I posted my last bolg nearly 2 weeks ago and a lot of things happened since, well actually lost of things happened last Saturday! But lets just start with Wednesday 22nd of february...
Sanskrit class was hilarious. Laksmisa (the teacher) started with saying:'a lot of friends (that's how he calls his students) have made mistakes in their homework, especially Jens' (the man from Copenhagen, where I attended his mysore class when visiting my sis). That is so not a nice thing to say, but when he says such a thing, he doesn't mean it bad and he says it in such a funny way that everybody has to laugh.

I was quite tired this week, after climbing the stairs of Chamundi Hill very early in the morning on Tuesday and the long day at the monastry on Monday, so I rested a lot - just chilling out reading a book or making my homework. Later that week I went to Jayashree again with Paul and Dagmar and she invited us (and all the other students that were there) to the wedding reception of one of her cousins. She got married in Bangalore the previous week, but would also have a reception here for the people that couldn't make it to Bangalore.
Since it felt like a once-in-a-lifetime- opportunity, we decided to give it a go and on fridaynight we met up with 2 american girls and took a rickshaw to the reception, which was held in a some kind of palace - huge and really nice. The bride and groom were seated on the (big) stage and there was a whole band (indian music) playing. The music here is often way too loud: they place mic's in front of the band and speakers everywhere, but that is definitely not nessecary - maybe the Indian people are a bit deaf because of using the horn so much in traffic - I don't know, but my sensitive ears can not cope with that kind of loud sound...
Anyway, so women, dressed in beautiful sari's (I borrowed an outfit from the family - it was very green 'not easy being green'- and men in their normal clothes - for a reception, men don't really have to dress up, but women actually should look amazing - were passing by and everyone had to go up the stage to congratulate the newly weds, give them a present - if you give money, you should always give a amount like 100, 200, 300, etc roepies plus 1 roepie - have a picture made together and then leave the stage on the other side and go for food. That was actually one of the reasons to go ;) - a really nice big buffet!
The food was great and there was so much to choose from! I was a really nice evening and a very special experience.

The next morning, we (Dagmar and I ) went to Paul for beakfast and afterwards we did some yoga - just trying out stuff and learn from each other. Later that day we went for a dosa. Sundaymorning was going to be early practice, so we all had an early night. Since Paul forgot to bring his photocamera when we went to the lake last week, he wanted to go there again and we agreed, planning to go just before sunset, so we would be able too take some nice pics. But first, in the morning that Sunday, we had conference.

Sharath spoke about yoga - how the only desire of a yogi is enlightment and that yoga is what we experience within - it's supreme to our ego and it should sprout/come within us. When we continue to do our daily practice, there will be a withdrawel of the senses within and we'll realise the beauty we have in our souls.
I you want to go deeper in your spiritual practice, Sharath says, you'll have to stop doing sports/ other physical exercises - they will make your muscles stiff, while yoga loosens your muscles. You'll may be having injuries after learning new asana's, which is not a bad thing, but when doing sports as well, it will not be good. The asana's are a foundation for the spiritual practice - when doing our practice, we can realise many things and we can change our live, our thinking.

There was a question about the Uijai breath - Sharath said that Guruji didn't understand the question - his english wasn't that good - when someone asked if he had to use uijai breath during the practice and he just answered yes. But what we really want to do during out practice is to breath with sound - no shallow breathing. The way most teachers explain uijaj is exactly this though. But uijaj is according to Sharath, a very difficult pranayama (breathing) exercise with lots of kumbaka (holding your breath).
Before doing pranayama (with kumbaka), it's important to purify your nervous system. That's what you do practicing intermediate/second series - so only when you mastered these series, you should do pranayama...

'The body is controlled by the mind and the mind is controlled by the body'. If you got your breath under control, your emotions will change. When the breathing is not correct, due to something that happend outside the yogaroom or because you don't understand asana, emotions can come up - but that's okay, let them come and let them go..

The walk around the lake was very nice, as was the beautiful sunset. We had dinner at Green Leaf that night and of course dinner was really nice.

On Monday I had to extend my card with one more month. As expected, Sharath changed my times so that Friday class would be at 6 am (instead of 7.30 am) and Sunday class at 4.30 am (instead of 6 am) the other days I would start at 8am, but that changed within 2 day to 7.30 am and 7 am (shalatime) the week after.

Since Monday was Dagmar's last day, we went for dinner together at Sixth Main after my Sanskrit and Hatha Yoga Pradipika classes. When we got there, Sarah and tho of her friends - Holly and Hope - were sitting there, so we joined them. Afterwards, Dagmar treated us on ice-cream afterwards -and to make it even better: I found my favorite squash in the big supermarket that evening - Litchi! I bought my first litchi squash in Bali, nearly 3 years ago and I was so dissapointed not to be able to find it in the Netherlands, but here, I found it and it is the most amazing squash ever!

To end Dagmar's last day, we went for a chai at Amruth's café - like we always do since we met Dagmar - and as always we were sitting on the stairs in front of the drugstore, sipping our tea, watching the people passing by...

On Wednesday we were going to have out last Sanskrit level I class, but the level II started the day before. It's grammar time - not one of my favorite things, I have to admit, but so far so good. Paul and I went for a samosa after class - did I tell you about Dagmar and samosa's?? She just loves them so much that she had quite a lot of those here. Once she ate 3 samosa's in one day and from that moment on, my landlady, Bunny, calles her '3 samosa'- and went for dinner at Tina's and a chai later on.
So Wednesday Sanskrit again. The homework this time was writing the opening prayer in sankrit and during class we had to write the mangala mantra (closing prayer) in sanskrit - and I could actually do it - no mistakes.. In the evening I met Sarah, Hope and Holly for dinner at Tina's (again).

After all these Sanskrit days, we skipped the chanting on Thursday and went to the swimmingpool. It was a suny day and there were not a lot of people there - most people go there on Saturdays. So there was a lot of relaxing, reading, chatting, swimming and ping pong involved. We arrived there around 10.30 am and left at 5 pm - perfect day.

Friday we had and early practice and we went to a 'secret' breakfast place with Lauren (from our Sanskrit class) and Simon (Pauls housemate). The 'secret'place was nice, but not that amazing - it was somewhere in Laxmipurum near the town, with no foreigners around - which was nice.

I arranged a taxi for Zuzanna, who was going to arrive in Mysore the following day. I already arranged a place for her to stay - first 3 nights in a room and afterwards in a appartment, the one above the one Dagmar was staying and it was even cheaper than the place I was living - yet I WAS living...
On Saturday my landlady told me she wanted to go visit her oldest daughter who just moved to Singapore for work for 5 months. She coould only go there with her youngest daughter this month - since she would have holidays - buut because I was living there, she couldn't go - so she asked me to maybe find another place to stay... If I coulnd't find anything, it would be okay, she said, but that diddn;t sound really sincere. Ten days earlier she went to the market and fell and ever since, she's just not so happy and in pain and that didn't makke my stay there very nice. She complained a lot...
I didn't know what to say or do, but I did want to leave: I didn't want to hold them back.. So I went to see Zuzanna - we actually met up for breakfast that morning and walked around town for a bit - to discuss the matter. I asked her landlady if she had something available and she did.. So now I have a really nice room (a bit smaller and with a single bed, but for the rest just as nice and with my own bathroom) for almost half the price I paid for the other room -crazy!
What also happened that day was my computer crash.. That was really bad :( I tried and tried to fix it, but nothing worked anymore.
In the evening, after moving and having dinner with Zuza at Green Leaf, I tried to fix my computer again and again and in the end I managed! Whoehoe! So it's working again and I hope it keeps on working....

This morning very early practice - alarmclock went of at 3.15 am - seriously! The practice was really nice though, although yesterday my lower back started to hurt so much.... I really need to find a massage therapist...
I just made a nice breakfast: yoghurt, papaya, watermelon, banana and walnuts and a cup of ginger cinnamon tea - this afternoon we'll have lunch - Edwin, Paul, Zuzanna and me, but first chanting at 10am - ths sun is out and: it's the best day ever!