Yoga at Sacred Heart Girls College. Hamilton

Since the beginning of this term I've been teaching yoga to the Year 11 girls at Sacred Heart here in Hamilton East. I get to do this because it fits in well with their PE progamme where they look at managing stress and alternative wellness practices. And I also get to be there because this progressive and forward thinking Christian Catholic school is broad minded about the girls education giving them a wide exposure to many things - awesome. Eilleen Stobie heads the Year 11 PE department and she manages to install me into their school week teaching 12 classes per week for about a month.

My objective is to give the girls a snap shot of yoga. I give them a vocabularly of movement, breath work, rest, contemplation, meditation and sound (we 'OM'). The 'contemplation' part is getting them to watch themselves - or asking them to stop a while to enquire how they feel after an asana, to watch what they're thinking. Relating this to stress I hoped they could see that sometimes all they needed was to stop and to listen and to take a long breath out...as well as to touch their toes regularly....

The asana based work was your basic repertoire of dog, cat, snake, tree, mountain, triangle all good earthy/animal stuff and plenty of other stretches, twists, balances and extensions. Hamstrings tight or what? Poor things! Lots of forward bends and plenty of time in the Childs pose. They mostly do all of this with good humour (hysterics sometimes) especially taking on regular rounds of sun salutes as best they could - kind of. Have you ever tried to bestow the virtue of disciplined physical hardship to a bunch of fun loving 15 year olds? Tough. If you fun-loving 15 year olds are reading this and I hope you are, you did well, real well. You were fantasic. And I'm proud of you.

I would say though the thing they loved must was truely resting and doing such things as sending positive affirmations to friends, sitting cross legged hands respectfully in prayer position and earnestly expressing 'Namaste'. I loved their listening and questions about the philosophy and meanings beyind yoga. When they have so many things that hall their attention away from themselves, that they could learn to listen to their own bodies wisdom and the sense of peace and quiet they can acheive by meditating and feeling gratitude for simple things, is the best thing.

So anyway you girls who are reading this, this is for you.... If you would like to continue on with a yoga practice of your own, I'd like to announce a weekly one hour class in the church hall I use for yoga in Hamilton East. Look at the days and times available and name your preference:

Tuesday 3:30 - 4:30
Wednesday 3:30 - 4:30
Friday 3:15 - 4:15

Cost options: $7 per class. $25 for 4 weeks. $40 for 8 weeks.

Please email me back: katie@sunsalute.co.nz or text me 021 1207 131 with your day preferences. Once I have responses we'll choose the most popular option, I'll contact you all and we'll get started.

NAMASTE
Katie

Carrot Salad with Thai seasoning

This is a salad we had for lunch one day at the Tahere Retreat after the boys had dutifully peeled and grated a whole sack of carrots. It's crunchy, colourful and very tasty with those great sour thai flavours mingling beautifully with the sweet carrot. I found it rifling through Stephanie Alexanders book The Cooks Companian (which I often do) and I'll give you the recipe exactly as it appears there. From memory though I didn't put chilli in, used plenty of both lemon and lime juice and had no lemon grass to use, and I was probably very liberal with the ginger (take the time to chop fresh ginger up nice and finely) which I think worked really well. For Brenda x

2 cups finely grated carrot
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 fresh chilli, seeded and finely chopped
3 cm piece ginger, finely chopped
1 tsp brown sugar
1 stalk lemongrass
juice of 3 limes or 1 lemon
2 tsp fish sauce
2 tbsp freshly torn coriander leaves and finely chopped stems
2 tbsp roughly chopped raw peanuts

Mix ingredients well and leave to marinate for several hours in the refrigerator. This salad is excellent as a bed for yabbies or bbq prawns and can also be part of a series of salads. Serve at room temperature.

Woof! It's food.

For the past 2 weeks I've been cooking at the beautiful Tahere Retreat in Raglan for their yearly 3 week meditation gathering. What a lot of food! Soups, salads, fresh bread, curries, corn and crumbles... And while we are all tired in the kitchen from heat and long 10 hour days, we are buoyed by the loveliness of everyone there, their appreciative manner and beaming smiles....we can't ask for more. If you're reading this and looking for some of the recipes from the retreat, either scroll down or tap on 'Recipe' label below and it'll bring up any recipes I've posted, just a few; Dahl, Quinoa Salad etc or email me for specific ones and I'll put them up promptly. katie@sunsalute.co.nz

Just a reminder Sunsalute yoga classes start up again very soon. Stay tuned for the timetable to be posted here. Until then......daily rounds of sunsalutes and also take time to sit quietly and peacefully... Namaste.

5 day Early Morning Ashtanga Yoga Intensive.

Starting your day with the discipline and grace that Ashtanga Yoga offers could be a fine way to stay connected and balanced as it just gets busier on the streets at this time of year.

Email me katie@sunsalute.co.nz if you have questions or would like to attend. It's wonderful to have some people respond with enthusiasm already. Well done! Here are the details:

Monday 23 to Saturday 28 November
Monday - Thursday (6am) at the Church Hall in Hamilton East, Friday day off and Saturday (8am) at Peter's studio on Albert St.
The classes will be in the Ashtanga Vinyasa style, a mix of talked-thru and Mysore style.
Beginners welcome.
Registration for this intensive is essential. Cost: $50 or $15 per class (a minimum of 2 - to be specified).
Either email me katie@sunsalute.co.nz or phone 021 1207 131

Once registered an email will be sent out to all those attending giving details and how best to handle such a challenge, advice on rest and diet etc.

Kausthub Desikachar in Wellington

Here I am now in Wellington. It's windy and yes rainy. Kinda perfect for a weekend indoors study. The few times the sun has shone, it's been stunning as Welly can be. The light gets that dreamy Mediterranean feel. True. (In a rugged and nuggety kiwi coastal kind of way). I'm lucky enough to be staying with friends in Lyall Bay, home to the iconic though fire gutted Maranui Cafe. The cafe is dead, long live the cafe. I hope they restore it to its previous charm. Anyway, heartfelt thanks Fremily. Wish you were here, Ahi and me.

For the past two days myself and about 50 others have sat enraptured by Yoga Teacher Kausthub Desikachar of Chennai as he has guided us through the 2nd chapter of Patangali's Yoga Sutra's - the ancient, authorative text on yoga. Kausthub is the son of esteemed Yoga Teacher T.K Desikachar and Grandson of the great yoga master Krishnamacharya who taught many of our yoga masters such as BKS Iyengar and the late Sri K Patabois Jois. So his lineage is watertight. But he is his own man, and happy to sit with that, which is admirable, he has a lightness and self-reliant air about him that you can't help but like. And he is one clever mind, clearly. He streams effortlessly through what he wants to impart to us with clarity and intelligence and a certain effervescence - he is quick to laugh and joke! The number of times his expressive cheeks punch out with a smirk or giggle to himself before he talks or instructs us is uncountable! But we're privy to most of it, he readily shares his amusement, much to our delight - and relief - the sutras can be heavy going.

The sutras are structured in sentences grouped into short stanzas like a poem. But they are hardly poetic as such, more strict instructions, stern almost. And they offer the most rich teachings. How not only to live well, fully aware of ourselves, that is identifying with our true self, not our many identities and patterns and foibles but also how to lead a spiritual life, free of fear. I'll attempt to go on....They state amongst other things, our negative behavioural patterns and resistance to change can cause suffering, bias and deeply rooted patterns which manifest negatively on all levels; the body, the breath, personality, intellect and emotions. And that we must constantly, continuously work on these things! We have to work at these patterns through becoming 'awake' or 'aware' of our negative (and positive) actions through self-reflection and self study, meditation (yoga, in other words) not only as an exercise aside from daily interactions but in every moment. We should strive to have this awareness and mindfulness - always, and that the more we achieve this the more (happily) we will 'see'. See what? See ourselves. The sutras or sentences that Patanjali has written give all the answers to the questions that each previous sutra poses. So we're told, and so it seems as we trawl our way through. But - it's all good in theory. Practice! There it is again, that word. It's mind boggling really, how such an ancient (3000 years old) text can be so utterly relevant and complete.

But - strangely, amazingly if you count up the sutras in even numbers skipping every 4th one in the first chapter - they give Patanjali's phone number. ? Now wait a minute Kausthub.

Visit www.kausthub.com for more information on him and to see some lovely photography (his 'second love').

Namaste. More soon.

Hamiltonian Yogis unite.

Now here's what hard working Ashtangis look like after a class, absolutely gorgeous. It wasn't long after our collective fundraiser class for our dear Meg Casley: http://megcasley.blogspot.com/
We raised NZ$315 for Meg. Thank you again to all those yogis who gave. Thank you.

Also! Big ups to KEITH for making us his delicious dahl last Tuesday night. As we started our sunsalutes out wafted from the kitchen spices and herbs and stock so delicous. Boy were those focussed vinyasas. We sung for our supper! Thanks Keith, a very elegant and nutritious soup and what a sterling idea. Lets do it again.

Tales of Peter Sanson.

Peter Sanson gave a 3 day workshop in Taupo weekend of September 26th, which Alan and I were lucky enough to attend. It was held at Taupo Yoga http://www.taupoyoga.co.nz/index.html Fiona Links' studio on Heuheu Street. It’s a nice little place, tucked away upstairs above some shops in the middle of town. Kind of feels to me like a little European artists pad, a warren of rooms and hallways, backdrop of the Alps through the windows. That is the mighty Tongariro National Park snowy and proud at the other end of the lake, Mount Ngauruhoe utterly gorgeous. Anyway wasn’t too cold, definitely rainy and moody with bouts of sunny- sitting in outdoor/indoor flow café -sunshine. Bring it on Taupo.

Peter is such a lovely teacher; he’s also quick off the mark orchestrating the entire room (about 15 of us at a time?) at once, yet never sacrificing attention for the individual. You’re aware of him, but not in a distracting way. His presence is so keen and alert he seems to keep the whole room driving along, in one big collective sigh as we ujaii our way to the end and back. It’s a lovely class and I’m grateful to be there every time.

I’m grateful for both teachers (Peter often conducts his workshop classes with Tauranga yoga teacher, Paul Scriven http://www.ashtangatauranga.co.nz/), their styles intermingle nicely. And that’s many a sweaty and focussed hour they put in from 8am till 12pm non stop – as one practitioner ends their practice clutching mat in hand and beaming, another is ushered in by Peter, ‘send the next one in! Come in, come in!…..free breathing, free breathing. Loose that leg!’

You can goggle Peter Sanson and lots of interesting stuff comes up, as he is a highly respected and world-renowned teacher. He gives workshops all over NZ as well. Upcoming workshops are:

Waiheke Island:

http://waihekeislandashtangayoga.blogspot.com/2008/07/peter-sanson-labour-weekend-08.html

Tauranga:

http://www.taurangayoga.org.nz/events_calendar/63/