Alms round was painful as usual but at least I’m getting used to the route. Kicked the road once and the final 10% was always a struggle. My parents came and offered food in front of WPN and dropped a wooden spoon in my bowl. All the other monks eat with their hands at WPN but I was seriously struggling to eat as quickly unless it was sticky rice. Also it was frowned upon to make a loud noise during the meal, which was easily done with a metal spoon banging against the bowl (hence the eating with hands in the first place). It’s easy to take such a simple thing for granted in the outside world but a simple change like this had such an outsized impact. I could eat normally again!

I saw my parents again after the meal albeit only briefly this time as they had already seen everything. I think ideally they should only come once more at the beginning of March (assuming I stay for 2 months) and then again 1st April when I disrobe and then maybe we spend a couple more days in Ubon. I would like to come back and make a few offerings myself as a layperson to the monks here.

In the afternoon I had some time to clean up and swept the kuti and the path leading up to it. There wasn’t much time for a nap before the marathon meditation session at 1:30pm. I was suppose to change the rotation but I went with the same 1 hour each sitting/walking/sitting. I didn’t know that they had sitting pillows that you could use and it helped immensely to lower the tension in the knees.

On returning in the evening to my kuti, there were now 2 tukkaes stuck to the outside. They have been strangely quiet. I hope they aren’t creating a nest under the roof or something. A friend who was also a monk here temporarily told me that you have to talk to it to make peace with it. At the time I thought it was a bit of a crazy advice but now I understood. What else are you suppose to do, other than to accept living with a foot-long gecko slithering around (which I have yet to accept)? So I simply asked it to please stay outside at least, that much I could take and went to bed.