Hi,
it was SUPER at your place! Really. I wasn’t scared of the dark, or excited about it either, just neutral feelings. My goal was clear – to take a break from the digital world, from light, from screens, from electronics, a bit from people too, and above all to find out whether I could hack it or would pack the dark retreat in after a few hours…
I arrived in the evening after dark, Tom quickly showed me round my little cabin, showed me everything I needed, brought me fruit and tea and some muesli in a box, I had a shower, sent a few photos to my mates, switched off my phone and turned out the light…
The first night I didn’t sleep much, I’d guess I slept an hour or two, then stared into the dark for an hour, and that’s basically how it went until “morning”, when I couldn’t get back to sleep… Suddenly there was a knock-knock and the first meal had arrived. I didn’t want to be told what I was eating, and I warmly recommend that to everyone. The food is truly fabulous, especially the soups – nothing bland and childish like a school canteen, but gorgeous, fragrant potato soup with mushrooms…a fantastic lentil soup.. then great salads with goat’s cheese, a classic shopska salad, I even had a pancake with something sweet :-D, a brilliant risotto… I really enjoyed the food…
It was my first dark retreat
Since this was my first dark retreat, I didn’t want to risk dying of boredom in there, so I brought a tiny mp3 player that doesn’t light up and has no display…I loaded it with ancient radio plays and a few audiobooks I’d otherwise have neither the inclination nor the time for… I deliberately didn’t bring any music…just the spoken word, and it was great…
I also foolishly thought I’d do loads of exercise, but in the whole time I only did about 100 press-ups and a few sit-ups… I had a notepad and pencil with me too and jotted down a few notes; mostly they were no use to me, I didn’t come up with anything groundbreaking in the dark… shame :))
My biggest struggle was probably not being able to air the place properly… the heat recovery and the fan are really nice and do change the air, but it takes a while… I was dying to throw the door wide open “at night” and let some air in… next time I’d do it…maybe with a scarf over my eyes..
The dark retreat flew by
And so seven days flew by just like that.. Suddenly the alarm beeped behind the shower, I opened the door in fascination, took a deep breath and walked out… within moments we’d met our nice fellow participants from the cabins next door and went for a walk right through the village to somewhere it was slowly starting to get light, and for the next two hours we just stood by the road waiting for the sun… For the first half hour we were staggering about like drunks until our eyes and brains got used to the 3D world again 🙂
Lenka and Tomáš provide fantastic support, each in their own way.. Tom will talk through your innermost feelings with you, Lenka will happily tell you a dirty joke or gladly listen to yours… Either way, they’re there for you, and if you want them they’ll help, and if you don’t want anything, they’ll be gone in a minute…
A few tips for people who’d get really bored:
– you can measure (estimate) time by how fast the tea in the thermos cools… if it’s still boiling hot even after you’ve been awake for a while, it really isn’t morning yet… lukewarm tea = food’s coming any minute 😀
– the shower helps enormously with boredom, even if it’s only 10 minutes; it always gave me a strange kind of energy and time then went much faster
– better cold than hot; I hardly turned the heating on, the cabin is well insulated, and although it was a bit chilly in the February gales, you sleep much better, honestly..
– a great laugh is counting how many hours you’ve already done (roughly) and how many are left…
A few tips for Tom and Lenka:
– that plum or cherry tree by the first cabin has a few branches resting on the roof, and it’s really annoying how they scrape the roof the whole time… for the more mentally fragile it could even be a bit scary 😀
– the shower enclosure is really tiny, I didn’t even try turning on the hydromassage… I’d prefer an ordinary but roomier one 🙂
– the mattress was fine, but after a week you can really feel that it’s lying on plain boards and not on a slatted base…a basic one from IKEA for a few quid would do – it would massively improve sleeping comfort :))
– I’d drill in a few hooks so there’s somewhere to hang a towel and maybe the clothes I arrived in… so they’re not lying around on the floor…
– and what would be mega mega super (especially in winter) is waiting for the sunrise in warm water… (a hot tub or just a plain bathing barrel…) You come out into the cold and wait for the sun in the cold… I’d happily pay through the nose for that… we warmed ourselves up by running up and down the road 😀 😀 So – try buying/renting a few square metres somewhere outside the village and setting up something brilliant like that for the winter… I think everyone would love you even more 😀
Bye
Kuba
