1st week in Mysore with Guruji at the AYRI (November 2005)

[Guest guest]

David and I arrived in Mysore on Sunday 6th November. On Monday

afternoon, all nervous and excited, we registered with Guruji at the

Ashtanga Yoga Research Centre. This also serves as Guruji's home,

which is a large and beautiful house by any standards, and even more

by Mysore standards.

 

Anyway, Guruji likes chocolates, so we brought him some. He was

sitting in his office when we arrived (there were just 2 other

people waiting to register before us). We had written him earlier

to tell him we were coming, but he had misplaced our letter together

with the photos we sent him. Anyway, he asked us to take new photos

and give it to him the next day. We filled in the registration form,

and turned the next page to see the conditions that we had to sign -

only 3 conditions - fees are not refundable nor transferable, we

cannot attend another yoga teacher or shala whilst we are studying

with Guruji or Sharath or they would expel us and finally, we must

stop practising when they tell us to.

 

That was it. We handed Guruji Rupees 26900 each (or what felt like a

million dollars), he counted it , smiled and told us to come "6.30am

tomorrow morning". (He actually has a money counting machine behind

him).

 

Anyway, the next morning, we arrived all bright eyed and bushy

tailed. There were about 60 people already practising in the shala

from the 5am session, and about 20 people waiting to be called in.

At first, we did'nt understand the order in which we were supposed

to go in. But it transpired that Guruji or Sharath or Saraswati

would call out "one more!" everytime somebody finished their back

bends, and Sharath would come out and choose us in order of

registration seniority. Some people who arrived later than us got to

be called in first, so long as they were "an older student". That

first day, all 5 of us newies were called in last, at about 7.15 am.

 

We occupied whichever space was available and started practice. The

other newie next to me, a young man from Greece was doing his own

thing. He completely threw me out - I was wondering if I was doing

the right thing - when I figured out that he did NOT know the

sequence at all. Nobody realised this until about 20 minutes had

passed, when Sharath came by and asked what he was doing, and told

him to do shoulder stand and come back the next day at 7.30am so

that he could teach him from scratch. As it was, that day Sharath

only taught him Surya Namaskar A.

 

By 8am both Sharath and Guruji had left leaving only Saraswati.

After we finished, I compared notes with David and 2 other newies.

Everyone confirmed that we got NO attention except for a touch here

or there from Saraswati. Hahaha

 

This went on to the 3rd day (Thursday) when I figured that I would

see how far I should go before someone would stop me. So, when I

finished my primary series, I tried out about 6 asanas of the 2nd

series before Sharath yelled at me to stop "Primary Series only,

Primary Series only!!!!" Caught out in my naughtiness, I nodded and

complied.

 

Today, Friday is led class day. The first session at 5am was led by

Guruji and the 2nd session (for us newies) was led by Sharath at a

brisk pace. We finished everything including Savasana in 1 hr 15

minutes. As for the Greek boy, Sharath let him follow till Navasana -

which we thought was pretty good considering he's only done 3 days

of ashtanga!!

 

No class tomorrow on Saturday.

 

They announced today that there will be no classes on Sunday and

Monday because Guruji is going to Mangalore to receive an award and

Tuesday will be moon day. Woe is me!!! We are only just to be here

for 2 weeks ( and we have paid a king's ransom already) and now no

classes for 2 days!! Oh well, I guess this is part of the Mysore

experience.

 

In any event, it is quite an experience prActising in the main

shala. The energy is high in the hall, and my practice has been very

light and fluid.

 

 

 

Namaste from India.

 

Alina