Arrival at the Yoga Retreat

Sightseeing in Mumbai was ok... did a lot of walking. Because it was Republic Day in India, people were just everywhere. I walked through town and just stood for a while and soaked in the Indian daily life... street vendors, traffic, cows and dogs walking in the roads, festivities etc... Then I walked up Marine Drive to Chowpatty Beach where a lot of Indian families had gone too. On the way I passed a lot of parks and sports grounds and everywhere, they were playing cricket. The beach was crowded and there were many foodstalls next to it. I was getting hungry and decided to buy something.

On the plane to Mumbai the menu was indian food and I was actually expecting a lot worse, but both meals were edible. One meal was lentil dhal with rice and potatoes and the other was eggplant and other vegetables fried in batter, like pakora (chilly bites).
The hostel breakfast was 3 slices of white bread, some jam, a banana and a hard boiled egg, which was fine... nothing to write home about here... literally :-)
Lunch I ended up having a chicken schwarma at a muslim restaurant. Dinner I finally went to an Indian restaurant, but they also served chinese food. I had Kashmiri Naan, which is Naan (thick indian bread, with a distinctive teardrop shape from being stuck to the side of the Tandoor) with a topping similar to a Pizza. I had chickoo fruit juice and also saw some other fruit on the menu I did not know. The juice was alright... looked like mud :-). After dinner I went to the fruit stalls outside (this is 23:30) and asked them about the chickoo and the other fruit called Musambi. Chickoo is about the size of a potato and is brown like mud with a skin like a kiwi. The Musambi looks like an orange but yellow and is a citrus fruit. I found out today that it is a sweet lime.

Well back to the beach where I had wandered off to. I carefully looked at what others were eating and how the food was prepared. I finally decided I was going to try one of the dishes on offer and I made sure I said not to make it hot. The cook took these two vegetable patties (prepared before hand), stuck his bare fingers in them to squish them up :-(, then put tomato and onion on top, and added two sauces on top. I was worried I was going to have to eat with my dirty fingers, but luckily he gave me a spoon. It was actually quite nice... although I did worry about the tomatoes having been washed in water... but I did not get sick.

On Saturday, after breakfast I checked out and made my way back to the train station to go to the domestic terminal of the airport. There I learned that the flight was delayed by about an hour, so I sat and read... it definitely is a regular occurence.
In Goa I got picked up by the Yoga retreat taxi and taken to Purple Valley and given my room, which I am sharing with Alan Reid from SA. He has been here 2 weeks already. (Michael Gannon is teaching here for 3 weeks and I am joining him for the last week.) He explained to me that there are different time slots that we get allocated into starting from 6:15. Every 15 minutes a different group arrives and joins the others. The ones who are more advanced start first and continue going as the later groups join in. This gives Michael the opportunity to focus on each group for 15 minutes on their specific area of need.

The retreat is like a little paradise, there are two buildings with rooms in them each with their own shower and toilet. Not extravagant at all, but very nice none the less. One of these buildings also has the kitchen with a big covered open space in front with tables and chairs made from reids, another covered open space next to it with place to sit, but these look more like beds with pillows. Below that are 3 or 4 chalets and then there is a beautiful swimming pool and deck with sturdy deck chairs made from wood and further down is the Yoga shala. I recognise the inside of the Shala from Michael Gannon's video.

The people here are wonderful and the staff are very nice who because they are also so much into the yoga, make you feel that they are guests just like you. I guess there are about 30 to 40 people here and they are so diverse and interesting.
There is Leena, the only indian girl, who used to run a yoga institute in Chennai (Madras) and is going to be running a business making yoga clothes.
There is Alice from the Netherlands who is into meditation.
There is Gloria from Spain who is a Trapeze artist.
Alan my room mate is a uni cyclist. Yes, he rides a cycle with one wheel for a living.
Sally, whom I knew from SA, is the owner of the Bikram Jozi Yoga studio in Thrupps shopping mall and Nick is her fiancee.
Michele is australian and lives in london and I think is a fashion designer.
Candice also arrived today is from California and works for a company making children's clothes.
Robert works in the film industry in Montreal, and took a break and has been the cook for the last 2,5 months here at the retreat. He's cooking skills are excellent. We are eating Indian food, but prepared for the westerner... it is not too hot :-) The food is really very good and I do not think I will be loosing any weight here!!!
That is just some of the people, but there are a few from Sweden and Norway, a few from England, a few from America, but there are very few guys. Nick and Sally are leaving on Monday, so that leaves like 5 guys.