The yoga retreat I signed up for ended up being more of a cultural experience. It became more about the sense of being a part of a temple community and integrating into Thai life and less about the asanas of yoga. For me, this is still very much yoga and since I have a fairly solid foundation in the movement aspect of the practice, I welcomed immersing myself into a different element of the yogic system. Often I enter into these types of adventures on my own. This time around I had a buddy to share the experience with.
J-bird comes from the same town and is sometimes a student in my classes. Everyone commented on how polar opposite we are. She likes to talk a lot. I like to talk a lot less. She is very animated and engages with people immediately. I am more reserved and warm up to others slowly. I am very open to new things and activities, but I tend to mull them over before jumping in. J-bird is open to new things and activities and jumps in immediately. This is partly how we ended up here. I mentioned this retreat to her and told her I was thinking about going. She signed up the next day! I tend to attract people who are the yang to my yin, so needless to say we got along famously!
Five others made up the rest of our retreat mates – Gait (the retreat organizer and temple VIP . . . more on that in a later post), Petra from NY, Vicky from Ukraine but currently living in NY, Julia (retreat teacher) from Ukraine, Alex from Ukraine, J-Bird, and me. 
We spent our time staying at two temples. The one we spent the majority of our time at is called Dharmastan Vimoksiwalai or Wat Vimok for short. It’s in the town of Suan Phueng which is about a 2.5-3 hour drive west of Bangkok. Apparently it’s a resort destination, but we didn’t really venture into the town/district much aside from occasional afternoon excursions. Either way, it didn’t really appear to be a place that many foreign tourists go to and I’ll make the assumption that it’s a place that mainly Thais go for vacation. Besides the resorts we saw on the drive to and from the temple, the area didn’t really seem to be developed, and the countryside atmosphere was perfect for temple livin’
Unfortunately we didn’t really get a tour of the place as it was a bit hectic with things going on when we arrived (I’ll get into that in a later post), but the grounds consisted of a main temple (which is still in the process of being built), a few smaller temples, various gardens, accommodations, a kitchen, eating/hanging out area and store.
The main temple:
The grounds were green and beautiful and had various areas for different kinds of meditation.
The room was fairly basic, but it wasn’t as bare bones as some other places I have stayed in. AND it came with interesting murals in the bathroom, just for a little amusement.
Our yoga classes were done in one of the temples. It wasn’t mandatory in this retreat, but I chose to practice seva (Sanskrit word for service) by contributing my time to teaching half of the morning yoga classes. I was grateful for the opportunity to continue to share my gifts and energy. 
The days started with morning chants and meditation with the monks at 4:30-4:40ish. This was optional, but since both J-Bird and I are morning people we checked it out the first day, and just continued to go the whole time we were there. It was by far my favourite time of the day and the part of this life that I will miss the most. The main monk that led the chant and meditation was so kind. We did get called out on the first day (and that is a story you will have to get me to share in person), but he made every effort to help us understand what we needed to do, to feel welcome and to chat with us after the meditations. Also, from the moment we arrived, people were always taking pictures of us whether we were aware of it or not. It was strange at first, but we later joked about it. We did end up getting copies of some of the pics which is why I have a few pictures of me meditating!! This particular shot was one that we both did not know was taken at the time 🙂
On the last day, the whole gang forced themselves out of bed and it officially became a party! 
FYI . . . I think bowing to Buddha statues can be confusing for westerners, but from my understanding it’s not a form of idol or god worship. From what I understand (and if I am completely off please let me know) the bowing is done three times as a signal of respect. First to the Buddha who was a person who introduced the teachings (this is different than worshiping him), second to respect the actual teachings and third for the community including the monks who do not allow the teachings to fade and be forgotten.
On the last day, we gave alms to the monks. It meant a lot to me that by coincidence the monk from our daily morning chants ended up at my “station.” I was so grateful for the opportunity to thank him directly and for the opportunity to receive a blessing directly from him.
It was an amazing experience to simply get to be and live there! Khop khun ma ka Vimok!!!