"Contemplation, serenity, meditation - qualities that are antithetical to the hard-driving, ladder-climbing Western culture, but important to adherents of Buddhism and non-negotiable in the Buddhist monastery in Thailand that I visited over and over again.

During one afternoon I was photographing a monk who was quietly studying with his cat which was patiently waiting to be fed. The light transformed what would seem to be an ordinary scene into an exceptional image. The cat and the monk seemed to mirror each other's contemplative mood, and both seemed to be privy to some unspoken secret."