Our heart chakras open today to our featured (okay, only) fan of the week: Fran (and Emory Sr.) Thomas. It’s so good to hear from home!

Koh (island) Ya Noi sits in the Andaman Sea a 30-minute, high-speed ferry ride east of Phuket, Thailand.

Feb. 12 (Tuesday):

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Five days in, and the path to enlightenment has never been clearer. I am now not only willing, but able, to direct my inhale into my left nostril like a jetstream, up to the center of my brain, and out the other side. I have learned to let go of “erotic/erratic” thoughts, repeat mantras like “I am culpable/ capable,” and respond appropriately when asked at the end of class if there are any “Christians/questions.” Who knew that spoken English could come out in such intriguing sounds and syllabic contortions? “Dis will open your eeps.”

“Island Yoga” has become the retreat we longed for, but candidly, the first 36 hours were tough. The heat felt unbearable, our “bed” was/is a boxspring with no mattress, and the first meal we ate was bad, decidedly not “yoga-campy.” The yoga/hostel operations here are run separately, which explains the incongruent standards. Breakfast is good – homemade yogurt, fruit, eggs, and toast. The coffee is not great, but we drink it for caffeine delivery. The real stuff gets put out at 5:45 a.m. and again, at 10. Otherwise, it’s a teaspoon of Sanka with hot water. After our first, restless night, a bit of panicked self-assertion secured a softer cover for our boxspring, and one more pillow. We have let go of the rest and embraced a state of constant, stinky stickiness.

From around 10:30-3:30, it is really too hot to move or do anything. We’ve found, though, that if we build our chi at the beginning of the day – in sunrise Tai Chi and morning yoga – we are content to languish in the shade until it cools off enough around 4 to swim or go back for restorative yoga. It’s crazy how few people there are. Don and I enjoy half-mile swims in the light green water that laps up gently against sandy beaches of the whitest, softest sand and wonder, where are all the people? Danes make up most of the tourists. We smile enjoying their tow-headed toddlers and lilted Danish. (Europeans really have cornered the market on relaxation amid simple pleasures). The sunsets here are magnificent, and afterwards, a coolness descends that opens your lungs and almost lifts your feet off the ground. No matter how “nice” the restaurant, you get in line with everyone else. Every establishment apparently has one stove with two pots on it, and if you get your order in after the other tables, you sit for an hour and a half or longer, hoping you can recover your appetite when food finally arrives. Lest you think that Don and I savor our spiritual refreshments, a typical conversation goes something like this. Melissa: “Wow, all I get when I suck on this straw is ice.” Don, aggrieved, but willing to laugh about it: “Melissa, I can see the level go down as you drink.” Melissa: “Well, don’t push the straw around then either. You’re just melting it more.” Don: “Next time, we’re each getting a smoothie.”  

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Ya Noi looks like my seven-year-old memory of “Gilligan’s Island.” Yet imagine the stands of palm and rubber trees, giant ferns, birds-of-paradise, and flowering bougainvillea without the snarl of sun-starved bathers, traffic, and expensive services we all have put up with for tropical beauty. Life is simple here, though not in ecological balance. If you don’t watch out, you can get caught down-wind of a groundskeeper spraying a cloud of pesticide on a hotel lawn. You may find yourself cursing at the reckless waste of small, plastic water bottles. But you will come up short in your criticism as you remember that everything you eat is locally grown or fished and there are no wasted resources – no lights left on, no computers idly humming.

Lying in the direct sun here would be foolish. Instead, Don and I poach two hammocks slung for use on a public beach. Has there ever been a greater invention? Not only is the hammock elevated, channeling the breeze over and under, but it cocoons your body, cradling your neck as you gaze upward at the play of light through sinuous branches. Looking out over the water, you remember the breathtaking vista of verdant, limestone outcroppings of various sizes and shapes that lies just off shore. In your peripheral vision may rest one of the wooden boats with a long rod to hoist its outboard motor so it can throw down an anchor in the shallows. For lunch, Don and I eat on the beach, quite literally, at an open-air restaurant where Muslim women cross the narrow road to deliver food to additional tables placed on the sand. For variety, there is an organic restaurant-bakery run by a Swedish-Thai couple five minutes away, a meandering, multi-level shack with hand-crafted wooden tables and pillows inside and outside, strategically placed under the shade of an arbor. Here, we enjoy Golden Milk (coconut milk, turmeric, ginger, and pepper) and eat fresh lettuces and vegetables. We use our motorbike to get around, but there is hardly any traffic (hence, our courage to rent one in the first place). For dinner, we’ve tried barracuda and a whole array of Thai noodle and rice dishes. The most gorgeous entrée is a whole fish (usually bass) steamed with garlic and lemongrass, presented with head and scales intact.

In a few minutes, Don and I will head out to lunch and run into a few of the 100 or so people who appear to be here on the island, maybe one of the talkative young French yogis, the cute, but exhausted Aussie-American couple, or sun-wizened Christina, she of the long, wispy white hair. [There is a fancy resort in the northeast tip, but they don’t let anyone else in, and we’re lucky that they tend to stay put right where they are]. The human footprint is so small otherwise. Chances are, we’ll run into someone we know, No one quite fits with anybody else and great games are had trying to locate different accents. Scottish Keri and Irish Kate (in my mind, experts on the subject) were stumped by teacher Ronnie’s adulterated English accent. Graceful, lithe teacher Ilya, grew up in New Caledonia, a French-speaking island between New Zealand and Australia (I think I’ve heard of it?). It’s astonishing that we come from so many places, yet can practice yoga together, a blend of Hatha with tantric breathing, kidney cooing (don’t ask), Qi gong, sun salutations, and restorative yin.

There are many repeat clients here at Island Yoga, and it is not uncommon for someone to book for one week and decide to re-up for two or three more (again, European flex time). Our cost per night is $110 (higher because we have AC). This covers breakfast, potentially five hours of yoga (Tai Chi at dawn, morning and afternoon classes), and our one-room bungalow with a porch, all-in-one, drain-on-the-low-side shower/toilet/sink off the back, hard-working AC unit and electricity, both of which have to be rebooted each time we return to the room. Eating out can be as cheap as you like. We tend to spend $18 for a full lunch, $24-30 for dinner with drinks. Thai massage is everywhere and very good ($13/hour). The upshot? If you can get here, you can live it up for a small fraction of what it would cost on any other island.

I am not my mind. Energy flows where the attention goes. I want to vibrate at a higher level and cultivate a store of life-giving chi. I want to steer clear of the habits and environments that drain my energy and focus more on the practices and passions that replenish and expand my heart. We’re all just muddling along, but as Meg would say, we can be better, be happier. Twice now on the same day, I have gathered in the light of the sun as it rose and been blessed by its radiance as it set, smudging the sky in a shifting palette of pinks and grays and crimsons. I…am…here.