I got there…here, just down the road from here, actually. It’s…oh, wow, why in the world I’m more apprehensive about this than anything I’ve ever done is strange. You get there, read the rules (posted below) and then go for an interview. The lady was nice enough, but didn’t interview me, just shared her thoughts on Buddhism. They had merit, sure, but I sat there for 30 minutes. Listening. If this is going to be what it is, then I’m leaving early. I dig the silent part of it, I would actually like to know how to meditate properly, hell, even an insight to another fascinating religion…but listening?

I hate what happened to the ‘church’ in that it went from being applicable to indoctrinated and should this be nothing more than a week-and-a-half worth of lectures, I’m going to be annoyed. I’m sure it’s not. I don’t know why I’m so jumpy – maybe a feeling of, as I eluded to before, uncovering something I’m not ready for.

The property is quite nice, not much in the way of color or decor, but quiet and peaceful. We had breakfast this morning (one of our two meals served a day), it was rice, fresh cucumber and tea. That’s it. You wash your dishes in the back. I like that. I went to my room which turned out to be a cell. A 4×3 meter cell. Concrete floors. Concrete walls. Concrete bed. I was given a mosquito net and a blanket. Near the raised bed was a small stool, raised not 5 inches from the floor with a curved seat. I quietly asked the monk outside where I could get the pillow that I was told to pick-up and he walked me back inside my ‘room’ and pointed to the stool. It’s a wooden pillow. They’re serious about this suffering thing.

I’m not to slap bugs on my body nor am I to attempt to kill any harmful insect. I’m to let it be.

This place scares me and I don’t know exactly why. Maybe I’m just scared of discomfort. Maybe I feel like this has the possibility of being a waste of my numbered traveling days.

Maybe I just don’t know.