This move is called IruttiKaal in Malayalam. This clip is filmed in my Kalari Institute CVN Kalari, Thiruvananthapuram (as complicated as Massachusetts!).  This is one of the toughest basic sequences for me. The hip joints have to be completely flexible to sit down completely like in full splits. I could not do it completely and my Gurukkal Rajasekaran Nair asked me not to do it. Children learn this easily and adults who are already flexible can do this, for others this is quite difficult. The spine turns around 360 or feels like it. And the gurukkal will pretty much manhandle the students. He would pull the kids’s hair to twirl around. It does not look too difficult while watching it. But one gets to do this, it is extremely demanding. One needs to coordinate the right and the left, twirl and change direction. When it is time to twirl, the brain needs to adapt so quickly as to where the body is and the control is important. The gurukkal would never be happy with the students. He would always complain and sometimes hit the children mildly to ask them to keep the focus. This is something I will have to practice next time I go to my Kalari Institute.

I am not sure what it is. Is it my vagabonding through India to study Yoga or is it Vancouver or is it my injured knee? Western “vinyasa” does not make sense at all to my body. This is the style I have practiced for so many years until I went to India. My teachers at my teacher training in San Francisco were primarily trained in this style, for they were direct disciples of the California Yoga queen Shiva Rea. I used to enjoy this style a lot. Not anymore. I am trying to figure out what happened.

I was at a “vinyasa” class last week. Music was Jazz. Sade and others were taking turns to provide the vocals.  The instructor told us to press on the golden egg between the root chakra and the genitals. Some more chakra talk continued. My golden rule of thumb had always been to avoid a class where the teacher talks about chakras. I normally draw the line at bandhas. Most instructors understand bandhas. Chakra talk is so DC (Deepak Chopra) and is what I classify as saccharine sweet. It is mostly mumbo jumbo to me. I understand chakras in the real yogic sense, but not in a yoga class where the instructor is trying to sound cool.

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I have always fancied having someone guide me in my Yoga studies. A lot of books say that great progress can be made when you have a guru, as a guru can show you the way. Sounds great, but I am pretty sure I am not going to find anyone who can fit this role. Of late, I do not want it either. I am afraid that the person will let me down. Last year, I was at an ashram in India. I thought I liked a teacher who could explain things very well. I also felt he practiced asanas and everything else that he was talking about. Integrity is super important for a role model. Then I got to know he was after a girl in my class. There is essentially nothing wrong with that. Just that he had claimed a completely different lifestyle in class. That was the last time I ever wanted a guide, teacher or a guru. Now I look for inspiration among my own friends, yogis or non yogis.

I am writing this as I read about this guru called Nithyananda. Normally I do not like to write about such people, they do not deserve my time and space on this blog. This guy has this ashram just outside of my home town, Bangalore. I heard about this guy the entire time I was in India last year. The youngest swami in India. One of the yogis that I had met was a follower of this man. She would meditate on this man and she had told me so much about him. I kept thinking to myself, what would happen if this guru is a fake. It would be such a waste of time and energy. I simply don’t trust anyone who lives in an ashram and claims he is a guru. True to that thought, I read there is so much confusion caused by this man.

I listen to radio while preparing dinner. There was a mini quiz asking to guess which country has made it to Olympics, which is not really known for Winter sport. I was guessing some country from Africa. It turned out to be India. Shiva Keshavan was so funny, he made my day. He is a luge pilot, I had to look up what it was.

There is still no luge track in India, where Keshavan was born 28 years ago 2,500 metres up in the Himalayas.

“We use the natural facilities, the natural track,” Keshavan explained. “With a few friends we get together. You beat a ski course and you beat a luge course.”

Even after having competed in a few Olympics before, he says he simply puts together his own equipment. He is compared to the Jamaican bobsleigh team that competed in 1988 and went on to become the crowd favorite.

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I realize how precious my knees are, every single time I get hurt. My left knee hurts so bad that I cannot do any ’serious’ yoga. I mean the typical western vinyasa flow with tons of warrior poses. Western vinyasa flow is what I normally practice, if my knees were any good. Now I am practicing ‘mild’ yoga to heal my knee. It is so ironic that my knee got hurt while practicing yoga. I should correct it, I got hurt while doing yoga mindlessly. Led by a famous teacher in an ashram in India along with 250 people. It happened 10 months ago and it still hounds me. It took a long time to heal while I was in India and I reached a stage where I could actually practice Mysore style astanga. I was doing good for a while, I had forgotten all about the knee pain or that I was injured so recently. The knee injury resurfaced back in the last few days, when I was in a hurry to get back to my daily practice. Now, all I think of is my knee. I know it hurts every single millisecond.

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I was in India during the Ganesha festival and I remember explaining to an American friend what it was all about. I was telling him that praying to Ganesha who is an obstacle remover has a few asanas involved. One of the main ones is where a person holds on to their ears and asks for forgiveness for all the mistakes. It is called Thoppu Karanam in Tamil. It is nothing but a dynamic utkatasana.

And then I read an article in the magazine Hinduism today, that some nut case has patented this sequence as “Superbrain Yoga”. I could not believe the nuttiness involved in patenting something that is followed in a religion for hundreds of years.

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Indian Railways has been one of my highlights traveling in India. For most part, the trains were on time and it was way cheaper than traveling by bus, with the exception of Shatabdi. Shatabdi was an especially nice train, with great views. Non-stop from Mysore to Bangalore in less than two hours!

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