I had glimpsed the 14th century temple of Lankatilake from the road wending through Sri Lanka’s rice paddies, but only when I got to the top of the rock-hewn stairs did I realize just how blue it really was: blue walls, blue columns, even a few blue elephants. Was there a blue Buddha inside? I wondered. The two-story-high wooden door was locked, and apparently no one was around on this remote granite outcrop. No wonder, I was miles from anywhere, an hour’s slow bus ride from Kandy, followed by another hour of walking in the midday heat.

In accordance with the local custom, I took off my shoes and wandered around to the back, bare feet on smooth rock. A few minutes later an old monk (think Yoda) startled me as I stared out at the green fields, green forest, green hillsides. He pulled out an enormous key from deep within his saffron robe. “Temple?” “Please,” I said, following him to the front door.

After a bit of wrangling with the lock and heaving on the huge door, we were in. A thirty-foot standing Buddha, his orange (not blue) robe matching the old boy’s, gazed down at me: I’m enlightened and you’re not!

I’m thinking, This old monk is out of another age. He probably lives here all alone, tending the temple, not needing or desiring any connection with the outside world. I bet his life is complete and uncomplicated.

Just then his cellphone rang. He pulled it out of the sleeve of his robe and began chatting away happily, oblivious to my shattered fantasy.

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Barry Evans gave the best years of his life to civil engineering, and what thanks did he get? In his dotage, he travels, kayaks, meditates and writes for the Journal and the Humboldt Historian. He sucks at 8 Ball. Buy his Field Notes anthologies at any local bookstore. Please.