I am now two weeks into my time in Goa.
I hired a scooter to make it easy to get around and explore. Plus, there seems to be a hierarchical system on the roads with cows, trucks, buses, cars, scooters, pushbikes all coming much higher on the pecking order than pedestrians. Wednesday is the Flea Market here and the trucks and scooters are ruthless and mostly on the crazy side so I tend to stick close to my neck of the woods on a Wednesday. It’s been about 20 years since I last rode a bike so my cortisone levels were peaking for the first few days. I had to laugh at myself because I also forgot how to turn smoothly on the bike – think I have the hang of it now – you lean into the corner and it makes you look like a cool dude and not crazy Westerner that should not be riding a scooter! People ride their bikes, talk and text on the mobiles over here (not many wear helmets) – I admire their capacity to multi-task and wonder whether there are many accidents…
Life is good. I had this beautiful moment the other day where I was riding to practise early in the morning, it was just light, cold, mostly quiet and I could smell the incense from the houses as I scooted past them. It was a moment where everything just felt perfect and beautiful – I felt like I was in one of those movies where the girl is finally doing what she loves and she is about to burst into song (it would have to be a Bollywood song to keep in theme!)…. And then a bug flew straight into my eye. Haha love those moments too – just focus on riding the scooter Biannka.
I am loving practise. It seems Marci and Rolfe are big fans of using the postures to explore the blocks (energy blocks AKA: very tight muscles) within your body and then finding ways (through correct alignment, different stretches, engaging bandhas bandhas bandhas and the correct muscles for each posture etc) to unblock these parts of our bodies/minds… For example, I now do a whole bunch of different hip opening stretches before Kurmasana and Marci asked me not to do Supta Kurmasana until my left hip lets go a bit. Also, while I am here my backbends have been with props against a wall and I know if I’m doing it right because my legs burn like crazy. Leg burning is definitely the measure. I was leaving class the other day and Marci asked how my back bends went. I said ‘good’. Marci: ‘did your legs burn?’ Biannka: ‘ahhh yeaaaah’. Marci: ‘tomorrow we do them together’. And the next day they burnt like crazy once again. Oh, and Marci has me doing some shoulder opener exercises and some shoulder strengthening exercises. With all the additions my practise at the moment is around 3.5hours. And I love every bit of it!!! I also love my coffee and granola afterwards too.
The first two weeks here were very challenging on a personal level. Once I finished practise I had nothing else to do. No work, no friends, no chores, no study, nothing… Just me and all the things I don’t like to think much about… Not much fun. Whilst I spend loads of time with myself at home, I do a good job of burying these things with a bunch of distractions. India however, has this way of stripping you back (unless you’re into the drug/trance scene of course…then you might go home with a few more issues), so there’s no getting away from the hard bits of yourself/life – you just have to move through it. Someone told me the other day that any difficulties faced in India pass one hundred times faster. I’m not sure about that but I feel grateful that I’m now feeling delightfully at ease. It’s a nice place to be. Love you India!!!
