What Do Monks Eat? | Life of a Monk

[Music] so by now you all seen the images of monks walking through thailand just go from one house to the next they have their alms bowl they're walking barefoot and again they're doing alms around and you've seen that but what is actually in the bowl and what do monks eat that's the question and that's what we're gonna answer today so for me i wanted to instead of just talking about it i wanted to show you exactly what we ate for the last seven days i'll be showing that to you but before we do that there's a few concepts that we need to understand in order to get the proper context so the first one is really a biku and what that means in the pali language is one who lives off alms so what that means is that our duty as a monk is that every single morning this is how we make our living we go out from one house to the next and then we collect alms from the lay people so it's actually a duty of the monk to do this and it keeps us again connected close to the lay people but yet still having some distance but it gives us that interaction the second part is that monks and the laypeople in buddhism it's a symbiotic relationship what that means is that working or living in the physical world is difficult you gotta earn a living you gotta cook you gotta clean you gotta do all these things to sustain and then also to develop a spiritual practice that takes a lot of time as well so in buddhism uh they split it split it in that delay people really support the monks with the material needs financially they cook for them they offer food and then again with the monks we have a duty to really train ourselves to keep our 22 227 precepts to really train our minds and to really purify ourself be a role model and through that meditation through that training then for us is go into the spiritual world develop that wisdom and then bring it out to the lay people and then we teach that so again it's a spiritual world mixed with the physical world and it's a symbiotic relationship again meaning that it sustained its supports and it helps one another and both party wins so this is just the design of it and this is how buddhism sustains itself the third concept we need to understand is merit making so in buddhism we believe that giving acts of generosity is very important because it trains a person to let go of ego it trains them to let go of greed and this is one way that the people can make merit by every single morning the first thing they do is they cook they offer to the monks and again with giving we train the people where you should give with good intention pure intention the item that you're giving is also pure and then you're giving to a person who is pure so that's why in buddhism they choose to give to monks because again by offering this act of generosity they develop this merit that's what we call it here but you can call it pure energy and this pure energy sustains them in this lifetime it brings them good luck it brings them good fortune and then also they get to carry this pure energy to their next life we get to share it with the people who passed away and this is just a good pure energy that they get to collect and also then through this act of generosity like i said it purifies their mind and it's another opportunity opportunity for them to let go of ego and to let go of greed so when you understand this context now we can go into the real question of what do monks eat so then to answer that question what monks eat is what we're offered so simply put whatever they put in our bowl is what we take and for us as monks we train ourselves where we're not choosy we're not picky we don't go into the bowl and we don't request hey i want this or i want that but no we collect alms we put our head down and we just be mindful and just eat what is given to us and out of gratitude because we understand for monks is the food is not for pleasure it's not for joy it's not for taste but really is when you understand it use it to just simply sustain your body so again anything they put in the bowl it's just another practice for us and we're so grateful because through this uh generosity and through the support of the lay people we get to sustain ourselves we get another day where we get to cultivate our purity we get to do our meditation and develop wisdom and again that's what we want to give to the world so without further ado everyone out there has their own belief system you have things that you enjoy what you like to eat and for me i just want to say for this this little moment is just put your ideas to the side and really just understand the context we're here at the papaya meditation retreat uh in a village where it's very small the people don't have much but again they're just offering the best that they have and for us as monks we're just truly grateful so again here's what we have been eating for the last seven days so i hope you enjoy so the very first thing we do once we come back from um's round is that we pour everything we have in the bag out onto the table we start to separate all the food the main dish onto one tray we have the rice on a different tray and then lastly we have all the fruit on the third tray and this way it's spread out it's easy for us to see everything and then we can share it all as a community [Music] the main focus of this meal is called katom this is a rice porridge it's very hot it's very plain so what they typically do is that they have a lot of side ingredients a lot of side dishes that they put into it to add more flavor so you see that they have this salty egg with dried shrimp it has many different flavors it's sour it's salty it's spicy and that's just very normal in thailand we have fried chinese sausage along with green string beans stir-fried with eggs this here is a sweet side dish we also have sticky rice this is sour pickled cabbage or lettuce and of course a glass of water here we have green beans stir-fried with pork we have a fried egg we also have boiled bamboo shoo along with a spicy sauce this is rambutan and the best part of thailand is that they always have fresh fruit this is a dragon fruit we have of course sticky rice can't forget the water and then also as a very special dish known in thailand it's called khao soi so it's just a local northern food and it's a curry noodle soup the pepper that you see on here is actually very dangerous and probably one of the spiciest thing i've ever tasted so be very careful this is our meal for day number three it consists of an egg noodle with barbecue pork very delicious we have a fish cake and also some fried meat along with some fresh green beans and some cucumber this is the sauce that goes on the side of the vegetables we have a banana an apple sticky rice this right here is baked banana and it's very delicious and of course we can't forget our water [Music] this is a dish called lab and it's just minced meat with different spices very spicy very salty very sour just very flavorful we have a side of cucumber with some steamed vegetables and some sauce on the side again very spicy we have a pork on a skewer and this they call mupping and it's very popular here all throughout thailand you also have fried fish we have bamboo shoot noodles with side of eggs it's mango season right now so mangoes here are just endless very delicious very flavorful we have a banana and then this is a rice dessert with sweet yellow beans inside [Music] day five consists of glass noodles with a side of chicken we have a fried chicken we have on the left hand side it's called name it's fermented pork i believe we have here green string beans stir fry with edamame we have fried chinese sausage and a boiled egg so this is the dragon fruit i was sharing earlier and this is what it looks like on the inside we have steamed peanuts some rambutan and a side of soup i believe that is squash with some meat [Music] day six the main dish here is fried fish we have a small green thai eggplant we have minced meat that has been stirred fry typically we put it over steamed rice this is just a spicy sauce that again we can put on our steamed rice or any of the meat dish this is called nam and also i believe that is some kind of chicken on top with some steamed rice we have baked bananas mangoes and fresh papaya and last meal of the week we have in the center just some saute mushrooms we have some fresh string green beans side of sausages and they call it saiwa here in thailand we also have some pork grinds and also i believe that is pork that has been fried on the skewer for the fruit we have rambutan we have a banana we have the typical mango steamed rice our glass of water and we always get this dish it's just random mysterious meat wrapped up in a banana leaf but typically it has different types of meat inside and they call this home so it's just steamed meat yeah this one i believe is chicken but typically it comes in all types of flavor chicken pork or beef there you have it and i hope you enjoy thank you for watching and for anyone out there if you have an opportunity to offer to the monks to practice generosity please take it and please continue to do it and thank you for watching and have a good [Music] day [Music] you

Channel: Nick Keomahavong

Views: 353,696

Rating: 4.8346462 out of 5

Keywords: what do monks eat, what monks eat, what do buddhist monks eat, what buddhist monks eat, daily meal of buddhist monk, how monks eat, when monks eat, where monks eat, daily life of a buddhist monk, daily life of buddhist monks, a day in the life of a buddhist monk, a day in the life of a monk, buddhist monk daily meals, buddhist monks eating, buddhist monk daily meal, what monks eat daily, buddhist monks, buddhist monk life, buddhism in thailand, daily meal of a buddhist monk

Id: dyf5U9m5p5M

Length: 12min 49sec (769 seconds)

Published: Thu Aug 13 2020