BANGKOK POST Issued date 8 November 2011 STORY:KARNJARIYA SUKRUNG

          The flood has hit parts of Bangkok and the water is expected to remain i the city for some time. Those affected by the crisis advocate acceptance, patience, resilience, empathy and a positive outlook in order to cope with this troubled period Life is never without problems and sufferings.
          According to Buddhism,however, every problem is there to help us learn and grow.During the current deluge, many Thais say they have learned some valuable lessons; chief among them is that money is not everything. No matter how much we have,there is nothing left on the supermarket shelves to buy. Some people say that in the murky floodwater,life’s priorities become clear.
          Life and loved ones come before material possessions. Family ties, friendships and community values are strengthened. The floodwater may wash away many things,but inner strength remains intact. We talked to some city dwellers who shared their experiences about the flood and how they are coping with this crisis.
          FEWER THOUGHTS, HIGHER SPIRIT Memories of the 1995 flood are still clear to Kittiya, a businesswoman in her 50s. Back then,the two-metre deep floodwater ruined everything on the first floor of her wooden house in Ayutthaya. She managed to escape with her parents just in time before the fast-rising currents submerged her home within a day. This time, Kittiya was better prepared. All her belongings were moved upstairs. Yet, the current flood has tested her resilience.
          The water rose to the house’s second floor. “Most of my belongings will surely be underwater and damaged,” she said. Not only the house in Ayutthaya but also her other residence in Pathum Thani has been submerged.”The floodwater there is at chest level. All the builtin furniture and appliances are beyond repair.” The damage is far greater than the previous flood, she said; however, she is not dispirited.”I am not as agitated as before. I think it’s the merit of dharma and meditation practice.”
          When her business crashed with the Tom Yam Kung economic meltdown in 1997, Kittiya turned to dharma and meditation, which she continues to practice.”Meditation keeps my mind free from stress and depression. Gradually,it has helped reduce my attachment to material things. When you don’t cling on to things too much, you suffer less.” Suffering, she pointed out, comes with thinking too much.
          “We suffer from our own thinking, our thoughts. When you think about what you have lost, there is pain, anger, regret – suffering.But you won’t have these adverse thoughts all the time. And when you don’t have such thoughts, you are free from pain.” The key is mindful awareness.”When I’m aware of thoughts and the activity of thinking, the thoughts subside and disappear;and that gives me peace of mind to enjoy life in the present,” she explained. Kittiya, her relatives and pet dog are currently staying at a friend’s house in Pattaya.”
          I feel like I am on holiday,” she said with a smile. She walks the dog every afternoon, spends time with her friends and family and visits temples. “Thanks to the internet and other modern technology, I can work anywhere. I am the office,” she said. The only thing she now dreads thinking about is house cleaning.”That’s a real nightmare,”she said with a chuckle.”And I think this can be a lucrative business after the floods too.” Past regrets and future speculations come at times, but the power of mindful awareness keeps her anchored in the present. A TIME TO RETREAT Early this year, media personnel Pimchana Hiranbarvorntip was perturbed by the natural disasters happening around the world – the tsunami in Japan, the earthquake in Burma and floods in the south of Thailand. “Disaster seemed imminent,” she said.”I felt a need to get myself and family ready.”
          The single mother prepared emergency packages for herself and her two children. She kept some survival kits at home and in the car boot in case she needed to escape immediately. Her preparation was tested by this flood.”The only hurdle was to convince my parents and grandparents to make an early evacuation.Initially they refused, so I had to wait until they saw the floods at their doorstep before they decided to move.
          Then I just drove off.” Pimchana chose to take refuge at a temple in Chanthaburi province.”This i like my second home. Besides, I think staying here during this difficult time is good for my spirit – it keeps me poised,” she said. At the temple, Pimchana enjoys a simple and slow life. She and her family occupy much of the day giving alms to monks, helping with errands, practicing meditation, chanting prayers and listening to sermons.”For me alone, this is a great opportunity I’ve been longing for, to be in a peaceful environment, to learn and practice meditation.
          The floods have given me a good excuse to retreat for an extended period,”she said. However, her teenage children and elderly relatives are not quite in the temple mood and will need some time before they settle into the new lifestyle. Without internet access, games,computers and television, the city teens do not know how to spend their time. “I’ve asked them to go through this with me.We all have to adjust to the situation. We will not have everything, every comfort we used to have, but we will be okay. At least our condition is far better than many people who are also suffering from the flood,” Pimchana said. Instead of having private rooms for everyone,the family of seven plus their dog stay in a single room.”It’s pretty cramped but we need to learn to live together, we can’t have the comforts we used to have or the privacy we’re used to,” she said.
           “This way, we learn to respect and tolerate each other more,” she said with a chuckle. As the flood shows little sign of abating any time soon, she plans activities to keep herself and children occupied and useful to the community. A yoga teacher, Pimchana thought about giving free lessons, as well as arranging art workshops and reading and storytelling sessions for children.”My son can go with the monks on their alms rounds and some monks are willing to give academic tutoring to children,”she said. For Pimchana, this flood retreat gives her ample time for reflecting on life.”
          Suddenly, I am clear about what the priorities in life are.It’s life itself, my life and the lives of my family.The rest we can reconstruct later.” She has lost some of her jobs already, and is not sure whether the job she has will be there after the floods.”But that does not matter much. I can restart my life and any honest job will do,” she said with a smile. REMEMBER AND CHANGE Never has leaving home been this heartbreaking,said Professor Parichart Suwanbuppha, a theology lecturer at Mahidol University.”I locked and sealed my house and took a final look at it. I felt so sad having to leave the house I’ve lived in since I was young to brave the water by itself,” she recalled of the time she watched water flood her home in Bang Phlat district. Her new house near her workplace at Mahidol’s Salaya campus is also submerged.”I told myself that I’ve got to be strong. Things will be okay, not only for myself but for all of us who suffer during this flood,” she said.”Last year, I cried over the political turmoil.This year, with the water, I can’t cry anymore.”
          After leaving her flooded house, Prof Parichart flew to Geneva to participate in an event organised by the Global Ethics Network for Applied Ethics. As a board member, she shared her reflections on the flood in Thailand. “In Buddhism, everything has a cause and effect. What we are experiencing have their causes, be they nature, mismanagement of water or the unbalanced relationship between humans and nature.” Above all, the academic out, the root causes of all misfortune are greed, anger, delusion and ignorance. A dialogue facilitator in areas of conflict in southern Thailand, Prof Parichart sees this flood as ecological violence.”Violence shows there are imbalances in the system.
         Facing and suffering violence, we need two keywords: remembrance and change,” she said. “We need to remember what has happened,we need to face sufferings truthfully as they present themselves. Then we need to learn from sufferings and transcend them.” To see the event in this light allows us to see ways to alter the situation, now and in the future. HELPING OTHERS, HELPING OURSELVES For the last few months, Thanathip Chatarabhuti, a freelance writer and green network enthusiast, has been a flood volunteer in Nakhon Sawan and Ayutthaya provinces. But as the water overflowed Bangkok’s Bang Phlat area,she has become a flood victim herself. “Impermanence and interdependency, that’s how I see it,” she wrote on her Facebook page and showed a picture of a food package she received from the relief centre. In hindsight, voluntary work helped her prepare for her own predicament. “I’ve seen people who were in a far worse situation, those who had to live on the roof.Yet, I saw flood affected people who could still smile despite their plight. This really gives me the strength to sustain my own ordeal which seems so trivial,” she said. The floods, she added, have taught her the lesson of “letting go”.
          “I’ve learned what is really important in life and what is not. We need to restore our capacity to rely on ourselves, to ensure our survival by learning to provide ourselves with the four fundamentals of life,” said Thanathip. “We think that money will give us everything should we need and want. But the flood situation shows us that no matter how much we have,there is nothing to buy.” Community, she said, is the key strategy for survival.”We should have an area in the community that will provide for people in times of crisis.” Thanathip is now living with her parents in their new house which they originally planned to move into next January. “I guess the plan to move house has been rescheduled,” she said with a laugh.
          Her new house in Chiang Mai is located in a self-reliant community, where rice and agricultural produce is grown organically. KEEPING A POSITIVE OUTLOOK Palinee Sermsinsiri thought she and her family would survive the flood as they had quite a large stock of food at home.But the fluctuating floodwater in Bang Bua Thong district in Nonthaburi made her think twice. Within a day, the water rose to an alarming chest level. With a two-month old baby, she needed to make a quick evacuation. The journey out of her residence was an adventure; from boat to truck and then to car.”Everything was chaotic,everyone wanted to get out and get help.I was so scared for my baby,” said


Palinee,director of communications at the National Health Commission Office. “I’ve realised that what we really need are the four necessities of life – a place to stay, food, clothes and medicine. Anything else is a luxury. We’ve been living in the house for eight years, so I think it’s time for renovation,” she said with a chuckle. Palinee and her family returned to their hometown in Ranong province.”I regard it as a long vacation. You see, it’s difficult to get an extended vacation from work. So this is it!” The nuclear family in Ranong has become an extended family again where all three generations live together in one house.”This i a merit from flood.Now the family is together, taking care of one another, and our relationship tightens and grows.” Yet, it seems everybody is under stress.”I don’t see the merits of stress. It won’t help improve the situation. So I choose to relax and go with the flow.” When feeling stressed, Palinee does breathing exercises. “Normally, I fall asleep quickly. But recently sleeping has become difficult and I’ve had dreams about the flood almost every night since I fled my home.Deep breathing has helped me fall asleep and sleep better.” ANTICIPATING FLOOD WITH MINDFUL BREATHING Living near the mouth of the Chao Phraya in Phra Pradaeng, Samut Prakan province, Burin Chotichaicharin felt he was also at risk of becoming a flood victim. For over a month, Burin and his family have lifted all their belongings to the second floor and built barricades to protect their house from the flood. Cars were moved to high ground elsewhere.With all the preparation done, all they can do now is wait. “It’s equally stressful. Whether or not the flood will come, when and how deep?,” said Burin, a Mahidol University undergraduate. These are questions that constantly run through his mind, especially at night. “During the day, I have many things to keep me busy. But anxiety attacks me at bedtime,” Burin said.”I breathe deeply and mindfully. It helps tremendously to keep me relaxed and at peace. Otherwise I would not sleep well.” His university, now surrounded by floodwater, has postponed the new term.Burin is using this time making EM mud balls which are named after the effective micro-organisms that help to reduce water pollutants and improve water quality.”This keeps me occupied and useful,”he said. Making EM balls, Burin added,requires physical strength and mental focus.”I take it as a chance to concentrate and do mindful meditation,” he said. Another important thing he thinks helps reduce his stress level is curbing news consumption. “Too much news intake doesn’t do any good. In fact, it makes us panic and stressed out. I used to constantly follow news updates and it caused a lot of anxiety and stress. “What I do now is watch the news less, do some research for myself and then do things I think are necessary for the looming situation. And when all the preparations are done, I just live as normally as I can.” ‘We suffer from our own thinking,our thoughts. When you think about what you have lost, there is pain, anger, regret -suffering.