Wow! What a storm full night. Flashes, thunder and heavy rain. Thanks for postponing it until we were in the room.
I’ve had better nights than this one. With a combination of the thunderstorm, one (I do believe) mosquito, pigeons, heat, humidity and headache. Good thing we learned yesterday that “good or bad, beautiful or ugly – it’s all temporary”.
As we go outside we’re both dressed in long sleeved shirts and trousers. It’s still to cold so I return to the room to pick up another layer of clothing for us. It’s a huge difference in temperature with or without the sun. Stein Michael was already there when we got to breakfast and we enjoyed his company while breaking fast. The servings were plentiful and it tasted great. Elsa Birgit joins us and soon the rest of the people from our group come along. Some ready for the first yoga session at 9:15, others like me will take a slow morning and join the calensthenic at 11.
I walk alone over to the yoga place and have all the time in the world. Just enjoying the atmosphere and smiling to everyone I meet. People look generally happy in this part of town and the houses give away the fact that there are more middle class and upwards here than in the city center.
The road into the area where the yoga center is located is just awful. It’s just a bumpy heap of stone and gravel. The houses on either side are quite beautiful and in stark contrast to the road.
I find the yoga place easy enough and hang around waiting for the first class to end. I meet up with several of the others and we get ready for the calesthenics.
The gym at the top floor is a gym in the old fashion way. Hard core training. No nonsense, no slacking and no whining. We meet Ash who guides us through an hour of functional training with body weight and kettle bells as well as other exercises. It’s a good session and I’ll feel some of these tomorrow morning.
Katja moves on to the next class, of course, while I sit in the cafe talking to Raj and a couple of the other team members. We talk about the life, universe and everything. Raj is a cool guy and has a lot of interesting views on things. Being from Nepal but married to a European gives him a world of opposing views at times and a solid ballast for discussions.
After Camilla is finished with her session everyone is at the cafe and lunch is done before we move to Durban square for the challenge. 108 sun salutations.
We drove to the square and get out and move to the little spot set aside for the challenge. It’s the fourth time this challenge is being held and it’s about doing a consecutive 108 sun salutations. The reason for this is to create awareness and openness about abuse of children as this is a suppressed topic in the Nepalese society. Raj’s sister is running an organization that works on this subject and are traveling to schools giving lectures and hoping to reach out to kids with a bad history. This challenge act both as a fund raiser as well as a means to make people stop and thereby being able to address them on the topic.
I do 20 before I opt out and watch and take pictures. It’s not really my cup of tea since I struggle with the monotony of it. For those who are able to do it like a meditation in motion is a a good thing. Katja is of course through them all and have thereby done all of today’s sessions and is crowned, at least in my book, as the Number 1 yogi of the day.
When we arrived back at the hotel Raj gave us “The talk” before the trek. Information about being on a trek, sustainable tourism and altitude sickness. We got the key of the land and it will be interesting to see if we will be affected in any way. We’ve been higher when climbing mount Rinjani with more than 400 meters, but there’s no guarantee. We’ll keep our fingers crossed and hope for the best while checking for symptoms.
After taking a long anticipated shower we meet with almost everyone on the group that wants to join up for dinner at a Vietnamese place. We go to Pho 99 and it’s really good. The fresh spring rolls, here called Summer rolls, are not the best I’ve had but the Pho pork is great. Pho is noodle soup with loads of vegetables and greens and then added meat or tofu. We are traveling with a vegan and a vegetarian or two so the selection suited us all.
A little shopping of snack for the trek on the way home and it’s again an end to a day. One more day of yoga festival before we begin the trek on Monday. Katja falls asleep in an instant as her head touches the pillow while I’m writing up our adventure for today.
View from our room @Yellow house
Oh, I saw some of the pictures Marcel took yesterday. I’ve probably forgot to mention him, but he’s a Dutch retired photographer who’s in Nepal and found out about the yoga festival. He offered to take pictures for free since he’s here already. I hope to be able to share some of these here as they are nothing short of spectacular. Where I see clouds and fog he sees a hidden gem of a picture. What an eye for beauty. Just you was until I to them or put them up here.
Yoga teaches us to cure what need not be endured and endure what cannot be cured. ~B.K.S. Iyengar
kogatravel 