragmatic practice that anyone can use to live a happier life. Before embarking on this trip, I had been feeling blue for quite a while which I assumed it was burnout from work. No matter what I did, I didn’t seem to be able to shake it off. I was hoping that maybe Paiboon could give me some advice, and he did, but it wasn’t the advice I’d expected. Read More →
Paiboon & I filming.
Wat Pa Don Hiay Soke is located inside a small village, a 30 minutes drive away from the small city of Udon Thani. There’s nothing you would recognize as a traditional temple here, the main monastery is still under construction, as it was when I first visited four years ago.
Instead, there’s a lecture hall, a larger multi-purpose hall used for meals, and smaller huts and houses scattered around for the monks and visitors to stay in. The entire area is populated with trees, in fact the temple is what’s known as a forest temple. It’s not an untamed jungle wilderness here, neither is it a luxury garden, and to call it a forest sounds about right.
I’m not sure how large the temple grounds are, as the roads extend further into the forest than I care to explore, because the deeper into the trees you go, the more voracious the mosquitoes become (and I’m already mosquitoe food here most of the time).
Today is the third day I’m here, and while most of the temple looks unchanged to me since my first visit in 2007, there have been a few upgrades. Newer houses for visitors. A newer toilet (which I really appreciate). A new office with Wi-Fi, which is how I’m able to publish this post. Read More →
A friend of mine once asked me how often the feelings of relaxation and happiness stayed with me after a vacation. Now, research has found that travelers may not experience feelings of happiness for long after a vacation.
Like every other life experience though, I believe that travel can be mundane, or it can be life-defining. I’ve spent moments traveling where I couldn’t wait to be home. There have also been moments traveling which have changed the way I look at life. Not all travel is good, and not all that is good can only be found in travel.
Having just come back from a work & play trip in Queenstown, New Zealand, I realized that maybe the point of traveling isn’t always about relaxation or happiness. Perhaps the point of traveling is in expanding your mind, to open up your worldview to include new vistas and cultures. To see things you have not seen, to consider viewpoints you may not have considered, to smell and breathe in a place entirely alien to the world you’ve known till that moment. To help you see the world differently, even if by only a little bit.
Before I’d gone to Queenstown, I would never have been able to imagine that such a breathtaking place could exist. Sure, I’ve seen the landscapes shot on TV and in the movies, but that’s never the same as being there yourself. I constantly found myself thinking there that if heaven really exists, it’d surely look like New Zealand. My world is bigger now. Read More →
A hundred years ago, the most powerful man in the world – for all his riches and might – couldn’t have done this.
And yet today, we fly above forests of clouds, islanded amongst seas of white, uninterrupted sunsets lining the entire horizon.
I try not to take it for granted.
