Darn!

Happily, we were let out of Dr. Choudhury's lecture at 11:30 pm. That meant a whole seven hours of sleep last night. It was actually harder to get up this morning than the two-hour sleep the night before.

This afternoon's lecture was so interesting. Rajashree was discussing each posture and the medical benefits of each. As she was lecturing she had two demonstrators, Joseph and Courtney doing the postures. Joseph is the USA yoga champ, and Courtney is the USA and World yoga champ. Amazing, amazing postures! I will post some pictures on the weekend.

Tonight was posture clinic. Pernille said she was going to try and get in my group, and she did! It was so awesome to see her walk into that room! Unfortunately, I didn't get to say Bow in the room. :( We were told we were going until midnight, then just as I was next in line [again!] at 11 o'clock, they said that's it for the night...darn! I did get a chance however to say the pose for her in my room just before posture clinic, and she gave me wonderful encouragement, so that was really nice.

We get to sleep in tomorrow...sweet! Because this is re-certification weekend, they changed our 8am class to 11am so all of us can take the class at once.

Happy belated birthday, Laura-Marie! Meant to say this in yesterday's blog, but forgot. I hope it was a great day! Now you are older than me again...yes!

A New Record...so far.

So it was bollywood again last night. I am sure you can imagine how happy the 300 trainees were. Bikram lectured until 1:30 and then announced we had a 5-minute break, then we'll put the movie on! I had my territory marked out, so the minute the lights went out, I went down!! In went the earplugs, knapsack for a pillow, and shawl for a blanket, and I was asleep! We got back to our rooms at 5 am!

Two hours sleep, and back down to the tent for yoga! Rajashree [Bikram's wife] taught the class so that made up for the lack of sleep. She sounded a little mad that Bikram kept us up that late, especially since she was going to be lecturing today and everyone was going to be falling asleep in it. So she said "I'll give you an easy class", and it was. I slept in the tent for an hour afterwards.

Now it is back down to the lecture tent for Rajashree and a Dr. Choudhury lecture on women's issues...should be really interesting. We have no problem staying awake because we have what we call the "Sleep Police" - teachers who walk up and down the side aisles, and watch for sleepers and the person sitting next to them have to nudge them awake...no, really...I am not making this up! haha

And happy, happy stuff for the Edmonton Sextet...the owner of the southside and downtown Edmonton studios, Pernille [and Michael] arrived today!! We saw them just before our 5 pm class. Pernille is doing her 3-yr recertification this weekend, along with 80 other teachers here.

Postures, Postures, Postures

Monday afternoon and evening have been posture clinics as well as Tuesday morning. I am barely keeping up with memorizing the dialogue for the next posture. Last night (Tuesday), we had posture clinic until 11pm, AND THEN Bikram lecture to start at 11:30 pm. We watched Mahatabarat (sp??) until 3 am.

I always manage to save an end seat for these nights. Last night, as soon as the movie started, everyone was hitting the floor to sleep. I was right by the glass exit doors we aren't allowed to go out of. There was a nice street light coming in through the door, so I stretched out on the floor in front of it, propped Full Locust Posture in front of my water bottle and studied until 1:30 am. Then I decided nothing was going in my brain so I slept until they turned the lights on to go back to our rooms at 3 am!

To top it off, we had to get up extra early this morning as they were taking a group picture of us on the top floor of the parking garage. The photographer was on the roof of the hotel looking down at us. They used our 300 bodies to spell BIKRAM. Cool...except for the getting up early part.

They announced tonight is the same thing...posture clinic until 11 pm, then a Bikram lecture/movie. I guess I will be studying Bow Pose...or sleeping.

Week 5 done!

In this picture, Alison [teacher from west Edm. studio], Shauna, Leanne, Shirley, Amy, Sharon, Michelle, Melissa D., Lisa.

Saturday morning's yoga class was extra special because Melissa D. and Shauna were there. I cried again when I saw them standing in front of the yoga tent! And we had a kick-ass class from Misha. We gave her a standing ovation, which made her cry! There is soooo much crying around here, that you are weird if you aren't crying! haha

I went to the brunch buffet with Sunny, then the usual Trader Joe grocery shopping with Sunny and Michelle. It was close to 5:30 when we got back. We were supposed to go for sushi with Leanne, Lisa, Shauna, and Melissa D., but both Michelle and I decided we were too pooped to go out again. I studied some of Wind Removing Pose, and watched TV until 10, then crashed.

I have been fighting a cold this weekend, so have been trying to just rest, and really don't feel up to doing much of anything. I have been taking my Audra meds that she gave me and they seem to be doing the trick. Missed dinner with the girls again, but Leanne got a take-out salad for me [such a sweetheart] and they all came up to my room after dinner tonight so that was great.

Happy Birthday Brenda S.! I hope you had a great day yesterday! Hugs.

A really, REALLY Wonderful Surprise!!

So friday night after dinner, I was in my jammies, curled up in bed watching TV - what a luxury that was! At 11:30, there was a knock on my door and it was Lisa and Leanne with sad looks on their faces. I thought "oh, oh, what's wrong", and then out jumped Melissa D. and Shauna T.!!!!!!! Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God! I screamed, and then just hugged and hugged and hugged them! It was so surreal!

Melissa D. and Shauna T. are teachers from our home studio in Edmonton. Melissa D. had been mentoring Lisa, Michelle, Amy and I before we left, and Shauna is Leanne's sister. None of us had any idea they were coming. Oh boy, I am starting to cry again as I am writing this.

I texted Michelle, and told her Lisa and Leanne were in my room, and to come on down. We hid Melissa and Shauna in the bathroom. So Michelle came down. The four of us were just sitting around on the beds chatting, and Melissa and Shauna came sneaking around the corner on their hands and knees. Michelle screamed, then started crying, then we were all crying again, and hugging.

It's really hard to explain how much it means to us to have them here - it's like a lifeline has been thrown to us, that we'll be okay now, and we can make it through to the end.

Standing Series Done!

We finished the Standing Series friday afternoon! Anyone who hadn't done Tree Pose on Thursday night had to do Tree & Toe at the same time. We had a wonderful lead teacher, Norma-Jean, plus [I was so happy to see] Sunny was also one of the teachers sitting in.

My Toe Stand went well, probably the best so far. I don't know whether it was because of Sunny's smiling happy face, or the exhaustion, but I was just more relaxed and the dialogue flowed. It was a such nice feeling because I was starting to lose all confidence in myself of being able to do this!

At our 5 pm yoga class, Bikram announced we could have the night off! You could not even imagine the sound of cheering in the room, we were all soooo happy! Rumour was we were going to be watching a bollywood movie.

After yoga, Patty [from my group] and I went to the Dragon Restaurant here in the hotel. It was so nice to just relax and enjoy a hot meal and not have to be studying dialogue at the same time and then race off to be at lecture or posture clinic.