Unexpected Freedom

Unexpected Freedomsounds drifted across the paddy fields from the lit village ofBung Wai, where every house, not just the headman’s, had itsown television set and stereo.After a day or two I discovered that the monastery hadnot changed too much. Although the dirt road from Ubon,the regional town, had been upgraded to tarmac, andmechanical rotavators had replaced the buffaloes in thefields, the monastery water was still pulled by hand from thewell; leaves were still swept daily; dye for the robes was stillmade with resin extracted by hard labour from the jackfruittree; and reading at night was still done by kerosenelamplight. The message so characteristic of the Theravadinforest tradition, ‘Keep It Simple’, still sounded out, like theresonating temple gong heard for miles around, even abovethe new and modern noise.The daily programme in the monastery was moreflexible than I had anticipated, so there was time to reconnectwith the other resident monks. There was also time toconverse with local villagers. Miraculously, they seemed toremember those of us who had lived there when themonastery was founded in 1974. The older folk hadn’tkicked their lifetime habit of chewing betel nut, nor had theylost their radiant toothless smiles. We exchanged storiesabout developments in monasteries around the world, somein countries that many of them had not heard of.As fortune would have it, there was an opportunity duringthis period of residence to visit some of the meditation mastersof the north-east, including my first teacher whom I hadn’t seensince leaving his monastery eighteen years before. VenerableAjahn Tate was a highly respected teacher somewhat senior toAjahn Chah and had been a disciple of Ajahn Mun in the 1930s.Having become a monk at the age of fourteen, his whole lifehad been spent earnestly in the practice and service of the2