Shala is clearing out

So quick update, I was being blonde again. Mumbai and Bombay = same city.  I talked with my dear friend, who has lived her 7 years, Randy. He is helping me get the money back and Tina, who is Indian and runs 2 restaurants here called her friend at that bank. 1) I am definitely getting the money credited back to my account but it may take at least 60 days and 2) I have to go to the bank and apologize to the manager for the way Joseph treated him. It is very very disrespectful in India to insult people like that. So if I apologize, then perhaps he will speed up this process.

So on to our day today:
I walked in for my normal practice time of 6 a.m. I usually wait with about 10 other people till a space opens up on the floor. Today I walked in and I was the only one in the lobby. I was called immediately on the floor. This is unheard of and shows the yogis are leaving. As the next 15 people came him he bumped all their times up to 5:30 a.m. from now on.

I have made some good friends here in just this short time. The friends who have been here before say that there are waves of groups that come where you’ll have really nice people and very strong bonds. The month of February has been like that. All of us girls and I would say at least 20 that I know pretty well, just really get along and they are good people.

You get close fast here, because we practice at the crack of dawn together 6 days a week. Then you see each other at the coconut stand throughout the day, at the same restaurants, walking the streets and so on.

Now that the month is coming to an end, people are leaving. They are off to Miami, Dubai, Portugal, Japan, Hawaii and so on. It is a bit sad, as where but Mysore can you get all these people from all over the world together? Samia and Steven left yesterday, they are from home with me and I am really sad they are going. Samia is so dang funny and Steven is just dang cool. I am really going to miss her bubbly personality. Some like Hector and Iman, have been here for 6 months and they are finally moving on. Iman is from Dubai and invited me there anytime. That is the wonderful thing about this place, not only are you working on yourself through the practice, but you make friends all over the world.

I can see why they have all stayed so long and keep coming back. You plan on coming for one month and then the yoga really starts working internally on you and of course physically. It’s what happens inside your brain and body that is amazing. So right at one month, things are starting to  really come together in our body and you feel good. Thus people end up extending and extending and extending. Till it’s 6 months, a year and like Hector who left today, we saw him dragging in two large metal locked boxes of personal items that he is storing with Murthy till he comes back next time. Others like our friends, Andrew and Jessica, ended up moving here and have been here a year now.

So the yoga truly works. It brings you closer to god, whomever he/she may be to you, and it brings you closer to the people you practice with. Mags and I walked home with Vera, a dear good soul from Portugal, whom we connected right away. She’s a surfer girl too, as well as, our 2 Canadian sister friends, so that seals it for us right there. We were walking home last night and we’re a bit sad, as we had just said goodbye to 5 friends at once. We’ll see what March brings for us. She said she is sad her friends are gone now, but that it is also good for her to be alone to be with herself as she feels she has work to do on her inner soul. I feel the same, though I am never alone as Mags is always my sidekick. (She is next to me humming and looking at the screen as I write.) I feel alone at times too and that is probably a good thing for me to dig deeper and peel some more layers of my outer self away.

News from home, I took a photographer from the PI newspaper around for a day to show her chained dogs as she is writing and shooting an article. We have been trying to get a no chaining law passed in Seattle and it is gaining speed. The article and photos are here:

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/photos/popupV2.asp?SubID=4656&page=1&GTitle=Chained%20Dogs%20&pubdate=2/24/2009

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/401317_dogchain25.html

Namaste!