The alms round was painful, but not as painful as yesterday. I took the liberty to carve my own path that avoided the more painful bits in the road. I’m not sure if one should do that. I also never bothered to think that along a road there were actually a multitude of paths that one’s feet could take. The sad thing was Ajahn K. left today to go back to Chiang Mai, which was a shame since I wanted to talk to him a little more. He was a really interesting character and was encouraging in getting ordained. I hope I can lead the alms round tomorrow though so we can go at a slower pace.

I spent the day following Ajahn R. to two monasteries. He asked if anyone wanted to go after ovata and I thought that it would be a good opportunity to visit other forest monasteries as the only one I know is WPN. Tan C. also came along as well.

The first one we visited was Wat Pah Bun Lom (วัดป่าบุญล้อม) which was about an hour away. It was right by the river so we went for a short boat ride with a monk on a small boat. He was a Brit who came from somewhere near Portsmouth and used to be at WPN. He showed us his kuti which used to be for a thera so it had electricity, lights, fans, the whole lot. It was a small monastery with only 5 monks so it was peaceful compared to the hustle and bustle of WPN. They take that small boat across the river to their alms round and the walk was only 15 minutes. For evening and morning chanting they had a roofed floating platform so it would never be flooded.

The second one was Wat Don That (วัดดอนธาตุ) which was a monastery right in the middle of a river which you could only get to by boat. It was a monastery of Luang Pu Sao and we got to see his relics and learn a little about how the forest monks lived back then. He was an important figure in the Thai Forest tradition and the teacher of the Luang Pu Mun. We didn’t meet any monks there.

At night the thing I dreaded most finally happened. The tukkae finally got in my room. I have no idea how it got there as I was pretty sure the roof is tight. I suspect it may be under the front door so I will try to use a towel to block it in the morning. I managed to nudge it with a broom all the way around and out. It didn’t like being pushed at all and often made a yapping sound and tried to bite the broom. I may consider moving to a concrete kuti for the next month.