Pong Wipes

Pong sweeps. Since we moved into Pong and Judith's guest house last week, this is one of the sounds that first became familiar.

Pong lives in a beautiful, old, traditional teak house on stilts in the greenest area of ​​Lampang, and his beautiful garden is cared for with incredible love and attention. Sweeping the driveway, which runs all the way from the front to the back of the plot, at least a hundred meters, is a regular part of this. It is performed as a daily ritual, usually following a number of other rituals that start at about four o'clock in the morning. With an hour's meditation, after which he jumps on his racing bike and, depending on the weather, cycles about 40 to 80 kilometers, sometimes even more, often with one or more friends.

When he comes back from his bike ride there is his broom. In his cycling outfit, including helmet, he immediately takes it in hand and tsjit tsjit tsjit (that's what it sounds like), off he goes. At the beginning of the driveway, where we can only hear and not yet see him. What is immediately noticeable is the regularity. If you listen a little closer you will hear even more. Purpose. Dedication. Peace. Pleasure. Luck….

After some time, Pong comes into view. The image confirms what I already perceived with my ears.
When I look at him a little longer and more closely, I begin to understand: Pong is meditating.
He grew up in a Buddhist monastery, where he went to live when his mother died. That was when he was about three years old. He lived there until he was 17 and had a happy childhood. He describes the abbot of the monastery as a loving father, who taught him how to be a good person. Who taught him all the norms and values ​​that are so important to him, from which he reaped the benefits again and again in the course of his life. He still respects those lessons, now that he has just passed his seventies. They are embedded in his personality, and Pong is one of those people who actually express and live their personal beliefs and vision of life. Service is one of Pong's outstanding qualities, and you can feel how doing-something-for-another brings him genuine joy. This also includes keeping his living environment clean and tidy, which brings us back to Sweeping. Pong doesn't swipe, he swipes. In addition to cleaning up his garden, the Sweeping serves a higher purpose…

I don't know how Pong meditates. With what intention, or in what meditative state he is when he Sweeps. There are many different forms and techniques, and many different levels that I don't even know about.

The sight of Pong's Sweeping makes me approach my own sweeping a little differently. I sweep the part of the driveway that passes in front of 'our' house, up to the back of the plot, and occasionally also the part of the road between the plot and the Wang river. When I tell Pong I'm sure he doesn't want me to do it, but I feel bad about leaving everything to Pong now that we're staying here, so I do it without consulting. I may thereby deprive him of part of the possibility of acquiring good Karma, but that's the way it is. As a sympathizer of the Buddhist view of life, I try to walk more or less in the middle, otherwise I will never really get there.

So this morning it became meditative sweeping. I started with a simple exercise in service and gratitude, by swiping into myself a mantra 'thank you thank you thank you thank you', looking for the appropriate feeling within myself. Soon I had a regularity that felt good. Later I shifted my attention to just being aware and simply observing. Every thought that came up I swept aside with my broom until no more came up. Damn, how nice sweeping can be, I could have done the whole goddamn street!

That's why Pong Sweeps. With so much Love and Joy. Day in day out. His body sweeps, his brain controls things, and Pong Himself? I suspect him of being Elsewhere and Everywhere, and wherever that may be, it's sure to be a good place!