Today was the last full day in Chiang Mai and I woke up feeling more tired than usual. Also had a nose bleed which is not a great sign. After the morning chanting, a doctor who was one of the meditators offered me some anti-inflammatory drugs and some spray for joint pain and I need to thank him properly later somehow after monkhood. They really helped and the pain during the evenings significantly lessened.

The final full day turned out to be pretty interesting. Myself and Tan M. had to be interviewed by the owner of the estate in front of all the attendants. It turned out that Tan M. was from a family of renowned silk-makers that created work according to traditional Thai E-Sarn techniques. It was easy to glean that he must have been a rather influential person by the way that he spoke and how many people already seemed to know him.

When it was my turn, I just gave my answers as honestly as possible. Our backgrounds couldn’t have been more different but with this new-found mindset of non-attachment and letting go, it was surprisingly easy to do. The interview session ended with photos which went on for a while. Afterwards I had a chance to speak to Ajahn and he warmly calmed my fears about Wat Pah Nanachat and reassured me that I would really enjoy it and make lots of friends there.

Later in the evening there was a chance for all the attendants (monks included) to gently mingle. This was the first time since the start of the retreat that anyone could talk to anyone else at all. If one couldn’t feel the contrast in how relaxed the atmosphere had become, one could certainly hear it. My mum introduced me to another guy who had spent a pansa (3 months during the rainy season) at Wat Pah Nanachat and I think he scared the hell out of her. I was somewhat disturbed as he spoke about bugs, snakes and the like but hopefully since I’m going during winter and not the rains, it should be significantly different. I wasn’t going to back out now at any rate.

Actually the point of talking to Ajahn Jaya was to ask about keeping my purposely downgraded feature-phone only for emergencies. In most temples in Thailand monks do have personal phones but forest monks do not have the same privilege, unless he reached a certain level of seniority. Ajahn elaborated about how he thought it was good that at least they had a rule there, but also understood that things might change in the future when you have a new generation of monks who’ve never known a life without a phone. In the end I decided to give my phone back to mum and will work something out if there’s an emergency. It made a lot sense to be rid of it if I was going to go all-in with this retreat.