Recollections of tudong walk in Thailand

Some memories from a tudong walk in Chiang Mai and Mae Hong Son province, northern Thailand, in December 2006:

… Walking up the mountain and down again, overlooking the hilly area of Pai ahead of us, we arrived at a village of the Karen hill-tribe quite exhausted, having covered about 25 km that day. Fortunately there was a small forest monastery with some monks from the north-east in this village, and the following day one of them invited me to go and have a look at the waterfall nearby. A group of young Karen boys tagged along behind the two monks, the Phra Farang (Western monk) being an exciting new arrival in this village off the beaten track which would regularly get cut off from the tarmac road during the rainy season.

The waterfall was quite nice, we had to wade through the stream and jump from stone to stone in order to reach it. The boys jumped into the pools and splashed cool water over themselves to escape the midday heat. Then they offered us the mandarines to eat and they also helped themselves – they tasted sweet and delicious. On the way to the waterfall we had passed an orchard of mandarines and the boys picked a lot of the fruits which they put inside a bag – my bag, which they had offered to carry for me, having been trained as good temple boys by the local monks. On the way back, feeling refreshed, the boys were cheerful and playful. As we passed that orchard again, I asked them about the owner, assuming it was someone from their village. They said, “No, the owner is from the next village, that is the Liso hill-tribe. He was here last week patrolling his property with a shotgun, and he threatened to shoot at anybody stealing his fruit!” They laughed at it as if they had told a joke, but I felt a bit uneasy about the few remaining mandarines … still inside my bag.

Shooting people here, close to the Burmese border, was not that uncommon. There were couriers carrying heroin and amphetamines to be sold in Thailand, and the drug dealers were targeted just around that time during the notorious War on Drugs which allowed shooting any suspects as a free-for-all. We were told that anyone possessing a mobile phone and a good map of the area would be seen as a potential courier. And human life does not count that much in this part of the world, even if carrying a foreign passport.

Continuing our walk further towards Wiang Haeng, we had to pass through a forested hilly area with few villages and only a bumpy dirt road used mainly by motorcycles. There were pine trees growing here because we were quite high up in the mountains. The temperatures at night could drop down to just above 0° Celsius. Finally, as it was already getting dark, we found a Liso village and put up our umbrella tents among the trees nearby. As expected, I did not get much sleep that night, having only my ordinary robe plus my sanghati, the double-layer robe, to use as a blanket. As I was spreading my mat on the ground, I did not see much in the dark, but as I got up in the morning, picking up my bag which was wet from the dew, I noticed some little holes in it: I have unwittingly placed it on a termite nest and they started nibbling on it.

Around 6 AM, shivering with the cold, we walked towards the poor-looking village and past the school which had the appearance of a cow shed. This place really looked like it has never seen any Buddhist monks before. The hill-tribes were not originally Buddhist, but with the development programs of the Thai government reaching out to them, they have been partially converted to Buddhism (but more recently the aggressive campaigns of the foreign Christian missionaries have had a noticeable impact here).

We walked between the bamboo houses, carefully treading in the mud trying to avoid pig excrement, while there was smoke to be seen rising from the dwellings, obviously a sign of some food being cooked. Then a Liso woman opened the door of her house and stared at us for a while in surprise. Offering food to the monks on alms-round was not part of her daily routine. But she would have seen Thai people in the town doing it, perhaps at the market where she sometimes went to sell vegetables and buy a few necessary things. Today was her chance to make merit just like the town-dwellers do every day, and not only that, the monks in front of her house were white Westerners! Strangely, the roles were reversed on this occasion: Instead of seeing the Farangs merely as wealthy tourists, a potential source of income for her, she was in a position to provide them with a meal to sustain their physical existence for a day. That gave her a sense of worth and dignity she may never have experienced before in her underprivileged backward life up in these hills. It was the shaven heads, yellow robes and bowls in the hands of these Farangs that made the difference… and the bare feet.

She called out something excitedly towards us in her language, being older she probably never had a chance to learn Thai. Then she made a gesture of putting some food into her mouth, smiled and ran inside her house. After a minute or two, she came out with a pot of hot water and some packets of popular Mama instant noodle soup, sold in the market. We stood there and opened the lids of our bowls. She paused for a moment, not sure how to do this for the first time, and then she simply poured the hot water into our metal bowls. She took a packet of Mama noodles, tore the plastic wrapping open, emptied the bag into the almsbowl, and then threw the plastic inside as well (for good luck?). Hungry monks are grateful for any kind of offering, and we also got some steaming hot rice with a bit of cooked pumpkin from another house. We chanted a blessing in Pali language, and they were no doubt assured that the local deities and spirits will continue to protect them from all dangers. Or were those white men dressed in robes who emerged from the forest unannounced also some kind of ghost? Feeding them should work best in any case…

Published at http://blisteredfeet-blissfulmind.net/?p=255

Thai translation:

เศษเสี้ยวแห่งความทรงจำจากการเดินธุดงค์

ณ เชียงใหม่และแม่ฮ่องสอน ภาคเหนือของประเทศไทย

เดือนธันวาคม พ.ศ. ๒๕๔๙

เรื่องโดย พระ คเวสโก จาก วัดป่าจิตตวิเวก สหราชอาณาจักร

แปลและเรียบเรียงโดย ภัทรารัตน์ สุวรรณวัฒนา

อ่อนเปลี้ยเหลือเกิน เมื่อลัดเลียบหุบเขามาไกลถึง ๒๕ กิโลเมตร อาตมาปรายตามองทัศนียภาพแห่งขุนเขาเมืองปายซึ่งตระหง่านงามอยู่เบื้องหน้า

เราได้มาถึงหมู่บ้านชาวเขาเผ่ากะเหรี่ยงแล้ว

โชคดีที่อาตมาพบวัดป่าเล็กๆอยู่แถวนั้น และวันรุ่งขึ้น พระอีสาน

รูปหนึ่งในวัดก็มานิมนต์อาตมาให้ไปชมน้ำตกบริเวณใกล้เคียง

เด็กๆชาวกะเหรี่ยงกลุ่มหนึ่ง ติดสอยห้อยตามพระสองรูป

หนึ่งในนั้น คือ “พระฝรั่ง” (พระชาวตะวันตก) ซึ่งกำลังตื่นเต้นกับการเป็นแขกแปลกหน้า

พวกเราเลียบเลาะลำธาร กระโดดผ่านก้อนหินหลายก้อนไปยังน้ำตก

อันตระการตาเด็กๆพากันกระโดดลงน้ำและสาดน้ำใส่กันเพื่อดับร้อนยาม

เที่ยง พวกเขาหยิบยื่นส้มจีนให้อาตมาและพลางรับประทานส้มนั้นไปด้วย

ระหว่างทางที่มา พวกเราผ่านสวนส้มจีน เด็กๆจึงเด็ดผลส้มมากมายมาเก็บไว้ในย่ามของอาตมา และพวกเขาก็อาสาถือย่ามนั้นไว้ให้ ดูเหมือนว่า พระท้องถิ่นได้ฝึกพวกเขามาให้เป็นเด็กวัดที่ดีมากทีเดียว

เราเดินกลับจากน้ำตกด้วยความแช่มชื่นเบิกบาน

พอผ่านสวนนั้นอีกครั้ง อาตมาถามเด็กๆว่าใครเป็นเจ้าของสวน โดยเดาเอาว่าเจ้าของสวน น่าจะเป็นใครสักคนในหมู่บ้าน

พวกเขาตอบว่า เจ้าของสวนนั้นไม่ใช่คนในหมู่บ้านนี้ แต่เป็นคนจากหมู่บ้านชาวเขาเผ่าลีซอ

เขามาที่นี่เมื่ออาทิตย์ที่แล้ว เขาถือปืนตระเวนคุ้มกันสมบัติ และยังขู่ด้วยว่าจะยิงคนที่ขโมยผลไม้ในสวนเขา

พอกล่าวจบ เด็กๆก็พากันหัวเราะร่า ราวกับว่าเรื่องที่เล่ามาเป็นเรื่องตลก แต่อาตมารู้สึกไม่ค่อยสบายใจกับส้มที่เหลือ…ซึ่งอยู่ในย่ามอาตมา

พวกเรายังคงเดินทางต่อสู่เวียงแหง โดยต้องลุยผ่านเส้นทางอันขรุขระและโสโครก ทั้งยังเต็มไปด้วยต้นสนรกชัฏ

ในที่สุดพวกเราก็มาถึงหมู่บ้านชาวเขาเผ่าลีซอ เมื่อความมืดมาเยือน อุณหภูมิก็ดิ่งลงเกือบแตะ ๐ องศาเซลเซียส และเหมือนอย่างที่อาตมาคาดไว้ คืนนั้นอาตมาไม่ค่อยได้นอนเพราะลำพังเพียงจีวรบางเบาและผ้าสังฆาฏิ

ที่ครองอยู่นั้นไม่เพียงพอจะต้านความเยือกหนาวแห่งค่ำคืน

ในความพร่ามัว อาตมาปูอาสนะลงนอนไปอย่างคนสายตามืดบอด

เมื่อฟ้าสาง อาตมาหยิบย่ามซึ่งชุ่มด้วยน้ำค้างขึ้นดู ก็พบรูเล็กๆซึ่งเกิดจากปลวกที่มาแทะเล็ม ที่แท้.. เมื่อคืนอาตมาวางย่ามทับบนรังปลวกนี่เอง

เวลาหกโมงเช้า พวกเรายังคงหนาวสั่นสะท้านและเดินทางต่อ ผ่านหมู่บ้านที่ดูเก่าโทรมและผ่านโรงเรียนซึ่งดูเหมือน

คอกวัว คนที่นี่จ้องมองอาตมาราวกับว่าพวกเขาไม่เคยเห็นพระสงฆ์มาก่อน ที่เป็นเช่นนี้เพราะแต่เดิมชาวเขาเหล่านี้ไม่ได้เป็นชาวพุทธ แต่นโยบายพัฒนารัฐของรัฐบาลไทยก็ได้ทำให้ชาวเขาส่วนหนึ่งกลายเป็น

พุทธศาสนิกชน

พวกเราเดินทางไปตามบ้านไม้ไผ่ซึ่งผุดพรายขึ้นในหุบเขา โดยต้องระแวดระวังไม่ให้เหยียบเอาขี้หมู ในเวลานั้นเอง อาตมาเห็นควันไฟลอยคว้างเหนือที่อาศัยของผู้คน ซึ่งเป็นสัญญาณบอกว่ามีคนทำอาหารอยู่

พวกเราเจอหญิงสูงวัยชาวลีซอคนหนึ่ง เธอคงไม่เคยใส่บาตร แต่คงเคยเห็นคนในตลาดใกล้ๆนี้ใส่บาตรอยู่บ้าง

นี่คงเป็นโอกาสอันงามที่เธอจะได้ลองใส่บาตรดู และไม่เพียงแค่นั้น พระที่ยืนอยู่ตรงหน้าเธอเป็นพระชาวตะวันตก! ตอนนี้ เธอคงไม่ได้มองว่าพวกอาตมาเป็นนักท่องเที่ยวที่เธอจะมาหาเงิน แต่กลายเป็นว่าเธอต้องถวายอาหารยังชีพให้พวกอาตมา

นี่จะเป็นโอกาสให้เธอได้สัมผัสถึงคุณค่าทางจิตใจบางอย่างที่เธอ

อาจไม่เคยสัมผัสมาก่อน พระฝรั่ง โกนศรีษะ ผู้ครองจีวรเหลืองกรัก ถือบาตรยืนอยู่เบื้องหน้าเธอ…ด้วยเท้าที่เปล่าเปลือย

เธอพูดกับพวกเราด้วยภาษาของเธอ ทำท่าหยิบอาหารใส่ปาก

เผยยิ้มน้อยๆและกลับเข้าไปในบ้าน

อีกประมาณสองนาทีถัดมา เธอกลับมาพร้อมหม้อน้ำร้อน กับซองมาม่าซึ่งขายอยู่เกลื่อนท้องตลาด พวกเราเปิดบาตรออก

ทว่าเธอนิ่งไปชั่วครู่เพราะคงไม่รู้จะใส่บาตรอย่างไรดี จากนั้นไม่นาน เธอก็ตัดสินใจเทน้ำร้อนลงในบาตร ฉีกซองมาม่าแล้วใส่มาม่าลงบาตร

ตบท้ายด้วยการใส่ซองพลาสติกลงไป (เพื่อนำโชค!?)

แม้ว่าจะเป็นการทำทานที่ทั้งอาตมาและผู้ทำทานไม่สู้จะคุ้นชินนัก แต่อย่างไรเสีย อาตมาซึ่งในตอนนั้นเป็นเพียงพระผู้หิวโหย ก็ย่อมยินดีในอาหารถวายทุกรูปแบบ

และยังรู้สึกว่ามีโชคที่ได้รับข้าวหุงสุกหอมกรุ่นและฟักทองนึ่งจากเพื่อนบ้าน

ของหญิงชาวลีซอผู้นี้มาอีก

ท้ายที่สุด พวกเราสวดมนต์ให้พรแก่ชาวเขาผู้มาทำทานเป็นภาษาบาลี ในขณะนั้น อาตมาเดาว่าเหล่าชาวเขาคงกำลังหมายใจอยู่ว่าเทพยดาและภูตผีทั้งหลายจะคุ้มครองป้องปกพวกเขาจากภยันตราย

หรือ พระฝรั่งที่โผล่มาโดยไม่บอกกล่าวนี้ก็จะเป็นผีด้วย? จะอย่างไรก็ตาม

การทำบุญใส่บาตรให้พระแปลกหน้ารูปนี้เป็นการตัดสินใจที่ดีสำหรับพวกเขา และดีที่สุดสำหรับอาตมา ในวันนั้น

_____________________________

The Bangkok Post has published another version of the article at http://www.bangkokpost.com/feature/religion/288181/wandering-monks

Wandering Monks

Call it a walking pilgrimage because there's a sense of freedom when one does not have to plan where one is going or where one is going to stay

People driving upcountry in Thailand can sometimes come across groups of Buddhist monks walking by the roadside, carrying heavy bags, bowls and umbrellas over their shoulders. They are referred to as tudong monks, and what they are doing could be compared to a walking pilgrimage.

For more stories of walking tudong in the West, visit the website www.blisteredfeet-blissfulmind.net. Gavesako Bhikkhu is a forest monk based at Chithurst Buddhist Monastery, in the UK.

They don't always have a specific goal to reach, although they might stop at some significant temple or shrine along the way. The walking itself is taken as the main point of this practice instead.

Usually we think of monks as living in monasteries, in some traditions they even take on a vow to remain in the same place for their entire life. But Buddhist monks (bhikkhus) have a different lifestyle, as we can see from the example of Buddha himself.

During the 45 years of his teaching career, Buddha wandered the Gangetic valleys and plains with his disciples, settling down in one place only for the three months of the rainy season.

This kind of wandering (carika) involved some hardship: Following the mendicant tradition, they would depend merely on alms-food collected that morning in the towns and villages. Their robes would be made from rags abandoned in the charnel house grounds. They would sleep and meditate under trees in the forest or in caves. Such practices were later categorised as "austere" (dhutanga or tudong in Thai), making a set of 13, which certain monks could undertake to observe for a shorter or longer period of time.

Until recently, anyone travelling on foot across wilderness areas or staying in isolated places would be faced with similar difficulties, if they did not have the comforts of modern transport and lodging. But there is an old tradition which is widely followed in Buddhism and which holds that making a strong determination to do or to refrain from something is meritorious in itself.

Following the stories of Lord Buddha's past lives in which he cultivated various perfections of character (parami), many practitioners like to emulate him and make such determinations together with some wish for the future. Sticking to one's determination is called truthfulness (sacca).

According to the Buddhist teachings, austere or ascetic practices do not automatically lead to purification of the mind, which is where the Lord Buddha differs from the well-established Indian tradition followed by Jains and other ascetics.

Buddha even warns that people may undertake such practices with the wrong kind of understanding and motivation; that is why he puts the emphasis elsewhere: ''It is through wisdom that one is purified''. However, in terms of lifestyle recommended for the practising monk, what is emphasised is simplicity, having few wishes, not being burdensome and difficult to look after.

When living a settled monastic life with a lot of accumulations, it is easier to get attached to the comforts of the place and to one's lay supporters, which is why Buddha mentions the danger of overstaying and encourages some wandering.

These days, when Buddhism in Thailand has become very institutionalised, many monks still choose to spend a few weeks or months after the rainy season by walking through the countryside. Usually these will be monks from the forest monasteries wearing dark brownish robes. Some groups of monks, even though they normally don't abide by all the rules strictly to the letter, regard this period of walking as a special purification exercise: They will walk barefoot, they will not accept rides in a vehicle, they will not stay under a roof or cover their head, they will not accept money. Occasionally also nuns and laypeople follow the monks as an organised group, which will have regular teaching programmes as well.

Walking is a physical activity which can be used for meditation just like sitting. Letting the mind be with the rhythm of the steps, a repetitive pattern that has a calming quality, can make the mind steady and firm.

Various impressions that impinge on the mind as one is walking, be they sights or sounds or physical sensations, can be gently received and then let go without grasping.

The tendency to fantasise or dig out memories of the past, in particular when facing discomfort, can also be checked with mindfulness. One has a sense of freedom when one does not have to plan where one is going or where one is going to stay: one can put up one's mosquito net almost anywhere or ask to spend the night in a village temple, take a shower and wash one's robes there, and collect almsfood in the morning.

For me, tudong is a great learning opportunity. Being with nature is a different experience than learning the theory from books or practising in an artificially created environment: one has to adapt and be flexible, put one's understanding of the Buddhist teachings to the test in unexpected situations.

By doing the tudong walk, one is also following the way of life which the Buddha and later teachers led for many years, which can deepen one's appreciation of the example they have left behind.

Also, despite the attempts to standardise Thai Buddhism in its outward forms, I have found from the tudong walk that different regions with their own ethnic groups still maintain their own particular cultures and customs that one may not be familiar with. But it is of the Buddhist spirit of generosity all the same.

This is why I believe so.

During my recent tudong in northern Thailand, after walking up the mountain and down again, after passing through a forested hilly area with few villages and only a bumpy dirt road used mainly by motorcycles, we finally arrived at a Lisu village when it was getting dark.

We put up our umbrella tents among the trees nearby. As expected, I did not get much sleep that night, having only my ordinary robe plus my sanghati, the double-layer robe, to use as blanket. As I was spreading my mat on the ground, I did not see much in the dark, but as I got up in the morning, picking up my bag which was wet from the dew, I noticed some little holes in it: I have unwittingly placed it on a termite nest and they started nibbling on it.

Around 6am, shivering with the cold, we walked towards the poor-looking village and past the school which had the appearance of a cow shed. This place really looked like it has never seen any Buddhist monks before. The hilltribes were not originally Buddhist, but with the development programmes of the Thai government reaching out to them, they have been partially converted to Buddhism (but more recently the campaigns of the foreign Christian missionaries have had noticeable impact here).

We walked between the bamboo houses, carefully treading in the mud trying to avoid pig excrement, while there was smoke to be seen rising from the dwellings, obviously a sign of some food being cooked. Then a Lisu woman opened the door of her house and stared at us for a while in surprise.

Offering food to the monks on alms round was not part of her daily routine. But she would have seen Thai people in the town doing it, perhaps at the market where she sometimes went to sell vegetables and buy a few necessities. Today was her chance to make merit just like the town-dwellers do every day, and not only that, the monks in front of her house were white Westerners!

Strangely, the roles were reversed on this occasion: Instead of seeing the farang merely as wealthy tourists, a potential source of income for her, she was in a position to provide them with a meal to sustain their physical existence for a day. Perhaps that gave her a sense of worth she may never have experienced before in her underprivileged backward life up in these hills. It was the shaven heads, yellow robes and bowls in the hands of these farang that made the difference ... and the bare feet.

She called out something excitedly towards us in her language, being older she probably never had a chance to learn Thai. Then she made a gesture of putting some food into her mouth, smiled and ran inside her house. After a minute or two, she came out with a pot of hot water and some packets of popular Mama instant noodle soup, sold in the market. We stood there and opened the lids of our bowls. She paused for a moment, not sure how to do this for the first time, and then she simply poured the hot water into our metal bowls. She took a packet of Mama noodles, tore the plastic wrapping open, emptied the bag into the almsbowl, and then threw the plastic inside as well (for good luck?).

Hungry monks are grateful for any kind of offering, and we also got some steaming hot rice with a bit of cooked pumpkin from another house. We chanted a blessing in Pali language, and they were no doubt assured that the local deities and spirits will continue to protect them from all dangers. Or were those white men dressed in robes who emerged from the forest unannounced also some kind of ghost? Feeding them should work best in any case...

PHOTOS COURTESY OF GUNAVADDHO BHIKKHU AND GAVESAKO BHIKKHU