OceanicThai

I am finishing up two months of studying Theravada Buddhism. I have been doing a weekly interview of a well-read devout orthodox Thai Theravada Buddhist as a part of my studies. My seminary class starts in a week and I will need to focus on that so  I will set this study aside for a season. I do not have the freedom to share much of what I have discovered and how I feel about it. It is an extremely sensitive issue to broach here.  What I read in the  พระไตรปิฎก Tripitaka  surprised me. I had Western understandings and expectations, I’m afraid, and although I have learned about Theravada Buddhism from Thai adherents, I thought perhaps the Tripitaka readings would be different, that perhaps what I had been hearing were distortions and unorthodox expansions. I was mistaken. Reading it in Thai was certainly different than reading it in English. It is possible that in translation there are elements that the translator knew would be rather unpalatable for the Western...

Thomas was a fellow student in seminary that became a friend. Thomas was unusual in that he was an artist and lived an interesting lifestyle compared to most folks in our little institution. He wore black jeans and Docker boots. He practiced yoga and subsisted on juice concoctions with Brewer’s yeast. He was a creative mind, a most diligent student, and I enjoyed our talks outside of class immensely. That year my husband and I were juicing and abstaining from meat as well.   When we left for Thailand I continued to correspond with my friend. In Thailand we began to eat a lot of local food and there was meat in it. I remember in one message reading Thomas’s disappointment with our eating choices. I wrote a long reply. The gist of it was that for the sake of building relationships with Thai people we gave up, among other things, our healthy dietary practices. He wrote a gracious and understanding reply. Years and years later I saw him again. In the passing of time he had transfo...

I do not know what “coming home” means anymore. I step off the airplane, that wormhole between one world and another, and suddenly I am in a space where I haven’t been in 4 years. It feels uncomfortable and strange. I no longer have my kitchen, my bedroom, my garden and my house, but I am a guest in someone else’s space. I can’t do the things I am usually doing at this new time; I will be on a completely different schedule. I will be seeing completely different people, I will be eating completely different food. Everyone talks to me about how wonderful it must feel to be home, but I am not home, I am in limbo. I don’t know what’s going on in the lives of my friends and family anymore, and I am trying to absorb the changes in my home country that have taken place while I have been away. Things do change; culture and society are not static. When I come home there are big and small changes in everything. I find watching the news on t.v. every evening strange, and as I watch it I feel...