Just Trying to be Normal

Six months living in a forest in New Zealand with a small community of Buddhist monks from Thailand

The author, in New Zealand, 1994

Sunna means ‘empty’ in Pali – the language of early Buddhism – and if it wasn’t for the sign at the top of the drive, one could have been forgiven for thinking that the aptly named ‘Sunnataram Forest Monastery’ was nothing but an empty field on the edge of a wooded hillside about an hour north of Auckland. The field, whic…