Yoga in Bratislava

@Darshana Yoga

Yikes! Pretty scary entrance.

19.15 - Power Yoga with Carlo

Great class even though I could understand NOTHING, except figured out that "nardi" means inhale and "vyvych" means exhale in Slovak. So there you go.  My gorgeous friend Zuzana organised the class which was good because the website was in Slovak so I don't think I would've figured anything out otherwise! She also dropped me off, just like a Mum drops their kids off at afternoon activities and spoke to the teacher for me in Slovak.   He was so cute and seemed nervous because I didn't speak Slovak and he spoke very little English and seemed intimidated because I did. Again, I will reiterate how inferior I've felt in all of these European countries where they all speak at least 2 languages. This dude had nothing to worry about.  I just reassured him that I would copy other people so no worries. Anyway, class began in the teeny tiny mini studio in the basement below street level of which we had to walk through a bigger studio (with a Yoga Therapy class still going!) as quietly as possible. The mini room was cool though because I was near the window and could see people's feet walking past. Okay, people, not just their feet. Also, the class had mirrors at the front which forced me to look at myself, s scary sight!  The back wall had this creepy swami yoga man which I also had to look at. I'm not sure which was worse.

Mirrors! Eek!

Some sort of swami yoga man. 

It was definitely a strength-based class which was perfect because I really felt like I needed to wake up my relatively dormant, carb-filled muscles! Carlo was one of those teachers who was clearly passionate about yoga and teaching.  Even though I couldn't understand anything, you could just tell through his body language and facial expression that he was just really into what he was saying. He was super nice and would always do the actions for me when he caught my eye.

Carlo, me and some Panda eyes.

This class alone was worth a hundred because of one particular adjustment. In the middle of the vinyasa flows we held Plank position, which, on a side note, apparently has no actual Sanskrit name am I correct? Anyway, we held our planks for a while and as I have a terrible habit of collapsing into my shoulders and arching my back to create "duck butt, he came over to correct me. All he did was point in between my shoulders which made me round my back, touch either side of my shoulders which  immediately made me come out of my shoulders and enable me to tuck my pelvis under. We actually held this plank for quite a while and really gave me the opportunity to correct this position. Brilliant!  I now know the correct alignment to do forever! Yay!

The rest of the class was a flowing Vinyasa style with lots of leg work through Utkatasana and the Viras. He really sequenced the poses well and really worked one side for a long time before changing. It just felt like such a good workout. I really enjoy this style. If I ever teach, I think this is something I could get into. ALthough, this yoga journey is making me doubt that as a prospect. That's a whole other issue though. Nevertheless, I could hardly walk the next day so that was great! Overall, a lovely little class which really made me work up a sweat.  I also spoke to lovely French girl afterwards in the change room and she said that this guy is one of the best in town.  I agreed with her wholeheartedly. He was excellent!

My Mum, I mean, my friend Zuzana and her boyfriend, Misko, then picked me up and we walked around the beautiful capital of Bratislava after that.  One of my favourite places yet! Bliss.

Zuzana and Misko.

Beautiful Bratislava.

Yoga in a park in Vienna

@Kula Yoga at Stadtpark, Wien

9.00am - Vinyasa flow with Carola Fassl

Is there such thing as Duck pose?

I have learnt so many things from this ONE class alone! This yoga trip just paid for itself! Well, not really. Especially seeing as I have officially run out of money and need to try and stretch it all the way to Croatia over the next couple of weeks.  Anyhoo, for anyone who sturggles with nerves/anxiety about teaching, of which I have for many years, take note of someone who is bilingual.  This lovely yoga teacher woke up this morning, ready to teach her lovely park yoga in her native tongue, German, well, technically Austrian, but apparently it's a sort of dialect of German. Turned out that there were 9 students. Myself and one other girl were the only English speakers.  I insisted that she teach in German because I understand bits and pieces. She then systematically asked every single student if they spoke English and decided on the spot to teach the class in English instead!  I was floored. I apologised to everyone, but profusely thanked them too.  I couldn't believe it. To be able to slip so easily into a second language is just incredible. I am definitely taking language classes when I get home!

The class was in the Johann Strauss Meadow. Delightful!

We began with a type of breathing that I've never done in my life. It starts with 'b'. Hang on, I'll just Google it...yeah, no idea. I totally forgot to ask her, but basically we sat cross-legged, put our hands in fists with thumbs tucked in and on the inhale, our arms would stay bent but swing up and over our head and on the exhale they would swing back and this would continue like a pendulum. It was cool. (If anyone still reads my blog and if those people know what this breathing is called, please email me. I've discovered that my comments don't work for some reason. Any suggestions about that too?!)

We then started off with a kind of warm up that I've never done before in a yoga class. Imagine one of those old school warm-ups you did for sport at school.  Like remmeber when the teacher picked someone for warm up and you did like the standard arm circles, lunges, star jumps, stuff like that? Well, we didn't do any star jumps, but we did do arm circles. So like circle your arms backwards and then forwards. Put your hands on your hips and circle them one way and then the other.  Stretch your neck either side, look up, down, links, recht etc etc (Look at me speaking German!) So yeah, it was actually really cool. Kinda got us all warmed up. Then we went into Cat/Cow and did the following series which I think I am actually going to use!

Kind of like this red cat. Thank you Asian man.

Bidalasana with leg variations:

• Inhale, leg outstretched to the back,
• Exhale, curl knee towards chest
• Inhale, leg outstretched
• Exhale, curl knee towards inside of opposite elbow
• Inhale, leg outstretched
• Exhale take knee to outside of same elbow
• Inhale, leg oustretched
• Exhale, leg straight out to side, leg perpedicular to the body, foot flexed.

She then repeated this sequence on the left hand side. Then we did some other stuff in between which I can't remember. Then we repeated this sequence once we were  in Down Dog (Adho Muka Svanasana) and modified it by coming into plank on all of the exhales. It was just brilliant. It reminded me of my Guerilla Yoga in Paris class where we built on each pose to lead to a culminating pose at the end. I find this technique really effective. I believe the style is Anusara from memory?  Really useful, especially for beginners. It's just like dance choreography really.

Sneaky pic I took during Paschimottanasana. 

One of the most difficult things, particularly at the beginning of the class, was to block out all of the noises. Carola explained that that's why we do yoga outside, because it's more realistic. We are constantly surrounded by noise, sounds, smells, so it's important to learn to deal with these whilst practising.  At first, the silence, or lack thereof was deafening. It was just so interesting to listen to every single sound.  Children playing in the trees, a big tractor thing cutting the grass, sirens from a fire engine, the bells of St Charles Church which I took a photo of yesterday, clicking from the cameras of Japanese tourists, drunk people walking home through the park from a big night out, the pitter patter of a jogger running past, a lady on her mobile phone, the wind in the leaves and even the creaking of the trunk of the big tree near me. It was just incredible.  I don't think I've ever in my life, just sat in a park and listened to the sounds around me. As a result of the yoga class this morning, I decided to go for a walk, JUST a walk around the park this afternoon. Again, something I've never done. I didn't even put on my sneakers so I'd be tempted to run. I just walked. I walked slowly and listened. Really made me appreciate life. Wah! Don't wanna get too deep! But this trip really has opened my eyes and made me appreciate the smaller things in life...then I went back to my 5 star hotel and ordered room service...

Tree pose of course!

We finished with Nardi Shodhana (alternate nostril) breathing and about 5 minutes of Savasana, in which I actually let go of all the distractions and relaxed. Weeeeeeeeeeeeee! Cue photo shoot. What a great class. I felt invigorated and calm at the same time.  Best combo EVER!

Then we all did a photo shoot. Yay for photo shoots! Thanks Carola. One of the most memorable classes of my whole trip!

We could hear the bells from this, St Charles Church. So pretty!

Yoga in Vienna

@Power Yoga Vienna

16.00 - Power Yoga Walk with Barbara

What a great studio and awesome class! It was another lovely slow power flow class and really helpful to give me some ideas for the future.Ah, I heart yoga. After having an overly indulgent eating day which included croissants for breakfast, a couple of coffees, berry smoothie, some chocolate and pistachio nuts for lunch and then finishing off with fried camambert cheese for dinner accompanied with a glass of local Austrian white wine followed by italian ice cream for dessert, the yoga was the one shining light from the barrage of bad decisions I made today! This was the best choice by FAR! Despite all of this terrible food (I am still managing to avoid meat as much as I can, wheat is a little trickier in these Eastern European countries), I managed to feel great during and after my yoga class. I was struggling with my newy acquired padding around my stomach and thighs due to aforementioned carbo loading that seems to be a daily occurrence, but managed to do most poses all the same.  I "found" my body again. I heard that expression in a class somewhere along the way and today I could really relate to it.

The studio again was all white with high ceilings, but unlike some of the stark feelings that other all-white studios conjured up, this one had an instantly warm, welcoming feel. Perhaps it was the friendliness of the teacher Barbara. She was just lovely and also really pretty close up. She was extremely welcoming and excited when I told her about my journey. She even introduced me to the class of which there were about 16 people. The props, mats etc were all grey, which I thought really softened the studio. I would definitely practise here if I lived here.  Also, I actually really want to live here.

My favourite sequence was a short standing series that flowed into each other.  It was Tree (Vrksasana), straight into Dancer's  (Natarajasana) and then straight into Eagle (Garudasana).  It was just really effective in keeping the standing leg engaged for a prolonged period of time and working my muscles that haven't been used in a while. I guess the upside of losing a fitness on this trip has been the appreciation of yoga from a beginner's perspective ie. someone who has never used those muscles before. That's kinda what I felt like!

I'm even getting better and understanding my rechts and links...rights and lefts :-)

The pose that blew my mind for effectiveness was a variation of Revolved Head-to-knee pose (Parivrtta Janu Sirasana).  Thanks to Mr Iyengar below, you can see the pose, but just imagine his bent leg was tucked behind towards the buttocks, rather than in front towards the groin.  Oh also, most people don't get that top arm to the toe. Anyway, instead of worrying about stretching the side of the body, the teacher told us to hang the head and use the weight of the head to stretch the side of the neck. It was the most amazing stretch EVER! Do it now! I dare you! I absolutely am going to add this to my repertoire and play around with more variations. The possibilities are endless! Also, it's further proof that you don't need all the bells and whistles to have a good workout or rather, asana practise.  Just using your own body weight is cheap and effective!

OOH OOH, we also did Revolved triangle pose (Parivrtta Trikonasana) and Revolved wide-angle forward bend (Parivrtta Prasarita Padottanasana) both of which are shown really well on this link.  Barbara told us to put our hand on our sacrum to keep it flat as we were revolving and do you know what was the first thing that came to my mind?? The whole metaphor of balancing a cup of water on it as per Yoga in Tamworth class. Crazy!  Also on a sidenote, I've been doing it wrong this whole time. The whole purpose of putting your hand on your sacrum is to ensure your pelvis stays parallel to the ground and your upper torso is the one doing the twisting. Idiot!  I actually felt the impact of this stretch immediately after doing it correctly. I am slowly but surely piecing all of this knowledge together to make one cohesive lesson in my head for when I return. Well, in theory anyway!

I am now a fan of the grey accessory idea. 

Here is a pretty picture of an ABC in Vienna
(Another Bloody Church).

Yoga in Prague

@YogaMe                        

17.30 - Vinyasa Flow with Rosie 

Creepy baby statues!

Creepy baby statues (with YOGAME written vertically in between)! Eek. Creepy baby statues are everywhere here in Prague. It's just so funny. I even found a website  listing "The 14 Most Unintentionally Terrifying Statues in the World" so click on this to check it out.  I think like 3 of them are in Prague.  I also visited the communication tower that has faceless babies crawling up it as you can see at the end of this blog.  Anyway, that's the first thing I saw above the entrance. Otherwise, it was a beautiful building.  I'm had to ring the buzzer, which I'm starting to get used to in all of these cities,  to go upstairs to the studio. I was greeted by a lovely guy named Jaan, (spelling!?!) who said something in Czech.  As I am so well-practised, I just launched into my usual:  "I only speak English". He was only too happy to then respond in English and ask where I was from/engage in smalltalk about his travels in Australia. It was nice. He also informed me that it was a fill-in teacher today, who was Rosie from Spain and because she didn't speak Czech, the class would be taught in English. Phew! So yes, I have to admit, it was nice to have a class in English, because it meant I could actually relax a little more and not spend the whole time craning my neck around to watch and copy!

I was a week too early!

Whilst I was waiting, because I was UBER early, I saw a flyer saying that Manju P. Jois, the eldest son of THE Pattabhi Jois, the creator of Ashtanga Yoga, was visiting this very studio to conduct a workshop exactly a week later. Argh! Talk about timing. Alas, it was not meant to me. Also, they had this really cute flyer about (from what I can decipher) Ayurvedic cooking. I like the saying: "Eat Your Best, Leave the Rest". Genius!



The class was a lovely slow-flowing vinyasa style in which the teacher, who looked like some sort of ex-Flamenco dancer, just floated around the room elegantly and effortlessly whilst giving clear instructions in an accent that, well, you just don't wanna mess with. She was a hardcore yogi with like zero body fat, but she was clearly so experienced that she didn't even once skip a beat, miss an instruction or have to correct herself with lefts/rights. It was just incredible. 


I can't remember any specific sequences because I was so worried about not doing a pose correctly when she walked past.I know. That's bad. Coupled with the fact that I'm really out of shape with this travel schedule and non-regular yoga practise, I just wanted to try and do my very best seeing as I'd claimed to be an important blog-writing travelling yogi.  Well hey, they think I'm a celebrity in Leutkirch, Germany at least! Anyway, it's just amazing how quickly you can lose fitness/strength/flexibility. But (hopefully) equally amazing with how quickly it can come back right? Right?! I bloody hope so! 

I could get used to all these high-ceilinged,
 bay window studios. 

One thing I did take mental note of for future reference and again, the entire point of this blog, was the positioning of the students in the class. The class was a fairly long rectangle shape, where the teacher's mat was in the middle and a few students on either side. It was good or a change to experience this configuration, but the only thing was when we went into Tree Pose (Vrksasana) and were trying t balance, we were often right in the line of sight of the person opposite us, so it was difficult to find that spot. Also, Rosie didn't skip a beat, but I think it would be difficult to get the left and right sides correct if you were int he middle and didn't have a reference looking straight at a student. That's just a personal thing for me to note though. I need all the help I can get if/when I ever become a yoga teacher!

Overall, a lovely class and a good experience to do a really slow flow class. I heart Prague!

Was going to do Swan pose, but I can't, so I didn't.
So here's a photo of swans with Charles Bridge in the background. 

Those little black things that look like ants,
are actually faceless crawling babies. 

Creepy babies!

Yoga in Krakow

@Sivananda Yoga Krakow

18.00 - Beginner/Flow with Kasia (That's Kate in Polish. It's fate!)

The entrance was through a hallway with
wedding dresses. How depressing?!

Meanwhile, in Krakow now and just got home from a lovely beginners class of Sivananda Yoga.  I LIKE PEOPLE AGAIN! The past few days has been tough and "cynical Kate" (apologies for talking in the third person, one of my pet peeves, but it's in context I guess) has really come to the fore.  Having not had much sleep due to sharing a room because I'm the world's lightest sleeper, making poor food choices, not fitting in any exercise and eating basically crap has really affected my attitude and judgement. I'm just so good at being sarcastic and cynical, it's easy to slip back into it when my defences are down and I'm  feeling vulnerable and overweight.  So interesting to see how these three things, or lack thereof: sleep, food and exercise, really affect me. But, YOGA has saved me once again!

I now know why i love yoga. The change in me since the minute I left the yoga class was immediate and evident.  There was a spring in my step, my eyes were clearer, my posture better and my breathing back to normal.  The past week or so, since joining the tour, I've just had a bit of a shift in perspective of myself and lost focus on yoga and what I'm supposed to be doing.

The street I walked up and down a million times
until I finally found it.

There's actually a lovely girl from Singapore on the tour who brought a yoga mat with her!  She does asanas and meditation every single morning and is clearly really dedicated.  She's been doing it only 2 years, but already looks like a seasoned veteran. I am now starting to question my own dedication and decision to become a teacher.  Should I be doing an hour of yoga every morning? Some mornings I feel like going for a run to snap out of my carb coma.  Other mornings I just need sleep!  Should I really be a yoga teacher if I'm not committed like this girl?  She did a yoga trek in Nepal which sounded amazing. We've chatted about yoga a bit, but to be frank, I'm quite intimidated by her, despite the fact I've been doing yoga much longer.  Doubt is beginning to creep in. I guess this is what travelling is about. Finding yourself.  Questioning yourself.  I was actually embarrassed when I told her I was a newly qualified teacher because I had a feeling she would judge me straight away because of what I look like and the way I am (at least on this tour) ie. cynical and judgemental Kate.  

Cool orange mat and bolster!

On to more important things...YOGA! I LOVE YOGA! This class in Krakow was just great! There were heaps of students of mixed ability and it was really impressive to see how the teacher, Katia, managed it all.   There was me, the non-Polish speaking idiot from abroad, two pregnant ladies and a range of abilities in the room.  The ease in which she adapted poses for the "up the duff" ladies (that's Aussie slang for pregnant) and then slipped into the English version for me, then back into Polish for the "normal" people was astounding. Makes me feel rather insignificant as an Australian as the majority of us have no need to learn another language and we certainly aren't multilingual like these Europeans. 

I particularly enjoyed her version of Supta Padangustasana. We used the strap, but before that, she made us simply bend our knees up and hold them, all the while engaging the lower, outstretched leg. I have never been more conscious of this leg in my life!  It probably hlped that she was stnading mostly by me to interpret the englsih instructins, but I constantly, well almost sonctantly, had it engaged. AMazing. THen, we added the strap and were told to put it around our heel, something which is new to me. She did this to ensure that our legs were at 90 degrees for sometime, to get the correct alignemtn and again, relaly engage the lower, outstretched leg. Only THEN, were we allowed to pull lightly on the strap to stretch our legs. We then took our legs in and did Supta Padang to the outside, then the inside, crossing over, but never lettign the hip collapse. Again, a first for me. Twas brilliant!

View from class.

It reminded me of the real reason of my trip and this blog, to learn as much about yoga teaching as possible. THIS is why I'm doing this. For no other reason. 

The highlight of the class, from a teaching perspective therefore, was when she divided the students into 3 groups.  There were about 24 students in the class and she put us into 3 areas, then demonstrated the 3 poses she wanted us to do. We then held the poses for quite a significant amount of time until we were told to stop and move onto the next pose. Sort of like a yoga "circuit".  I am now officially a fan of this for 2 reasons.  The holding of poses for longer than normal, well, what's normal anyway, and really getting into them and sinking deep and finding your breath is just so effective.  One was down dog with heels against the wall, rope around the hips with blanket protecting body…then forward bend into Uttanasana. Sitting on chair and rotating either way, inhale arms up, exhale arms grab back of chair and twist towards it, then cross legged, bending forward with arms outstretched and head resting on a block. Now, these Poles are a tough bunch, so they don't use little foam blocks, they use the real thing. Wood. It ain't soft either. I just accepted that as part of the challenge really!

The next day I visited Auswitzch. What a humbling experience. 

The main square in Krakow. Amazing place. 

Yoga FAIL in Zakopane

Yay 4 Joga!

After a complete stuff up on my behalf in Zakopane, a lovely little mountain/ski resort in the hills between Poland and Slovakia, I managed to walk PAST the studio several times, but not actually find it. I blame my constant state of sleep deprivation and that my eyes are permanently cloudy and bloodshot from only eating meat and bread!  Eastern Europe is a tough place to make smart eating choices.  It has been made particularly difficult, because I decided to do a tour which is rather restrictive in terms of food choices on the road. In any case, I managed to eventually find the yoga studio in Zakopane, only to be a day out with my dates. The pitfalls of holidays...no idea what day it is. Oh, it was also 9 degrees, so the odds of me actually venturing out to do a yoga class were slim to none. I don't do 9 degrees. 

Here is a taste of what I've eaten and why all of my clothes are now too tight. Went into shop that had in big writing: "Omelet" and I just popped in for dinner because I thought, gosh I really could do with a nice sort of vegetarian omelette. I feel like I could be getting scurvy with the lack of vitamins I've received. I am also so so so sick of eating carbs and meat. Cue "omelet" delivered to me that looked like this: 

Polish "omelette".

Next, my tour buddies and I went to a sort of roadside takeaway place and they safely ordered hamburgers.  I ordered a "Salatka" to which the Polish lady promptly brought me a few pieces of lettuce or cabbage and said "Sorry, no Salatka" indicating that the rest of the salad is for the hamburgers. Righto, I thought, I'll just have some chicken.  Again, my whole no meat/wheat thing has completely gone out the window on this portion of the trip unfortunately.  So there were some roast chickens on the rotisserie thing and I thought that would be the safest and healthiest.  Next minute, she hands me a WHOLE chicken, cut in half and sitting on a plate. Guess, I'm eating a whole chicken for dinner then! Didn't get a picture of that one because of the embarrassment factor. My mates managed to help me out though. 

Oh, every few metres there are little stands that sell all these pastry things. I haven't tried one as yet. Oh and in the background, you can see a giant soft serve ice cream. They are also everywhere here. Again, haven't had one yet, but with all the travelling, I seem to be on an endless search for a good coffee and snacking on nuts, sweets and chocolate. Ah, chocolate...

I eventually did manage to find some markets that sold this beautiful fresh fruit...much better. 

So, Zakopane was unfortunately a lost cause in terms of yoga. There were 2 studios, but I seemed to miss both classes on both nights I was there. Idiot. 

Iyengar Yoga in Berlin

@Iyengar Yoga Institute 

18.00 - Level 1/2 Iyengar with Anna

Sun and Moon bike rack!

We did Savasana for HALF AN HOUR!!! It was really really really really difficult!

I did plan on going to a few more of the "Top 10" classes in Berlin, but in the end, my hotel ended up being right next to to this studio so it was a no brainer to go here. I did go for a walk that afternoon though and find a bunch of the studios. Sun and Moon, the #1 studio, even had it's very own bike rack! They are huge on bikes here in Berlin. Such a cool city. I have put the photos of some other yoga studios here too.  Oh and also I walked past a thing called a "GIVE BOX". From my interpretation, it seems like you just put random things in that you don't want and then random people take them. Talk about karma yoga!

The Give Box.

So, this class was okay. I took the advice of the lovely Marion from my previous class in Berlin and told the teacher upfront that I only spoke English. She nodded and replied (in English), "Okay, but do you understand some German?" I then replied, semi-confidently so as not to look like an idiot, "Oh, yes, things like left, right, inhale exhale etc." To which she just sort of nodded.  Little did I know that when she launched into class she would speak at a million miles an hour with no English. Eek!  I spent most of my time looking around at everyone else trying to figure out what we would do.  More on that in a minute.

The studio was actually through these big doors, down a lane
and up some stairs. It was all white inside.

The atmosphere of this class was nice, but also, well, I guess you could say just kind of flat.  Before class began, people filed into the room and nobody really spoke to each other or even do the polite nod hello. Also, the teacher was sitting on her mat with her eyes cast downwards. She just looked really really sad. She wasn't fiddling around, arranging stuff or chatting to people as they came in, she was literally just sitting there, doing nothing. It was odd. I think that almost set the mood with the class from the beginning. This was an excellent example of how the teacher, or any leader, like a tour guide for example, ahem, can really affect the group dynamic. Like the saying, "the team is only as good as its leader" So yeah.

We began with about 5 minutes of omming. I actually lost count how many times she did it, but it was definitely way more than the standard three.  On the upside, "om" is the same in every language so at least I understood one thing this class! We then did anther 5 minutes of breathing and then stood up and did one set of Sun Salutations, then a Prasarita Padottanasana and then we were straight to the wall.  Is that an Iyengar thing? Like not many Sun Salutes? I can't recall that in my other Iyengar classes. Anyway, this was where it got a bit tricky, because I'm just in my own world sort of thinking we'd be doing a bunch more standing stuff, but then suddenly, everyone had grabbed their mats, blankets, straps and blocks and moved to the wall. I then just followed the lady next to me and hoped for the best.  The sad teacher then, from what I could decipher said, "the people who can do headstand go to this side of the room and the people who can't go to this side of the room". Suddenly, I was back in Year 8 when we had to pick teams for sport. I am the world's slowest runner and have giant feet. My neighbours who I grew up with even told me I ran like a Velociraptor.  It was around the time Jurassic Park was released. So yes, all of my insecurities came flooding back. Surely this was not a very yogery thing to do?  Is it? Is that normal to split the class up into 2 groups, like the good ones over here and the not-so-good ones over there, with then both groups facing each other, sizing each other up and stuff?

So yeah, the not so good people did the Headstand variation hanging by he rope against the wall with legs in Baddha Konasana and arms touching the floor.  The rest of us just launched straight into Headstand for what seemed like about 20 minutes.  My neck and shoulders started to go numb anyway so I guess that's a good indication that I'm in a pose for too long! I kept thinking about "The Science of Yoga" book and how people are more prone to suffer from a stroke during yoga than ever really goes reported. Pretty sure I shouldn't be thinking about this mid-yoga class. Oh, THEN, everyone started packing their stuff up again, so I copied and off we were back into the middle of the class into a quick Bridge pose (Setu Banda). Oh and by quick, I mean, we did it about 5 times. This was THEN followed by Fish (Matsyasana) and then suddenly, up everyone got again with mats and stuff in tow and we were setting ourselves back up against the wall.  We also needed chairs for this one which was the highlight of the class, because the chairs were all leaning precariously against each other in one long row and of course, as soon as the first person grabbed one, the entire row collapsed making a HUGE crashing noise! It was the first actual exciting thing that had happened in class thus far and of course, I giggled and looked around, but no one else did. Awkward.  The sad teacher then demonstrated the Shoulder Stand (Salamba Sarvangasana) variation using the chair against the wall and we held that for like another 20 minutes, then slid down and off the chair into Supta Badda Konasana, one of my favourites poses for like another 15 minutes or so.

Then, up we were again and packed our stuff up. I was one of the last people to put my chairs away and of course, I made the entire row collapse...again. It was really strange, because as I was akwarkdly trying to restack/pack all the chairs, nobody and I mean NOBODY, not even the sad teacher, came to my aide. It was funny. I literally was still trying to pack up the chairs, which of course were at the front of the class as the sad teacher began to teach the next pose. People were getting into it and everything and there I am, trying to be as quiet as possible with all these steel chairs clinking and clacking about. It was quite funny.

So then we did Lord of the Fish/Seated twisty pose (Ardha Matsyendrasana)...at least I did one side, after I'd figured out how to stack the chairs. In the end I just let them fall. Again, no one blinked an eye. Then, we just launched straight into  Savasana for half an hour!! I am NOT kidding! It was crazy. It was actually like 30 minutes of lying down without anything else happening. She didn't talk us into it, there was no music, just silence.  I'm not sure if it was intentional, or the sad teacher didn't feel like doing anything else.  All I can say is that we literally did like 6 poses in this 90 minute class. It was so strange! I enjoyed holding the poses for longer than normal, but some of them, well, I just got bored and my mind wandered.  It was a really good lesson to learn for me to figure out the perfect timing for a pose.  Not long enough, the students won't reap the benefits. Too long, the students will start thinking about what they are going to have for dinner tonight. So yes, it was definitely helpful to experience a slightly too long hold in this class. Unfortunately, as a result, it made me not really enjoy the Iyengar style that much. It felt competitive and stagnant.  This class anyway.  After each pose, we had to either get new equipment or move mats to/from the wall.  We just sort of awkwardly moved our mats around about 4 or 5 times in the class. I felt like I spent most of the time moving house and not actually doing yoga.   But, I did learn heaps from it. I didn't speak to the lady at the end either like I have done with most of the classes because she just still seemed so sad.  I wonder why?

Berlin Jivamukti Yoga. 

Berlin Ashtanga Yoga.