Day 8, Yoga School , Rishikesh, India, February 10, 2023

My intention was to just once again enjoy my time here, and, I had a good day!

As I get stronger, remember the poses and am able to execute them, I am having more fun. However I hate the breathing class. Apparently the meditation teacher thinks he’s also teaching breathing because today was two hours of it. The classes are so boring unless we get to lay down because then you can hope you’ll fall asleep.  It’s so uncomfortable sitting on the hard cement with an infinitely thin yoga mat. Today the real breathing teacher made us breathe 50 times in a minute with our arms raised and bending the knees up and down. That was only one of the exercises. I kept my eyes closed and tried to look like I was doing it but there’s no way I am hyperventilating over and over and over. He said we will feel lighter and our arms may tingle. Duh! That’s a buildup of CO2 in the blood causing that, it isn’t anything yogic or spiritual.

Lunch was once again raw radish and cucumber which I am very tired of, white rice, lentils and kofta which means blended carrots, capsicum, potatoes, cauliflower and green peas according  to the Internet recipe but I doubt all of that was in it.  We probably got potatoes and carrots.  No way are they going to spring for the other vegetables!  The food processed vegetables are rolled into meatball sized balls, fried and then cooked in a sauce, always a sauce which they call a gravy, with chilli powder, coriander powder and always garam masala. It actually tasted pretty good but I’m so tired of the gravy and breakfast was just two hours before so I wasn’t very hungry.  I am though looking for the perfect sweet lassi,  I’ve tried 2 different places but so far, no luck.  

After lunch I took my pants to a tailor to get the hole fixed in the leg.  The man took a look at them, walked to his cupboard and pulled out a piece of cloth almost identical to my pants! He knew exactly what caused the hole as did everyone except the guy who did it and for Rs.200 which is $3.26, I will have repaired pants tomorrow afternoon.

Yesterday I noticed they were setting up a huge tent by a restaurant.  Today it was completed-

and there were lots of people in fancy clothes milling about. There’s a wedding! As I carried on down the street the groom and his family were on their way.

Leading the group was the music machine and DJ. The cart was pulled by a motor on wheels that did not have enough oomph to get up the hill so men were pushing it a few feet at a time and then blocking the tires and dragging the DJ stand up the hill –

Next came musicians and dancers –

and then the groom –

The procession carried on up the hill-

Once the groom arrived at the wedding hall, there were fireworks but I didn’t hang around.  

The afternoon classes always come along too quickly.  Anatomy was boring - hyper and hypo lordosis- as if I care or as if I’ll ever have a client that has it.  And if I did, wouldn’t they already be seeing a physiotherapist for proper care?  Then Mr. philosophy who thinks he’s funny and these young kids giggle at him to encourage his not funny behavior, had us draw a picture including a snake, mountains, a river, the sun, a tree, a bird, a house and a path and then told us what each symbol stood for. Now he’s Mr. psychology apparently. So we looked at each other‘s drawings and then of course I end up in the group with the nerd of the class and she starts analyzing everybody as if she knows what she’s talking about. I reminded the group more than once that this was just for fun!  He mustn’t have felt like talking about the usual boring stuff.  My last yoga class was very difficult because my muscles are absolutely exhausted. That’s good because you’re supposed to fatigue your muscles like that, only thing is there’s no rest because tomorrow will be another gruelling day. I couldn’t do half of what we were supposed to do because my body was just mush. And, we have to know the Sanskrit numbers from 1-17!  Frick.  I’ll never teach Ashtanga yoga!  What a waste of ink even writing them down!

I had a good day but I don’t really belong here. I have no intention of teaching yoga so why am I putting myself through an hour of breathing and an hour of meditation, an hour of anatomy and another hour of philosophy when all I want to do is practice yoga?  Oh well, I am 38% done and I think I can stick it out until the end.