Reader Martijn Diepenhorst has submitted the following post. If you have any questions or comments, please add them as a comment below this post so we can all see the further information discussed there.
Update: a meditator has added a detailed comment below this post with further info about training at this monastery.
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Location: In Chiang Mai, northern Thailand.
Tradition: Ajahn Tong (modified version of Mahasi Sayadaw Vipassana).
Practice intensity: 8 out of 10. There are daily teacher interviews and yogis are discouraged from resting throughout the day. At the start of the retreat you have to give your cell phone to the office.
Accommodation: Individual kutis and rooms.
Food: Vegetarian and non-vegetarian (you can choose).
Min/Max stay: 7 to 45 days (can be extended). On the website you can see which day you can start (these days are fixed).
Cost: 300 Thai Baht (around USD 9) for the entire program, including bed, laundry, and opening and closing ceremonies. Donations are also welcome.
Clothing: Encouraged to wear all white (including underwear). Shop in the centre sells white clothes.
Transport: Airport taxi from Chiang Mai airport is about 25 minutes. From town you can go by taxi, tuc tuc, Songthaew (you can use the Grab App).
Contact: Website at https://www.watrampoeng.com where you will find contact details and directions to the centre. Note you must book a course in order to attend at this centre. Details of how to apply are on their website. Also, Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/watrampoeng.chiangmai/
Visas: Most nationalities get 45 days automatically on arrival, which is plenty for one of their 26-day courses. If you want to stay longer you have to go to the Immigration Office in Chiang Mai (it can take half a day to fill in all the forms and get the extension). The official website with more detail is https://www.thaievisa.go.th/
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Wat Ram Poeng is an old and wonderful temple with a history that goes back to 1492.
The centre’s abbot is Ajahn Suphan, a former student of Ajahn Tong who was the abbot before he went to Wat Chom Tong in 1991, and who was a very respected meditation teacher in Thailand. He was also trained under the guidance of Mahasi Sayadaw and his method is based on the Mahasi technique, but it’s quite modified.
The centre frequently runs retreats with a fixed starting date. You will be welcomed in the Foreigner Meditation office by a Chinese monk or a Thai Mae Chee. They speak English and Chinese (and maybe more). They will teach you the technique and they really kindly try to support you with all questions that you may have throughout the course.
In the centre you can meditate in different places: at the stupa, the Vihara, your kuti, and in the library. The centre is open throughout the day so people come to visit the temple, do offerings, or sometimes on sightseeing tours. So that can sometimes be a bit disturbing. In the centre, it looks like they are always building new buildings (see also reviews on the internet) so from time to time you hear construction sounds. In my experience the centre is mainly quite peaceful and silent, especially in the evening.
The daily interview is with Ajahn Suphan if he is at the centre. It was quite a strange and uncomfortable way how they do the interview. You are in his office with all the international students (sometimes more than 20 students), so everybody is listening. It can sometimes take 1.5 hour of waiting before you have your interview. My trick was to come at the end when almost everybody was gone.
Ajahn Suphan is very friendly, kind, and funny. You will notice that he will try to say hello in your native language. The interview is mainly about how many hours you sit and which step you are in the method (the method has different steps). Ajahn tries to force you in a gentle way to sit more and sleep less. Because there are many students, the interviews are very short.
In the morning around 4am the international students come together to do a morning chant. There are no Dhamma Talks, but sometimes a little bit of a motivational speech by the Chinese monk. On the full moon day (Uposatha) you have to follow the evening event which is attending a service in the Vihara and walking with many people around the stupa with candles and flowers which you offer to the stupa. Because I stayed for around 45 days I found that, after attending 1 Uposatha day, it is up to you if you want to follow the other Uposatha days. In the morning after breakfast you have to do some sweeping around your kuti. The kutis of the male international students are in the same area. It is a simple individual kuti with a shower and a fan. Because the kutis of the international students are close to a house outside the centre you will hear people talking or watching television.
As I already mentioned, the Mahasi technique is quite modified. Ajahn Tong added 28 touching points, mindful prostrations, and the three determination days at the end of the course (where you don’t sleep for 3 nights). While in Mahasi centres they put a lot of emphasis on doing everything very slowly and mindfully, here they don’t do much with that as they only give a little bit of attention to be mindful throughout the day. Slowly you build up the time of your meditation. You start with 15 minutes walking and sitting and go up to 1 hour. Ajahn Suphan will guide you in that. The centre gives you a timer which you use for setting the time of your meditation. If you are meditating in a public space you will hear the timer of the other people.
The meals are very well-balanced and you can choose between vegetarian and non-vegetarian. It is not a buffet style, but you can decide for yourself how much rice/noodles you want and if you want some fruit. Sometimes some extra food or drinks are offered by local people. The Mae Chee who gives you the food will mention when the food is very hot. There is also a shop where you can buy food or yoghurt. Around lunch time there will also be fruit and ice cream sellers.
As a conclusion I would say this centre is really suitable for beginners who want a taste of the Vipassana practice in the method of Ajahn Tong and it is also great for an experience in Thai culture/Thai Buddhism.
Places To Meditate 
I have done a 10-day introduction, 26-day basic course and 10-day advanced course at Wat Ram Poeng. I found it the most intense practice I’ve done in my life. Mainly because their practice of Determination (meditating without sleep for three days and three night) which I didn’t see mentioned in this report.
Indeed the introduction and basic course start with 15 minutes walking and sitting and increment with 5 minutes a day with the extra steps and touching points to be noted, up to one hour. The advanced course starts immediately with one hour walking and one hour sitting (where you set intention to experience the different vipassana nanas). The teacher asks every day in the interview: ‘How many hours?’ I found this encourages heroic effort to meditate as many hours as possible (in my experience from average of 14 hours up to 22 a day).
It’s true you are not lifted out of your bed and there are no mandatory group sittings (best place to meditate is in your room they say), but in the 26-day course from roughly 16 days onwards you are strongly encouraged by the teachers to sleep only 4 hours a night. This is only possible in my experience if you meditate all waking hours. Then at 22nd day or so for three days and three nights Determination happens where you are asked to meditate without sleep at all. Except for one interview a day, you stay in your room. Food is brought to your room twice a day. You alternate one hour of walking with one hour of sitting. Before the sittings you make an intention to experience “meditative attainment” for increasing amounts of minutes. I found this practicing all night very tough, but rewarding.
This sleeping for 4 hours only first and then Determination also happens at the end of the only 10-day advanced course, but here I could choose between two (48 hours) or three days (72 hours) of meditating all day and all night without sleep.
I found this periods of four hours of sleep and then Determination gave me lots of confidence in life. I learned that my mind can remain stable and I can feel awake even without sleep. Though now I prefer to go to Mahasi centers with a more even and sustainable pace of meditating hours.
I thought I’d mention this practice so others are aware this is on the cards for the 26-day basic course. Of course you can modify the practice if you so desire (a Mae Chee also told me: ‘If you fall asleep and wake up don’t worry or get angry, just continue your practice.’). Please let it motivate you and not discourage. Wat Ram Poeng truly is a wonderful place for meditation practice.
Because of this Determination practice I found the intensity at Wat Ram Poeng definitely a 9/10. Only because there are no checks if you are actually meditating it’s not higher for me.
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Thank you Erwin! That is a detailed and helpful response!
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