Touched by God

Touched by God

I had an interesting conversation with Chandru yesterday. Chandru is Guruji’s photographer. He also manages the bookstore, where he sells dvds of Iyengar classes and intensives, cds of classes, and photographs of the family, in addition to books written by the Iyengars. Chandru is about 60. He has traveled quite a bit, as he goes to the conventions with Guruji and Geeta, and has a son in Australia. He has worked at the Institute for 33 years and says that he and Patricia Walden “grew up together.” He is nice looking man who wears western clothes, like a dark polo shirt, Dockers, and reading glasses, carries a western style brief case, and an i-phone. He can also be seen in blue bloomers and a sleeveless undershirt in Geeta’s class. 

I was thanking Chandru for being so kind to us. “It’s just part of my job,” he said. I explained to him that other people do their job around the institute also, but not with the kindness he offered. “You soften the hard edges of this place,” I told him. “You make the harshness bearable.”

“That is because I put brackets on my time here,” he explained, making the hand gesture of parentheses. “From 9-12, Monday through Saturday, I am here. My wife does not bother me with domestic things.” After that I am home and I don’t even pick up the phone when they call me from here,” he said, waving his finger around to point to the Institute. “Other people, they don’t bracket, and they have more stress.” 

He began to talk about how the Iyengars are special people, different from you and me. He compared them to a few famous Indian singers, dancers, musicians. He patted the top of his head and said, “we say that they are ‘touched by God.’” I nodded in agreement. There is no denying that Guruji, Geeta, and Prashant, have unusual knowledge that you cannot find anywhere else in the world.

All of a sudden Chandru got animated. “Think of this. . .  Say you or I lose our job, lose our husband or wife, or lose everything. We think about survival. Okay, I can clean something, I can wash something, I can lift with my arms, I can load trucks, I can do something so I can survive.” “Of course,” I nodded, in agreement, thinking about how so many people just beg on the streets, but he or I would find work.

“Guruji wouldn’t do that,” he said. “All these times in the early days when he went to the West, he ate only bread and water, to keep his vegetarian diet. And when he had only 2, 3 students, he did not think of anything else but yoga. He kept on practicing yoga every day. You and I, we think like this: if the electricity goes down and the fans don’t work, then we don’t practice,” he said, waving his hand in dismissal. “We just say, oh, it’s too hot, I’ll do it later. This is not Guruji. Nothing gets in the way of his practice.  You know so many times in the practice hall, I am disturbed when the windows are open and the horns are beeping in the streets. It hurts my brain,” he said, furrowing his brow. “But you see Guruji practicing right by the street side. He has been practicing there since the beginning (1975, when the Institute opened), and never does he move over to the other side of the hall. He doesn’t hear any of it. He is so inside, he doesn’t even hear it.” 

The main classroom and practice hall at the Institute is on the second floor. One side faces the street. Indian drivers always beep their horns. They beep when they pass a car, a motorcycle, a bicycle, a pedestrian. It’s loud, it’s obnoxious, and often seems unnecessary.  The sidewalks are crumbling, the curbs are high, and so people tend to walk on the street instead. Without clear lane lines, and with vehicles of all widths, from the bicyle to the rickshaw to the SUV, drivers do a complicated dance that requires constant communication; hence the beeping. The windows at the Institute are always open in the summer, while 9 ceiling fans whip around up above. The place is airy and wonderful. Our muscles open and spread to the outdoor temperature and humidity.

I continued with Chandru, “What I don’t get is how Geeta can possibly know and teach such fine and accurate details, how she can feel this in her body, given her practice today.” Geeta today is about 65 years old. She has problems in her hips that make walking difficult. She hobbles from one hip to the other. When she practices, it is mainly restorative, often supine postures, or supported seated postures, with the aid of wooden props, bolsters, and blankets. Yet she knows exactly how to teach us to do headstands, shoulderstands with variations, backbends, you name it. The memory is in her cells from years and years of previous practice. “When Geetaji was very young, a teenager,” Chandru explained, “she used to assist Guruji in the Intensives.  He would see a student doing something wrong, and he would point to Geetaji and say, ‘Show them how they do.’ Geetaji would do the pose wrong, just like they did, so they could see.” Immediately I understood: she had taken the students’ pains into her body for their benefit. Now she suffered the consequences. No wonder she could speak so assuredly about what did and did not invite pain and problems. She knew from her own experiences.

Senior teachers from all over the world look to Geetaji for guidance and teaching, because she is so brilliant, sensitive, and penetrating.  She will often refer to and credit her father; for example, at the Las Vegas convention, when she lectured on the Pancha Koshas (five layers of human existence) she said, “Guruji has mastered this in his practice. He is the only one out there who has mastered this. You go to any other yoga teacher, you will not find they have experienced and understood this. Guruji is the only one in the world who knows this.” She added, humbly, “I will try to explain this subject, but Guruji is really the only one who knows.”

At other times, she will say, “Don’t think that because Guruji is a man he doesn’t understand the woman’s body. He knows. All these things we know about menstruation and woman come from him.”  She doesn’t fawn unnecessarily to her father. But when she needs to show something in a posture, she does not hesitate to point to one of the hundreds of 8×10 photos of her father in asana on the walls.

And yet, Geeta is a legend in her own right. Her knowledge is unequalled as is her ability to covey it. And this is why it is so maddening when in the U.S., you refer a student to Geeta’s work or writings, and the student says something about her being so fat or disabled.  They’ve never met her; but they have seen her pictured on the cover of Gem for Women, seated for pranayama. They have heard that she does mainly restorative practices. “If I do Iyengar yoga, will I get fat like her?” “Why should I follow her? I can do more than she can,” they think. Those who have had the privilege to be in her classes are amazed by her brilliance and keen powers of observation. She sees you wherever you are, even if you are one of 130 students.  She feels what is happening in your body, and corrects you from across the room. She reads (and responds to) what you are thinking in your mind during pranayama. 

The years of “unbracketed” commitment to the subject of yoga, her father, and the Institute, have taken a toll. She is tired. Her body pains. At the beginning of every month, a new group of brazen westerners like me come, not knowing the rules, maybe not comprehending the accent, wanting attention. She teaches five classes a week and supervises the medical classes. She is the director of the Institute. She is a doctor of Ayurvedic medicine.   She gets stressed. Her body pains. She shouts.  Sometimes it’s too much for her.  She dreams of retirement.

We don’t know what will become of the Institute once Geeta retires. The senior teachers from all over the world are making their way here, not just once a year for a month now, but twice a year, or a 2 or 3 months at a time. We are all trying to get what we can from the Iyengars while they are alive and well. As Chandru says, they are not like us. They are “touched by God.”

A Trip to the Caves

Getting out of Pune to the Ellora Caves

This past weekend, I took an excursion outside of Pune with four other women to visit the ancient caves of Ellora.   These Buddhist, Hindu, and Jain caves are World Heritage sites and are an unbelievable representation of the tenacity, creativity, perseverance, and sheer strength of human beings.  In total there are about 33 caves.  Some are simple rock-cut meditation rooms carved into the side of a cliff.  But the most fantastic and complex cave we saw was a large, decorated cathedral-sized temple named after Mount Kailash in Tibet, that was whittled from the top down into the earth, creating a 3-dimensional complex of wondrous intricacy and scale.

To get there from Pune, we hired a car (and driver, a nice man named Jusef) and drove northeast into Maharastra (the state we’re in) toward the old Mogul capital of Aurangabad.  The city of Aurangabad itself was not particularly interesting but the drive there and back gave us a better sense of non-urban India.  The highway between Pune and Aurangabad crosses the flat and arid Deccan plateau, a geographical element covering most of Maharastra, and passes through parched farmland and many small, rural towns.  Right now (June) is the end of the hot season in India and just before the monsoons, so the land is dusty, the air is hot, and the sun is unforgiving.  But, as we drove the rain came down, settling the dust and greening up the farm fields.  We passed many river beds, some dry, some wet, and in the occasional pool of water were many people congregated, washing or bathing.  The  farms were tilled and looked very fertile.  We saw some people crouched in their fields, preparing rows for planting, or harvesting small plants.  The farmhouses were simple and functional, close the fields, and in some cases were as basic as a thatched roof huts or tents.  Near Aurangabad, there were many brick manufacturing areas. You could tell by the mounds of red dirt clay and the brick ovens, made of bricks themselves.

The towns were busy epicenters.  Tea shacks lined the road, vegetable vendors stood beside their rickety carts, and convenience stores advertised Coke or Airtel (the Indian cell phone company).  Though active community centers, these towns appear bleak. In all cities, large and small, trash lines the road. In Pune,  women gather at a particular spot on the sidewalk (on the way to the Institute) where there is a gated driveway. That gate is opened and there is a lot of trash. The women are sorting the trash, removing the compostable waste and paper waste. These people are poor, reserved, and do not speak English. It is a very humbling job.

In Pune, it is still possible to see oxen pulling a wheeled cart driven by a farmer. There are cows that roam freely in some parts of the city, belonging to nobody, but fed by villagers peddling vegetables. In the countryside and smaller villages, farm animals use the roads to get to fields where they graze. Goats are allowed to nibble on trash piles. Whatever the goats do not eat remains. Little foil wrappers, plastics, and other bits.  The businesses are rundown, and there are loads of people milling around every shop and vendor, visiting, watching tourists, or having tea. It is not usuaual at all to see a family of 3 on one motorcycle. The father drives, the toddler is right in front near the handlebars, and the mother rides side-saddle on the back, sari flapping in the breeze. Two men often ride together on a single motorcycle. The priority is getting where you have to go and nobody thinks twice about.

We arrived in Aurangabad on Saturday evening and checked  into a four or five star hotel, brand new and still under construction. This hotel had new everything, A/C and cable television, internet, and a pool.  Of course there is a great disparity between wealthy and poor in India – we tourists are on the luxury side of things, but certainly not like the wealthy in India who are extremely wealthy.

 The next day, Sunday, we went to Ellora.   Ellora has over 30 caves constructed over the period from 400 to 1100 A.D. The oldest caves are Hindu, built from 400-600; the next were Buddhist, from 600-800; the Jain were constructed bewtween 800-1000 A.D.

Our tour guide was excellent. He had a B.A. in History and a Master’s in Tourism, and was qualified to lead tours in any part of Maharashtra (the state we are in), and some other parts of India. He knew about all the religions and answered all of our questions about Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism. He expalined the meanings of the carvings. In the Hindu temples, the carvings are largely Ganesh (the elephant symbolizing success, wisdom, and good beginnings), Shiva (the destroyer) and Parvati (Goddess of strength and power) in marriage; and Vishnu and Brahma.

 Monolithic architecture differs from our architecture in that buildings are literally carved out of ONE STONE. The stone is a mountain of basalt. The carving takes place from top to bottom, front to back. There are 3 classes of artisans: unskilled laborers, skilled artisans, and master artisans. The unskilled lift and carry debris out of the caves; the skilled did the rough cuts, the masters did the intricate and final carvings. 

The masterpiece of Ellora (and the most fantastic of all the caves between both sites) is the Kailasanatha Temple.  Kailash is made up of two central buildings, surrounded by a courtyard and a three-storied building along the perimeter.  The entire complex is huge – our guidebook says it is twice the size of the Parthenon in Athens and 1.5 times as high – and to construct it, they dug three huge trenches into the cliff face and the shape was ‘released’ with tools, removing 200,000 tons of rock!  The temple in the center of the complex is an active Hindu temple.  The back of that temple held an alter to Shiva. The altar is a huge lingham (phallas) surrounded by a circular “moat,” with a trench leading into another room. The lingham was decorated with flower garlands and incense, where many visitors paid their respects.  By touching the stone lingham, then touching their forhead and then their heart.  Some people left rupee notes stuck to the wet lingham. We were encouraged to touch the lingham for power and strength by an Indian tourist. 

In this Hindu section of  caves, the grand structure was that of a chariot. I mean the bridges, buildings, windows and temples formed a chariot and a yoke for the horses. We were shown walls with many lines of story, one depecting the Ramayana, the other the Mahabharata (of which the Bhagavad Gita is a part). These are the two greatest epics of what is now called Hinduism. By the way, Hindu is a British word to describe the peoples of the Indus Valleys, beneath the Himalyas. The indigineous people called the area Bharat. ”Maha” means great. So “Mahabharata” is the Great Bharat or Great India, and is a set of mythical stories about the origin of India.

The different temples and caves were not built by separate religious groups. The skill sets of artisans came from all different religious groups. So whatever your relgion, if you lived in the period 400 Ad to 500AD, and were a skilled Artisan, you would have been working on the Hindu section. If you were born later, you would be working on the Buddhist section. They finished one section before starting the next. Plans went from one person in a generation to another person who oversaw them. There was great cooperation from everyone to get these plans fulfilled.  

The  Hindu cave was a two-storied temple, where the second story was a large hall dedicated to Lord Shiva with 56 decoratively carved pillars (Nadja counted).  There were also at least relief sculptures carved into the perimeter depicting Shiva and other gods in the Hindu pantheon.  By comparison, the Jain caves were more intricate, because the technology of the tools had evolved over the centuries; yet, the iconography was more calm and peaceful, because like Buddhism, Jainism dipicts a seated meditator. (The jain meditator is always naked, and the buddhist icon is always clothed).  This group of Jain caves is set atop a hill and has a remarkable view of the surrounding valley. 

My favorite temple was the Big Buddhist sanctuary. It was a two-storied temple with ribs carved into the vaulted roof in imitation of wooden beams, and acoustics as fine as any modern music hall. I had the feeling tha I was in Notre Dame, by the accoustics. But it was all dark grey stone inside. Whatever paintings were on the ceiling had long ago worn down. But you can see remnants of paintings of horses.  The huge Buddha in the back of the sancutary was sitting on a stool or bench, with legs on a smaller stool, just like Geeta Iyengar sits when she teaches. Other buddhas do sit in Padmasana or swastikasana. And in the  Jain caves, the figure of their main guy (forgot his name) is seated in siddhasana.

These monlithic temples are architectural masterpieces, engineering feats, sociological wonders of inter-religious cooperataion, and incredibly peaceful spiritual sites.  Though we were only able to spend one day exploring them, we saw a lot and got a strong impression of the GREAT old cultural heritage of India.  When we were lucky enough to be alone in a cave or temple, it was lovely to sit and bask in tranquility and to feel the contemplative power inherent in this sacred place.

There are 900 such caves in India; 500 of them are  in the state of Maharashtra; 80 % of those are in Pune.  So we will probably visit more of these monlithic temples in the city before we leave.

 Written by Carin Allen, Nadja Rafaie, and Pauline Schloesser

Class with Geeta Iyengar

Imagine a yoga teacher so precise, so powerful that she takes hold of your attention and immediately directs your consciousness inward. She directs you and a hundred others to stand firmly on your heels, and use a “pincher action” to make “dimples” on the sides of your hips. From this compactness, you are to lift and expand your chest. Lift the side ribs; spread your collarbones, roll your upper arms out to bring the outer shoulder blades firmly against the back ribs.  Immediately you feel the connection between the firmness of the hip sockets and the Popeye-expansion of the chest. “Now the consciousness can go everywhere,” she explains. “Come, sit here.”  We move in closer and sit by the platform. The platform is a stage shaped like half of a hexagon, projecting out into the room, which is similarly shaped to maximize the teacher’s view of the students and vice-versa.

“If I had told you to stand straight and open your chest, none of this would have happened. You see, I cannot just tell you to open your chest or all of you would be standing around like this,” she says, demonstrating an erect, stiff figure without vibrancy, eyes bugged out.

“But what did I say? I told you to move that skin of the outer hips back and make those dimples. Bring the skin of the outer buttocks closer together; and that firmness comes and then the pranic energy can come into your spine and chest and over there you have that openness. And I don’t say, bring the consciousness into the chest. Did I say? No, I did not say! I don’t have to say because by firming the hips and doing in such a manner the actions to open and widen the sternum chest, the consciousness is already there. And from over there it can go through the entire body.”

This is the Iyengar method at its best. It is an ingenious delivery of some part of the great body of knowledge acquired by B.K.S. Iyengar over his 70 years of practice. Teaching in the Iyengar method involves the articulation of precise body mechanics to allow movement of cosmic energy (prana) through the body. When the body is aligned and expanded properly, the consciousness can spread and make meditation (dhyana), possible. An excellent Iyengar teacher will repeat the same actions in another asana, thereby linking the intelligence of one asana to another, and teach you to sensitize your mind so that you can grasp how the same actions in another pose might lead to a completely different state of mind. 

The delivery of an Iyengar teacher—her words, their melody, volume, and inflection—is to be dynamic, to assist the sadhaka (practitioner) to become mentally alert and then mindfully sensitive. That loud, shouting, booming, demanding voice says “Pay attention,” to the point that you dare not day-dream or wander in your head. This alertness brings you first into the skeletal body. You are directed to your limbs, the muscles and the joints, and told what actions to take, based on what the teacher sees that you need. After the teacher has observed that you have successfully taken the actions as directed, she directs the mind to observe the process in your own body. For example, after teaching us the relationship between the compacted hips and expanded chest in Tadasana (mountain posture), she then has us perform the same actions in Utthita Trikonasana (triangle posture). “You are to sensitize your mind now, and see what is happening in the sternum chest and the sides of the waist. Did you make that dimple on the side of your hips? Did you use that prana to open your chest? Did you stretch evenly the sides of your rib cage? Don’t just do the asana in the same way that you have always done. Perform the actions and then see what is happening over there. You must make your mind sensitive if you are to penetrate the body and see what is happening.”

If the teacher observes that you are not with her—that you are somehow NOT paying attention, not mentally present, not mindfully sensitive, or just plain stupid enough not to know the rules of the Institute and follow them–a thunderous monsoon of emotion will be rained upon you. The lightening will strike, and if it hits you directly, you will get mentally and emotionally fried, unless you have the strength and rootedness of a hundred year-old oak tree. At the very least, you will lose a limb, a tiny branch, whose breaking point must be healed. Those who have been around the Institute for a long time—either by living and working there, or returning every year for their month long course—are like these wounded and repaired oak trees. Every scar they have is a testament to their wisdom and strength, which is not always appreciated when they return to their home countries and try to offer what they’ve learned.

But the veteran yoga teachers keep coming back to Mother India, and to the Iyengar Institute. Patricia Walden has been coming every year for over 30 years; some, like Lois Steinberg, come twice a year. I haven’t taken a poll, but it seems that the teachers who keep coming back somehow accept the lightening as a part of nature; they don’t take it personally, they know it’s not really about them. Or, they rationalize that the unpleasantness of the yelling is the price that must be paid to learn at the greatest yoga temple in the world.

Today, Geeta taught backbends in the Ladies’ class. I was unlucky to be menstruating, but lucky to be doing so right next to Lois Steinberg, also menstruating, and leading us in the menstrual sequence, chapter one of her outstanding book Geeta’s Guide to a Woman’s Practice.  

 

When you’re menstruating in Geeta’s class, you’re sent to the back row to do the menstrual sequence. I love backbends and desperately wanted to receive the teaching that Geeta was giving, but have too much experience to lie about my condition to serve my ego.  So I surrendered to my nature and agreed, as the only person wearing the watch, to keep track of timings. One minute on each side of forward bends. After several of these supported postures I sat up and listen as Geeta started to talk about the ill consequences of doing backbends wrong. She was talking about the chest. She mentioned something about inviting disease in the thyroid with a closed chest. And then Lois warned me, “you’ll get yelled at,” so I soon put my head down again melted my brain into the bolster. The lightening did not strike and I kept my ears open.  

The emphasis on the backbends was all LEGS. In Ustrasana (Camel posture),  the instructions were to press the shins and ankles down, and move the legs forward. Move the back body and spine to the front body. Do NOT let the body fall to the head side, but resist this tendency. This theme of the legs and moving to the leg side was continued by linking actions in Dhanurasana (bow) and Urdhva Dhanurasana (upward bow). In Dhanurasana, she emphasized freeing the thighs from the abdomen. Pick them up, move them back to prepare for the pose. There was some shoulder preparation, but the main emphasis was lifting the thighs off of the floor. This was done first, in the preparatory stage, one by one, to create maximum space between abdomen and thighs.  She also had them lengthen the chest forward. After students took hold of their ankles, they were instructed to press the buttocks down. “Lift the thighs off the floor and maximize that space between the thighs and abdomen. Do not allow the knees to go wide. Keep them in line with the hips. Turn outer knee toward the inner knee and then lengthen the outer thigh from the outer hip to the outer knee. Maintain that alignment!”

In Urdhva Dhanurasana, the main instructions were to straighten the arms, but move the buttocks and hips toward the leg side. This was to prevent chest compression, or the decrease in space between neck and shoulders and ears and shoulders. “Even if your arms are slanted and your shoulders are not over your wrists, move your hips to the leg side. You are to see that the chest remains open.” Over and over again, she gave these instructions as they repeated the backbend from the floor. People used different prop setups depending on their needs, and assistants were called over to correct and assist anyone whose arms were not straight or chest was closing. After 6-8 repetitions, she gave them a rest, and asked, “Was that not better? Did you not feel the difference? Come, sit down, listen here.”   

By this time, we had finished our supported supine postures in the “red” section, so I moved in for the talk. “So many times, even teachers from the west are teaching these backbends wrong. But what does it mean to be doing right? Look at these pictures of Guruji.” We all look up at the hundreds of black and white 8×10 photos on the upper walls surrounding the studio. “Do you see his chest? Is it closing or is it open? (It is obviously beautifully open.) But so many teachers, they look at those pictures and they see the arms and legs close together and they teach it wrong. If you are a master, okay, you can do like this and the chest remains open. And for people who can do well, they can’t teach! They see someone struggling and they don’t know what to do, because they can do for themselves and they don’t understand what the correct action is. But for beginners and even advanced students, we must begin with a different shape and work with the open chest first. And when that is coming, okay, you can then come more to the chest side; and then you must work with reshaping the arch. But that is a different chapter. Today the chapter is on opening the chest by moving to the leg side.”

Geeta was in top form—calm, clear, and informative. “You see otherwise you inwite the problems. The problems that are inwited (v’s and w’s are interchangeable in this country) when backbends are done wrongly can be in the thyroid. That compression there affects the thyroid and so many of the hormones. Or you get a headache and feel nausea. That headache means there is to much pressure in the brain and that nausea means the organs are affected wrongly. This is why it so important to keep that chest open. You see even in the medical classes, we always see that that chest remains open and there is no compression in the throat or neck. Am I right?” The senior teachers all nod. “So see that you are working correctly and not allowing that throat to become tense or the chest to become compressed.”  

The lesson was clear and unmistakable, a real take-home from India.

Half way point: two weeks down, two to go

Guruji got back from Bangalore last week and was practicing during Ladies’ Class. Geeta taught an excellent class, which I will detail in a further post. (I no longer have internet at the apartment, so the document in my laptop is not available to me here, at the cyber cafe where I am now having to check email.)

Guruji was in the reception area of the Institute this morning. I was able to walk over and pay my respects to him. This involves bowing down, touching the floor or his feet, and then placing hands in Namaskar when you come up. I looked at his eyes and smiled with gratitude from my heart. He gave me the warmest smile and it is etched in my soul.

It’s obvious that even though Guruji is 90, he still likes to be part of the action. Although he doesn’t get up and supplement or interrupt Geeta’s teaching any more, you can tell he likes to know what is going on. He may be deep in his supported backband or in headstand, but he is keenly aware of the vibrations of the room. And once in a while, he is known to come over and correct someone or help with something. I have not witnessed this yet, but he’s only been in the practice room twice while I was there.

I try not to think much about how I will teach what I am learning. The Iyengars really hate it when you do this because it means your mind is divided and all you can think about is how to steal information without really learning in your cells. I hope students are not expecting too much when I return. It takes time to absorb this stuff and then figure out what is appropriate to teach to beginning level students who are not practicing on their own for 3 hours a day.

This past weekend, while Carin and Nadja took a 6 hour road trip to the famous Caves, I went for the spa route and took off for the Ghats, just one hour and fifteen minutes from the city. I went to an Ayurvedic treatment center called KARE, where for about $90, I stayed in a luxurious room, had two consulatations with Ayurvedic physicians, received two incredible massages with hot oils and body scrubs, and ate very clean vegetarian food appropriate for my dosha (constitution). For those of you who are familliar with Ayurveda, my dosha is Pitta-Vatta., or FIRE-AIR.  The cottages on the mountain all face a Lake in the Valley, and at this time in history, the lake is completely uninhabited by homes or boats. That will change as there is evidence of terraces having been recently formed on other slopes of the mountain, also facing the lake. The fast-rising middle class here will want their second homes here.

Ayurveda is ancient Indian medicine. Ayur means health; veda is knowledge. The foundation of Ayurveda is this axiom: all disease results from digestion. We are what we eat. What we should eat depends upon our prakriti or nature, which they call the constitution. Your dosha (constitution) is primarily AIR (Vatta), WATER (Kapha), or FIRE (Pitta). Then you also have a secondary dosha. The primary and secondary doshas can be determined by an analysis of your pulse and other physical characteristics, such as: your tongue, your skin texture, your nails, the shape of your face, and your eyes. To some extent your musculo-skeletal frame is also a factor.

Foods either exacerbate or mellow out your dosha. For example, my primary dosha is Pitta, fire. The foods that excite pitta are hot, spicy foods. I am not to eat this except in the tiniest proportion. Kapha people should go easy on the fats. Vatta people need to avoid foods that cause gas. I’m simplifying, of course, because I don’t have my book or my food chart in front of me.

I have experimented wtih Ayurvedic cooking before, with a book by Vasant Lad and his wife. Lad is probably the most famous Ayurvedic doctor in the world. Anyway, having been in India and eaten Ayurvedic food, I am now a lot more confident about my ability to prepare it.  So I’m saying that when I get back I intend to make a party with Ayurvedic dishes. I will even learn how to make chapati. Then I will show the movie “Leap of Faith” which is a new Documentary about Guruji’s life. It is so well done.  Look forward to that, friends!

The Institute and What it’s Like, from my roommate Carin

 

The institute where we are taking yoga classes is called RIMYI (Ramamani Iyengar Memorial Yoga Institute), named after the late wife of BKS Iyengar and dedicated to the teachings of Iyengar yoga.  It is a funny shaped building –something like a pyramid, but cut in half from the top down – located on a quiet street in downtown Pune, and contains 2 classrooms, a library, some administrative rooms, and is surrounded by a lovely courtyard.  BKS & his son Prashant and daughter Geeta live in the adjoining house to the institute, so it is literally like taking classes in their home!  Quite extraordinary.  The institute has 1-2 classes per day, beginner to advanced level, that are attended by both foreign students (like us) as well as local Indian students.  All classes are taught in English, which is fortunate for us; this is decision that the Institute made a while ago when they encouraged students from around the world to come here to study and practice.  The teachers in class sometimes add some instructions in Marathi (the local language) for the local Indian students who aren’t so fluent in English, but for the most part the instructions are given in English. I find it really fun to be in class with local folks; it reminds me that the Institute an important place for travelers from far away, but also an important place for people right here in Pune.

 

Arriving at the Institute last Monday, we were assigned a schedule of daily classes, one per day Monday through Saturday.  Monday & Tuesday mornings are class with Prashant Iyengar from 7am-9am (this early morning class requires that we have an alarm clock!) Wednesday & Saturday mornings are the women’s classes with Geeta Iyengar, which is a wonderful time to be with women and explore the yoga practices as they relate to women’s bodies and cycles.  Thursday evening is Pranayama (breathing practices) class with one of the local teachers.  And Friday evening is general class with Geeta. 

 

We’ve been through a week of classes now, and I can already feel the transformative experience of being here and practicing yoga daily.  The classes have been amazing.  Prashant’s class last Tuesday was focused on the using the breath as a tool to explore the pose more deeply.  He talked about infusing the pose with the breath in order to bring integration of body, breath, and mind.  This was a new focus in the asana for me, and very interesting to explore.  Geeta has been sick this week so she didn’t teach at all; instead we’ve had a series of the local Indian teachers leading her classes.  I’m very impressed with the clarity & poise of these local teachers, especially Gunaaz & Raj Laxmi.  They taught with such sensitivity, control, and clarity of instruction.  The sequences of poses in the classes are familiar to me (similar to what I’ve learned back home from Patricia) but are just slightly different, making it interesting and challenging to learn new things.

 

In addition to daily classes, there is “open practice” sessions everyday at the Institute.  These are 2-3 hour blocks of time when the practice hall is open and available to be used for personal practice.  I attended these practice sessions everyday this week, and was inspired and invigorated by the other students in the room.  It was exciting to watch how other people practiced, and especially to see how they worked with props and modifications of the poses in their own practice.  Everyone is doing different things during this practice.  One person might be hanging upside down on the ropes doing inversions, while another is working on her forward bends, while another is helping someone with their scoliosis.  It is really wonderful to be with fellow yogis in practice (not class) and to see the dedication and effort that so many people put into their practice. 

 

In addition, what is special about these practice sessions is that Geeta Iyengar and the other local teachers also use this time for their practice.  That means that we have had the fortunate opportunity to practice alongside Geeta Iyengar.  This is wonderful and in a method that is sometimes considered hierarchal, these open practice sessions are a wonderful time to simply practice together, to share our experiences.  When BKS Iyengar returns to Pune later this month (he is currently out of town visiting Bellur, the town where he was born), I understand that he will also attend these practice sessions.  So then we will be practicing alongside BKS as well! 

 

The most remarkable thing to me about the Institute are all the props.  Iyengar Yoga is known for the use of props to aid in reaching a pose: wooden blocks to support the hand in standing poses, blankets to support the base in inversions, wooden slant boards to lift the wrists in Down Dog or other arm balances, belts for various purposes. And while we have many of these props back home, RIMYI has so much more.  They have many many custom-built objects used to support students in different poses. They have tresslers, large wooden “horses” that are used to support you in standing poses or for backbends.  They have blocks of every size and shape.  They have ropes hanging from the ceiling so you can hang upside down with minimal effort; for example, you can do rope Sirsasana (headstand) if your have a shoulder injury or are fatigued.  They have benchs and backbenders and small tables to support you in Halasana.  It has been really fun learning about the props – i.e. watching how people use them – and experimenting with using them myself.  My personal goal for this upcoming week is to learn to do Sirsasana (headstand) on the rope wall. 

 

Nadja, Pauline,  and I have been really enjoying the classes and practice sessions so far, and are looking forward to more next week.  We’ve been doing 2-4 hours of yoga everyday and my body is really enjoying it!  With the heat (90 degrees in the afternoons) my body has easily been giving into the poses, and I am finding that I’m able to do things here that I haven’t been able to do in a while.  In addition, it feels so good to be devoting this time to myself and to my practice.  I feel so fortunate.

About the Food: From Carin T. Allen, flatmate from Boston

Besides the 5 hours of yoga we’re doing everyday, and a few hours of shopping here and there, finding, buying, or preparing food seems to take up the majority of the rest of our time.  As you might imagine, there are so many wonderful foods here in India, and particularly a lot of options in Pune.  We have been having fun with it all.

In the 12 days we’ve been here, we’ve alternated between eating out at one of the thousands of restaurants in Pune, and eating in our apartment.  The first few days we ate entirely in restaurants; the shopping in the local markets was far too daunting, and learning to use our Indian style kitchen was even more terrifying.  So every lunch & dinner during the first week we gorged ourselves on the feast of cheap, delicious local food.  We started with all the recommended restaurants – Aroma Café, Lalit Mahal, and Asha Dining Hall – and then even found a few places on our own.  Our first “find” was this open-air, cafeteria style place on FC Road (Pune has the habit of abbreviating all the road names) which we discovered is open at 7am in the morning and serves coffee!  We found this place on our first Monday morning after we arrived in Pune when the jet lag was still causing up to wake up at 4am, and the coffee detox hadn’t kicked in yet.  As we have now discovered, a restaurant open for breakfast is rare in India. 

 

There are so many wonderful things to eat in the restaurants.  The local favorite is the Thali (which literally means “plate” I think) comprised of 5-6 side dishes — like Daal, yogurt, mixed vegetables, chutney — served with Roti (bread) and Bhath (rice).  The thali is served on a stainless steel platter (thereby getting its name) which is something like a camping plate that you might find at REI, with each of the side dishes served in small bowls. A favorite snack are Dosas: thin, crispy rice pancakes that are rolled into a tube shape and stuffed with a mound of spiced potato yumminess, and served with a spicy tomato sauce (sambhar) and chutneys on the side.  The Mysore-style dosa is slightly different: the pancake is served flat and coated inside with a spicy spread, and served with coconut chutney.  Then there is the Idli (pronounced: id-lee).  First of all, the name is adorable.  Second of all, the appearance is equally cute: they are small, round, steamed, puffed, rice “cakes” that look like small, white pillows.  They have little taste of their own, but are served (of course) with sambhar sauce on the side, and are really easy to eat.  Rice and daal seem to be a staple at every meal, and we try to supplement with vegetables (okra, eggplant, cauliflower, or “mixed veg”) and bread on the side.  We’ve been sticking to a vegetarian diet which is not hard to do here.  In fact, it would be more difficult not to eat vegetarian.

 

At the restaurants, we often rely on the kindness of our waiters to help us put together a meal that actually makes sense.  We have found the servers at the Aroma Café, a simple but lovely restaurant on the top terrace of the no-frills Ambiance Hotel, to be particularly helpful in their suggestions of food to eat.  We will throw out a few ideas and they usually shake their heads and kindly but firmly respond “No, you should get this” and they point to something on the menu that we had overlooked.  So far, they have always been right.  When we have servers that don’t speak much English, or if we are otherwise left to our own devices to choose a menu, we usually end up with a table full of yellow dishes, or all saucy-soups, or all rice-based dishes, all of which are certainly wonderful and edible but don’t exactly create a well balanced meal. 

 

There is a wonderful variety of food served on the streets.  A few days ago we stumbled across a collection of carts where people were gathered having afternoon snacks.  One cart had an intriguing treat that looked like a bundt cake made of rice.  The “cake” was encrusted with tomatoes and cilantro, and served with crispy chips (or something). We have no idea what this was.  Nadja was quite interested and wanted to try it, but I stopped her.  There are tons of fruit juice carts & chai vendors as well.  The favorite local drink is “lime soda” which is served in restaurants as well as on the streets, and is a fabulous concoction of freshly squeezed lime juice, soda water, and sugar syrup.  On the 95 degree days, this has been a treat!

 

There are so many fresh fruits & vegetables in the markets.  It has been fun to bring them home.  We have had oranges, pineapple, melons, watermelons, and tiny bananas.  The mangos are in season and are particularly good.  When they are ripe you can practically drink them; they are so soft and sweet.  Last week Pauline concocted a mango-yogurt smoothie with the old school blender in our kitchen! 

 

We have begun cooking a bit in the past week, as eating out every meal gets tiresome (and very rich for our stomachs).  Yesterday I made quesadillas with red onions and green peppers, with fresh tomato, cilantro and lime salsa on the side!  We thought of you, Mario!  One night Pauline made an Indian style tomato and okra sauce and a few days later Nadja and I made the same thing Italian style. We’ve also had a few dinners of just fruit, or peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.  For those of you who know my last experience in India, you’ll know that peanut butter tastes really, really good to me here.

 

Of course you can’t talk about food and India without acknowledging the most delicious drink of all: Chai.  There seem to be many recipes for this, but my favorite is when they cook the spices directly into the milk/water and then add the tea, allowing everything to brew together, which yields a creamy, sweet, spicy and utterly yummy cup of tea.  Today we travelled across town to visit with Madhu, the wife of Chandru (the man who runs the bookstore at the Institute), and she made us the best cup of chai I’ve had so far.  It was sweet, but not too sweet, and had plenty of cardamom in it.  Yum…there’s nothing like home cooking.

 

Let me end this interminable discourse on food and cooking by saying that our stomachs have been doing well (to fairly well) so far on our adventure.  We are drinking only bottled water, which none of us like due to environmental reasons, but it is the safest method for reliably clean water. We are also careful to assess the food we are buying in restaurants or in the markets. We peel all fruit and wash vegetables in a Grapefruit Seed water wash.  (Grapefruit seed extract is a natural antiseptic, did you know that?)  We are careful to eat off of dried plates and cups, so as never to consume any untreated water.  Nadja has had the iron maiden stomach and hasn’t gotten sick at all.  Pauline and I have suffered a bit of the travelers’ stomach but are chalking it up to the cucumber sandwiches during lunch a week ago.  We’re all feeling good at the moment, and are hoping this continues.  We’re all venturing out of Pune this weekend – we’re told our stomachs will be more vulnerable outside the city limits.  Stick to rice, daal and yogurt we’re told.  Stay tuned…

A Kids’ Class at the Iyengar Institute

As I sat on the winding staircase known as the studio-viewing “balcony,” kids and their parents streamed in. The kids played with the props.  One kid took advantage of the sirsasan ropes that are suspended from the ceiling (for rope headstand), and sat in it as a swing. Her mother pushed her until somebody came and put a stop to it. Eventually 100 kids or so and their parents congregated, and the teachers appeared.

Abijata, the beautiful granddaughter of Guruji, lead the class, assisted by 3 or 4 well built men. She sat the children down and began the prayers to Patanjali, and to the Guru. In call and response fashion, they payed homage to Patanjali, Guruji, Bramha, and Vishnu. We don’t call the invocation a “prayer” in the U.S. because that would freak too many people out. But here they don’t make any bones about it. After the invocation, Abijata pointed to the plinth (stature) of Patanjali, and explained that in the prayer we are giving thanks to him for his texts on Yoga.

After the prayers were done, Abijata laid the ground rules. This was, afterall, the first class of the new year. Every year the Institute closes in May, when Geeta travels and does conventions. The mats and blankets are washed; some of the staff go on holiday to distant countries like Austrailia.

The children were told that class began at 8am, ended at 9am. Some of the children would be leaving at 8:45, and she would let them know who they were later. Children were to come clean, dressed, and on time with an empty stomach. “You do not have to take a bath, but you must at least wash your face, hands, and feet. You are not to eat breakfast before yoga class. But you may have a glass of milk. Even that must be taken at least 30 minutes before class begins. And you are to use the toilet before you come to yoga class. For dress, you are to wear t-shirt and shorts. No pants. Do you see these pictures all around you of Guruji? We have to see your body so you must wear shorts. You are to be comfortable, so you must wear half-sleeves. Next she addressed the parents: “Today it is okay if you watch. But next time, you are to drop off your children and pick them up after class if they don’t come on their own. Because they do worse when you are here.”  As a teacher of kids in the HISD after school program, I couldn’t help but be impressed by the command she had of the kids, the parents, everyone. No parent was going to question her authority, or argue some nagging exception, or call some higher managerial authority. This tall, substantial, twenty-something woman with the long sleek black braid had told them the way it was. Of course, it helps to be Guruji’s granddaughter, and the likely heir apparent of the Directorship of the Yoga Institute.

So, what time you are to wake up??” She asked the kids. “5 am,” one eager little boy said.  ”Seven or seven-thirty, if you live close, no later,” she said. 

These kids are trained in right principles from the get-go. They are given yogic principles in simple form. Cleanliness, in fact comes from the Niyamas (fixed observances) in the yoga sutras. They are also taught the same principles of alignment adults are taught. The main difference in teaching the kids is that their verbal participation is sometimes evoked: (ARE YOU READY TO DO YOGA? meek “yes”, OH, SO TWO OR THREE OF YOU ARE READY? “YES,” they respond again. Also, they move faster. They jump, the jog, they go quickly from one pose to another. This is to awakent them and keep their attention. They do not hold postures as long as adults. They do not make endless adustments in poses. The directions are kept very simple. Prashant could never teach this class.

When the asanas (postures) began, I noticed that no one was using mats. I guess they figure mats are too complicated; or kids are tough enough. No props, either.  

Here is the Sequence

1. Tadasana, feet together stand tall, don’t move.  Lift chest, shoulders down and back. Don’t protrude the abdomen. “Stand tall and don’t move. Does a mountain move? You are not to move.”
2. Urdhva Badhangullyasana, (interlaced fingers, arms stretched overhead).
3. Urdhva Hastasana (arms stretched straight over head)
4. Jumping in place, high, to become alert. (The men on stage looked like they were on pogo sticks. Now I know why they were so athletic looking.)
5. Measure distance between each other by spreading arms sideways; then  Utthita Hasta Padasana (basic stance of spread arms and legs, feet facing straight ahead)
6. Jogging (first one leg up, then the other, then faster faster faster. Kids need to MOVE.)
7. Jump from Tadasana to Utthita Hasta Padasana.
8. Jump from UHP to Tadasana x 6 reps
9. Urdhva Hastasana to Uttanasana (forward bend with straight legs), quickly, X6 keeping legs and arms straight
10. Parsva Hasta Padasana (teaching heel to arch alignment), otherwise maintaining chest and arms of UHP. Demo first, then everyone. Here children are to learn the names.
11. Tadasan to UHP to PHP, asking the kids what is the name of this pose I’m doing? Arms straight, head up. 1, 2, 3, JUMP. Say UTTHITA “utthita”, HASTA, “hasta,” PADASANA “padasana”. PARSVA (parsva) HASTA (hasta) PADASANA (padasana), kids repeating.

During this very active sequence, Abijata noticed that one boy had stopped jumping and looked sickly. ”What’s the matter here? What’s happening?” She asked, as she came off the stage and approached him. Putting an arm around him, she noted, “You are feeling sick? . . Come here. Sit down. (She put him on a bench next to the staircase where I was sitting. ”Sit here. Put your back against the wall. Open your chest. Keep your eyes open. Did you eat breakfast before class?  Did you use the toilet before class? (no). At this point Abi explained to everyone: “If you eat late at night, go to bed late, and do not use the toilet before class, then your digestive system is not clean. If your digestive system is not clean, then your muscles will not work properly, and you will get dizzy and feel sick.” She very gently attended to the boy by putting him in Savasana on a soft mat while the others continued class. Another kid dropped out for feeling dizzy and nauseated. He also rested in savasana with legs crossed.

At 8:45 am, there was a break in the action and the youngest children, ages 7-8, were released. Abijata gave a lecture about good habits as kids sit in Swastikasana  (simple crossed-legs) on the floor. She spoke about having an early dinner on Saturday night, getting to bed early, and waking up in time to use the toilet and wash before yoga class. “You have to develop these good habits,” she said, speaking directly to the children, parents listening in the back, “if you want to do yoga. “You see, you sit around like this (she slouches to show). Why are your chests collapsed? Because you sit like this when you are watching tv. You sit this way at the dinner table. And at school. It is a habit. Or, you are tired. Why are you tired? Because you went to bed late last night. You ate late, went to bed late, and didn’t use the toilet before coming to class. This gave her an opportunity to reiterate the principles of saucha ( prounounced show-cha) or cleanliness and purity. She also told them to sit straight while watching t.v. One of the older male teachers interjected, “We are not saying to watch t.v. But we know you do it.”  There were smiles. ”So sit straight.”  

“Stand up,” Abijata commanded, as she scooped her hand up. It was time for more asana.

1. Dandasana (hands behind, fingers pointing forward, use arms to lift buttocks off the floor. Sit straight, don’t lean back.
2. Swastikasana, now Urdhva Hastasana in Swastikasana.
3. Adho Mukha Swastikasana
4. Supta Swastikasana, arms straight back overhead on floor
5. Adho Mukha Swastikasana to Supta Swastikasana again
6. Tadasana
7. Urdhva Hastasana!
8. Finally, a review all postures from the day in quick succession.
   1. Uttanasana
   2. Dandasana
   3. A.M. Swastikasana, Supta Swastikasana
9. Last five minutes of class, Savasana: Legs together, Hands at sides of thighs; Head in the center. Not to the side.  Close your eyes and see if you can be still for one minute.  Turn to the side and get up.
10. Ending Prayers: Returning Students from last year invited to go to the stage to lead Invocation to Patanjali and Guru Brahma with many verses.
11. Reminder about proper dress for next time.

Then all students were  released except those who were returning students from last year. Abijata discusses their place in the class and the progression. “Do you want to do more advanced postures?” she asked YES! they replied. “Okay, but did you stand straight in Tadasana? Did you hold your arms straight in Urdhva Hastasana? Did you stretch even your fingers in Utthita Hasta Padasana? You must show us that you know these things in the first five minutes of class, and then you will be taken upstairs to do more advanced postures. But only if you show us.”

With that the most experienced bunch was released and the new year had begun.

 

Finishing the First Week in Pune

I am sorry to say I am finishing the first week in Pune with a bad case of Traveller’s Diarhhea. I made the mistake of drinking a glass of tap water at a salon. I asked if it was filtered and they told me it was; I later came to understand that their command of English is left wanting. We also had a misunderstanding about the services and the prices, as they gave me a 1.5 hour facial in addition to my pedicure, and I didn’t have enough Rupees to pay for it. Plus, I had to tell them to get me out of the clay mask because I needed to get to class! I walked into class 5 minutes late. Luckily, Geeta was not teaching. 

I say luckily, because she would have probably reamed me out.  But Geeta is recovering from her travels abroad. She gave a convention in London in late May and returned to Pune warn out and coughing badly. We saw her come for practice on Wednesday and Thursday, doing restorative postures with 2 assistants to help her place props and straps. 

We were so excited thinking we were going to have Geeta for Pranayama class on Thursday evening. Geeta is world famous for her pranayama classes, which lead you into an exquisite blissful state. I have only experienced this with her once, when she came to Las Vegas for the U.S. convention.

Anyway when class began, Pandu, the secretary, came up to make an announcement: all those who are for the first time in Pune, go upstairs for class. That meant that we would not be getting Geeta for a teacher; instead we would have another Indian who assisted at the Institute. We waited for 30 minutes. Most of us were in supta baddhakonasana or some other restorative posture. Finally a woman named Raj Lakshmi came up and led the class. As it turned out, Raj is a great teacher. She was absolutely spot on with instructions, and her accent was easily understandable. I fell asleep in lying down pranayama, which can be embarrassing, but they understand that we are tired. I cannot remember the last time I fell asleep in pranayama. You must remember it is really hot and humid here, with no a/c. They open windows, but sometimes there is no breeze. They run many fans at the institute, but it may not be that way in every place you go. 

On Friday, the monsoon finally came. What is a monsoon? It is simply heavy summer rain that comes with a cold front and brings relief. We would call it a flash flood in Houston. The monsoon could last 5 minutes or 2 days. But it is heavy and the streets flood. The cooler termps make everyone happy—I think this is why Indian movies always feature happy songs and dance in the rain.

Now is the time to watch out for mosquitoes. There is standing water on our balcony. I have greased myself up with “Bite blocker,” a natural, deet free product available online from the U.S. So far, so good.

I was at the salon when the monsoon hit. I accepted the water from the lady, and took a refill. She assured me it was filtered. It wasn’t. When I finally got to class, I was extremely exhausted. I didn’t get yelled at. An Indian woman named Gulnaaz was teaching. Like Raj, Gulnaaz is a senior assistant for the medical classes and assistant to Geeta during her practice.

We did standing poses, as is the norm the first week of the month—really basic stuff like down dog, Trikonasana, Vira 2, Utthita Parsvakonasana, then Vira I and Vira 3. At that point I thought I was going to die. I had already done an intense standing pose practice for 3 hours earlier in the day. People had remarked about my energy—“Where do get it? I just wish I could suck some of your energy for myself!” So I thought that explained my fatigue. Then I became farty. Ah, well, probably shouldn’t have had the Dal at lunch. Hard to digest. Then there was the long necklace of sweat on my chest. Why wasn’t anyone else sweating so?

After class, I felt barely able to walk, but then again I have blisters on my feet from new sandals. I didn’t bring much in the way of shoes because they are so cheap here, I was encouraged to buy some. Anyway, arriving back at the flat, I was almost too tired to eat. We had mangoes (prewashed and dried before but), watermelon, and toast with peanut butter. It is a relief not to have rich Indian food for every meal. But I was too tired to clear my plate or do dishes. I didn’t even brush my teeth, but flopped right into bed. After an hour or so, the cramping began, and I was up every hour with the Pune Poops. 

So I skipped class today, and practice as well. I didn’t leave the apartment. I was too weak and feverish.  I am taking Immodium and started a 3 day course of antibiotics, given by Nadja, my flat mate from Boston, whose travel medicine doctor was smart enough to prescribe for just such a case. Geeta got another Indian woman sub today, and again they did standing postures. So far there has been little new information for me in these postures, and I have not been adjusted once. My flatmates have been adjusted, and I know the teachers do walk around.

 I am feeling much better after just one dose of the antibiotics. I am sure to be in class Monday morning with Prashant. I look forward to it.

I thank all of you who are continuing to make it to class and keep up your practice.

 

Warm regards,

Pauline

The prices in Pune (pronounced Poo nay)

The most expensive thing by far is lodging. The 3 of us here are paying $900 for our flat. My friends commented that these are “Boston prices”. But it’s a very big apartment with a large terrace off the little kitchen.

Next is tuition at the Institute. It’s $450 for a month of classes. You have class 6 days a week, not on Sunday. Classes are 2 hours. Then you are given a practice time of 3 hours each day, sometimes immediately after class. It’s still less than the cost of classes in the West, but its’ not silly cheap to come to India any more.

What is silly cheap is food in restaurants. Unless of course, you order beer. A rickshaw taxi to our lunch restaurant yesterday cost the 20 Rupees, which amounts to about $0.42. That’s less than 15cents per person for a 10 minute ride!

Our meal at lunch, which was an unlimited Thali (plate) of different cups of vegetables, soup, raita, beans, etc., was 55 Rupees each, plus 13 R for each of us to get a bottle of water. A Rupee is worth about 2.1 cents.

Oh, and I bought a pair of sandals from off the street yesterday. They are normal looking Western type slides of black leather and a heel. Price was 200 R, which I negotiated down from 220 R. Cheap.

We did have beer with dinner last night. Half of our bill went to beer, which is NOT to say we drank a lot. We shared two large bottles for the three of us. But that was a treat.

This Sunday we are planning a shopping exursion for clothing. One of my friends wans a sari and we all want long sleeved Kurtas.

First Few Days in Pune, India

Tuesday, June 2

I am here in Pune sharing a wonderful and spacious apartment with 2 friends from the Boston area. We are 5 minutes walking distance from the Ramamani Iyengar Memorial Yoga Institute.  For each of us it is the first trip to India.

We have been struck by the noise and pollution, and the chaotic travel of motorized rickshaws, cars, and motorcycles. Most intersections are uncontrolled, with no lights or stop signs. So you have to wait and dodge all this traffic. When you get off of main roads, however, the scenery becomes green and lush, instantly quieter and more serene.

We had our first asana class this morning, with Prashant Iyenger. He is the one and only son of Guruji. Class was from 7-9am. There were no instructions given regarding how to do the postures. In the advanced classes, in which we are enrolled, we are expected to know all the “points” of the basic postures. So he just tells us to take Trikonasana or dog pose, and then as we do it, he speaks philsophically about how the breath is a nutrient to the body and the mind; how the mind is conditioned by breath but also conditions the breath; how physical adjustments change the mind and the breath.

His main instructions, repeated over and over through different metaphors, were this: use the asana as a tool to achieve what you want to achieve in the breath or the mind. Use the breath as a tool to bring whatever you need to bring into a pose, whether it is endurance or strength in the legs, softness in the face, or expansion of the chest. You set your intention with the breath to do the work you want it to do. Same for the other tools: the body, the mind.

This way of working is called “making propositions” and “soliciting responses.”  The point of working in this manner is that yoga then becomes a tool for life. You can transfer this power of propositions and solicitations to any area of your life.

He went so far as to say that the breath should be used as a “supplement,” or a “nutrient”  for the body. When the breath is directed properly by the mind, it can provide  protein or vitamins or calcium.  My flatmate Carin and I were debating whether this was metaphorical or literal. I believe he was speaking literally. In any case, we have both read about sages and mystics of the Himalyas who have existed for a long time without food, aparently able to get nutrients from breath and sunlight.

I liked this teaching. The theory of making propositions in practice and soliciting responses is obviously a good way to practice asana. You take the pose Trikonasan, for example. I am feeling tight in my hips. What happens if I proposition the breath to rotate my leg so that my hips become unstuck? What happens if I make the proposition while exhaling? What about during inhalation? What about while retaining the breath? What answers are solicited in this particular experiment in the laboratory of the body?

I realized I already knew that I use my inhalation generally to lengthen, expand and stretch; the exhalation is for rotating, pressing, releasing. The point is I can control the breath and use it for my purposes once I understand it. Then all I have to do is set my intentions. The breath becomes the servant of the mind. Or the body becomes the servant of the breath; or the breath beccomes conditioned by the body. They are all interrelated and causality goes in both directions.

The larger lesson is this: once you understand that you can change your mind by adjusting the body, or change the body by using the mind to direct breath, you can transform in any area of your life.

What is it I would like to change about myself? If am rude or prone to harshness, what is my breath like during these times? I can learn to change my behaviour by watching my breath. If I lack the will power, that is, my mind won’t cooperate, I can also change my mind by putting my body in specific asanas.

So this is what a class with Prashant is like. Very theoretical, psychological, philosophical. He does not come around and correct alignment or even tell you what version of the posture you are to do. It doesn’t matter to him whether you decide to do the first repetition of Warrior I with your hands on your waist or go to the final position. Today it was all about breath, mind, and body as a whole.

Namaskar,

Pauline