Road To Mysore

Last Tuesday evening I was invited to John's 50th birthday celebration(from England). John arranged his a party at The 3 Sisters at around 6PM. It was a perfect place to have a party because we were in a small rectangular room sitting knee to knee on the floor. It was a nice and cozy party. There were about 20 of us. As we entered the room, John gave each one of us a neclace of flowers and placed a red kumkuma on our forehead. A lot of the women looked good all decked out in there saris. After dinner one of the 3 Sisters performed an Indian birthday ritual. They had candles, incense and were singing and dancing to John with 5 other female yoga student. I didn't understand why the Sisters insisted on have only 5 women at a time in the ritual but there was a reason for it. The party ended about 8PM which is pretty late for us yoga students. There was too much food and I particularly ate too much. You know you've eaten too much when you taste dinner again during practice the following morning. Not a good idea.

Practice the following day was pretty good. My knee is still a little sore but feels much better. Binding on Mari B on the left side is not a problem but binding on the right side is now nowhere close. I think when the soreness eases up I'll get back my range. It's like I have to take 2 steps back before I can go forward again. This practice is really testing my patience and so far I'm just rolling with the punches. It was only last week when I binded on right side and now it seem like I've never done it. I'm also starting to get my backbends back. I didn't do any on my first 2 weeks. It was always shoulderstand and then padmasana. I got my headstand back too. Doing headstands with very little hair is a strange feeling. I'm slowly getting used to it. It's like your used to the extra padding on the top of your head. My hair is growing back quite nicely though. I don't think I'm going bald again anytime soon.

Yesterday I was dummy for the Thai massage class. Kerri, Rhonda(the 2 sisters from LA), Vincent(still from LA) and Maura(from San Diego) are taking a Thai massage class with Enzo. The class started last Monday and ends this Friday. Enzo would demostrate part of the routine on me while the rest of the class would watch and then the class would work on each other while I waited. I was supposed to join this class but I decided to hold off on taking any classes after I took the ayurvedic massage class a couple of weeks ago. It was too soon and a little disappointed with the class I took.

Anyway, I partially regret not taking the class because Enzo is a really good bodyworker and he leaves for Thailand at the end of the month for 6 weeks. The moment he started working on me, I could instantly tell he had the touch. Five minutes into the demo, I knew he was good. Most of the yoga students rant & rave about Harini but I think Enzo is much better and Sashi is nowhere close. Enzo and I agree on one thing...we're not a big fan of ayurvedic massage...it's just a glorified swedish massage using excessive medicated oils.

Enzo is very instinctive. He knows where your edge is and never goes past it. I've had a lot of Thai massage before in LA(at least 12 times) and he is by far the best I've had. He knows how to connect with his client and is very passionate with his work. I knew midway through the demo, I wanted a full session with him. I scheduled one with him today at 5PM.