What better way to welcome January 1st than with your eyes closed, sober, in silence? Louise Williamshas meditated her way through New Year's Eves around the world
DECEMBER 31ST most years finds me off the beaten party track: on a hilltop in Sri Lanka, at Glenstal Abbey in Co Limerick or, in a few weeks' time, at a Buddhist centre in rural France.
My first silent New Year's Eve came about by chance. It was 2005, and I was working in Sri Lanka. I had some free time after Christmas and wanted to use it to try out Buddhist meditation.
My guidebook recommended Nilambe Meditation Centre, high in the tea plantations above the hill town of Kandy. "No electricity and just a single mobile phone," said the book.
Nilambe's website recommended warm clothing and a torch. E-mails would be "sometimes checked" (they weren't), and the phone was never picked up, so I set out to the remote centre without a reservation, intrigued by this lack of communication with the outside world.
It was December 27th, and I had about a week free. I could stay in Nilambe if there was room for me and I liked it, or I could head down to a beach for a party on December 31st.
When I arrived I was given a timetable and shown to a basic room in the women's quarters. It had a concrete bed, and the mattress was stuffed with coconut fibre. Just a few words of welcome, and from then on it was shh all the way.
Nilambe is not for the faint-hearted: each day you get up at 4.45am, eat only two meals and spend about 10 hours meditating - some sitting, some working, some walking. You use the vipassana system, which is also known as mindfulness or insight meditation, based around awareness of breathing.
Between 4pm and 4.30pm you have tea and chat to other visitors if you feel like it, but otherwise you don't speak.
It was all new to me: the sitting, the quiet, the apparent emptiness of my day. At the second meditation session I became quite frightened, overwhelmed by the strangeness of the place, and I had such bad nausea that I had to leave the meditation hall to get sick.
But with time I got to like the environment. What Buddhists refer to as "mind chatter" gradually faded, and I found an unexpected joy in being silent, in developing my concentration during long hours spent cross-legged, in practising "mindfulness", awareness of everything around me, from the vegetables I was washing during working meditation to the feel of the cold damp air on my face in the early morning.
Eating meals alone in silence outside, tracking birds in the garden, taking in the tropical trees on the slopes in Nilambe's grounds, walking up through the forest to the view over Sri Lanka's hill region: it was a journey of discovery for me, and one of the happiest periods I can remember.
A few pests did get between me and calmness. The forest floor was covered in leeches, and although I'd do my best to flick them off my toes - think wriggly worms - before entering the meditation hall I once opened my eyes during a session to see a leech fat with my blood stuck to my ankle.
After a few days at Nilambe I realised I was on to something. I stayed for seven days in total, through New Year's Eve and into early January. Without any fanfare I said goodbye to one year and started another, and I had the time of my life.
As last New Year's Eve was approaching I realised I wanted nothing more than silence to see in 2008. None of the timings of the many Buddhist retreats in Ireland suited, so at the last minute I called Glenstal Abbey, in Co Limerick.
Could this Buddhism-inclined non-church-goer come to the Benedictine monastery for some silence? Yes, indeed, and I was welcome to attend the five daily liturgies in the church if I was interested.
I wanted to spend most of the time in my room, meditating: it was warm and very comfortable, which was perfect. Br Ambrose was on hand in the guest house if I had questions.
Early lauds was at 6.35am, and it was a beautiful way to start the day, with Gregorian chant. Then I meditated for an hour, went for some walking meditation in the grounds, and stopped for lunch in the guest dining room, where excellent food was served and eaten without talk, to a background of classical music from the brothers' boom box.
The days passed with lots of meditation and a bit of reading in my room, around a loose timetable of the five daily prayers in the church.
Dinner was in the refectory after vespers, in the company of the brothers this time. Again, music was played as we ate in silence. You might expect the atmosphere to be gloomy, but the music is often cheery and the atmosphere light.
There were other guests, but I stayed in my room and didn't speak to anyone. It's a struggle at first not to strike up a conversation, but I was there to be silent, and silent I stayed. (Because I hadn't spoken a word, on my final evening, when I was getting ready to leave, one of my fellow guests asked if I was German.)
This year I'm heading to Plum Village, near Bordeaux. It's a Buddhist meditation centre founded by the Vietnamese monk Thich Nhat Hanh. Roll on New Year's Eve. Roll on silence.
Where to look for a quiet start to the new year
Ireland
Dzogchen Beara Tibetan Buddhist Retreat Centre. Allihies, Co Cork, 027-73032, www.dzogchenbeara.org. Beautiful location on Beara Peninsula; accommodation in a hostel in the grounds or in nearby BBs. Retreat from December 31st to January 3rd; €300.
Clare Island Yoga Retreat Centre. Ballytoughey, Clare Island, Co Mayo, 098-25412, www.yoga retreats.ie. Yoga with islanders Ciara Cullen and Christophe Mouze. Homey centre, remote island: you need to fit in with the once-a-day ferry. Yoga retreat from December 29th to January 2nd; €450, including food and accommodation.
Sunyata Retreat Centre. Snata, Six-Mile-Bridge, Co Clare, 061-367073, www.sunyata centre.com. Monastic retreat from December 28th to January 3rd; €350.
Glenstal Abbey. Murroe, Co Limerick, 061-386103, www.glenstal.org. You need to book, but dates are flexible. You make breakfast yourself; all other meals are included. About €60 a day.
Overseas
Nilambe Meditation Centre. Nilambe Office Junction, Kandy, Sri Lanka, 00-94-777- 804555 (rarely answered), www.nilambe.org; €3 a day.
Pluscarden Abbey. Elgin, Scotland, fax 00-44-1343- 890258, www.pluscarden abbey.org. The monks don't use the phone. No fee; donations accepted.
The Retreat Company. The Manor House, Kings Norton, England, 00-44- 116-2599211, www.theretreat company.com. Arranges silent breaks almost anywhere in the world, from Bhutan to Argentina.