OPERATION MOM, DAY 12
That yoga could be considered a spectator sport was beyond the realms of my imagination. Until now, that is. But then there is wisdom in that old cliché: every day is a new experience.
Deepali and I arrived at the National Sports Club of India complex to find ourselves witness to what appeared to be a rehearsal for the Olympic Games of yoga. The centre of the stadium was abuzz with practitioners of every kind keenly analysing twists, turns, mulas and bandhas. The contestants were lined up on one side, awaiting their turn to demonstrate their yoga skills to a line-up of lungi-clad judges equipped with handheld slates and chalk.
Deepali wriggled her way to the front row so we could get a prime view of all the goings-on. I followed dumbly, knowing that she would find us the best seats possible. She did, in the second row.
As we settled down with some chilli-flavoured popcorn, a girl was getting into position on the participants’ yoga mat centrestage. Her long, black hair tied into a ponytail and a massive tikka adorning her forehead, she was dressed in a neon green leotard and shocking pink yoga pants and looked like some kind of model–actress who had walked off the sets of a yogic Bollywood movie, if there is such a thing, that is.
‘Imphali or Nepali?’ Deepali whispered to me, noting her features.
I shrugged. She could be either.
‘Yaar, do you know anything?’ Deepali was laughing. ‘She’s neither.’
‘And how do you know that?’
‘Take a look at that outfit. It’s so firang.’
What did that have to do with anything? Firang yoga apparel was very much in vogue among Mumbai’s die-hard yogis.
‘Ya, but who’s going to wear a foreign outfit and stick a chamkeela tikka on their head? Only a foreigner would be that ridiculous.’
Yes, the tikka was a ridiculous accessory for a competition that entailed twisting yourself into ridiculous poses. As I processed the thought, the compere made an announcement: ‘Next up, from Hong Kong, Chan-shing Tai, Wendy.’
Hong Kong! Asia’s world city. So fast-paced that its inhabitants didn’t even have the patience to let the next person finish their sentence. How does a place like that breed yogis?
Over the next fifteen minutes, Ms Chan proceeded to flex herself into the most unimaginable poses. She stuck one leg behind her ear like Dr Yuva had in the online photo, and then bent down to prostrate herself to the line-up of judges. Then she positioned herself into a headstand; but no sooner had she lifted her legs, she folded them into a lotus position and lowered her thighs onto her elbows into something called the crow. Deepali and I looked on in awe as the audience cheered Ms Chan’s amazing yogic gymnastics and the judges scribbled marks on their handheld slates.
‘How do they do that stuff?’ I asked, staring at her without blinking my eyes.
‘I have no idea. But one thing is for sure. This dame should be in Rio de Janeiro 2016.’ Deepali’s eyes seemed ready to pop out of their sockets.
‘Yoga is not an Olympic sport,’ I insisted.
‘It should be,’ Deepali responded, chomping down her popcorn ferociously.
‘In fact it isn’t a sport, period,’ I said, still in denial of these championships.
‘Do you think she knows Dr Mirno?’ Deepali said, her eyes fixed on the chamkeela tikka.
‘Deepali, how does your mind work?’
But she didn’t answer. By now, Deepali was too spellbound to even respond.
I have to admit that I too was enthralled by Ms Chan’s yogic acrobatics. It was as if we’d got a free opportunity to see a Cirque du Soleil rehearsal. One by one, in relatively rapid succession, we got to see the antics of Master Rajeev from Pune, Miss Nidhi from Mumbai, Swami Ramanathan from Kozikode and Pundit Krishan from Jalandhar.
But it was the next round that really knocked my socks off: Yogic wisdom. It was an oral exam in which contestants were required to demonstrate their knowledge of yogic philosophy. Dr Yuva was the chief examiner and had relinquished his dhoti in favour of white track pants and a Nike shirt that was so tight-fitting that he looked like some sort of a massivechested, Popeye-just-ate-spinach-armed superhero. Hardly yogic. I couldn’t take my eyes off his overly attractive form. Is this what they meant by tall, dark and handsome?
Deepali nudged me. ‘Stop ogling. He’s your mother’s age,’ she chided.
Somehow, I couldn’t picture the two of them together. Mom may be able to provide long discourses on Twitter, but her know-how of yoga was nowhere compared to this.
Dr Yuva, was clearly an authority on his subject and walked up and down the line of contestants, prodding each of them to spout their philosophical sapience.
‘How does the yogic body breathe?’ He asked, directing his gaze at Ms Nidhi.
Questions on basic anatomy? Was he for real? But Ms Nidhi’s answer left me dumbfounded.
‘We breathe through the nine openings,’ she responded.
‘Absolutely correct,’ Dr Yuva announced.
This was followed by a flurry of clapping by the audience.
‘There are nine openings in the body and oxygen is taken in by each of them. Put your hands together, please, for Ms Nidhi from Mumbai.’
Deepali and I turned to each other in disbelief. He didn’t just say that, did he? That there were nine openings in the body?
‘The guy doesn’t know how to count,’ Deepali whispered. Then her brow furrowed. ‘Wait, does he consider the nostrils to be one hole divided into two rather than two separate holes?’
I was grappling with the answer too. ‘Does the belly button count as an opening?’
‘Nah, not unless yoga is okay with clogged holes,’ came the reply. ‘But seriously,’ Deepali continued, ‘was he talking about men or women? Because, you know, that there is a difference—’
‘Deepali, let’s not go there, please!’
A rustle of chatter had spread through the stadium. The others in the audience must have been equally confused about the nine holes. Dr Yuva silenced them with an unexpected announcement: ‘For the next thirty minutes, we’d like to invite audience members to come and participate in a workshop. We will take you through a series of basic asanas that will make a difference to your daily life. Will those who wish to volunteer please assemble at the centre?’
Deepali turned to me with a mischievous grin. I knew exactly what she was thinking.
‘No way,’ I said before she could ask. ‘There’s no way in hell I am going to embarrass myself in front of all these people.’
She looked at me with puppy dog eyes. ‘Come on Ilz, don’t be a wimp.’
I tried to brush her off. ‘You and I are not exactly the putting-leg-behind-the-head variety.’
‘Don’t be such a drip,’ she said indignantly. ‘It’s not like they are going to make us do that kind of stuff. He said basic asanas.’
‘What do I need to learn basic asanas for?’
‘To impress people.’
‘Which people?’
‘Boys.’
Sometimes even Deepali’s knowledge of the male gender is dubious. Boys like watching cricket and football, not yoga shows. But Deepali was not about to give in.
‘Did you see how hot that Chan chick from Hong Kong looked? What all she could do?’
I reminded her that Ms Chan’s asana display was far from basic.
‘Okay, sit here and sulk by yourself then.’ She stood up, tossed her hair behind her shoulders and stuck out her boobs defiantly. ‘I came here for yoga and I’ll be damned if I leave without getting some.’
Deepali made her way through the aisle and marched down with the confidence of a statesman about to give a speech. I sighed, set down my popcorn and got up to join her and about thirty others who were getting ready to participate.
I began to panic the moment Dr Yuva began to bark out instructions. ‘Revisit your ocean breath,’ he said.
Revisit? How could I possibly revisit something I hadn’t visited in the first place?
‘Shut thighs tight,’ his voice boomed into my ear.
Shoot, he was standing right next to me.
‘Shut thighs tight,’ he repeated for my benefit.
Okay, Mr Yogic Wisdom, just how tight does one have to shut their thighs here? It wasn’t until I sneaked a glance at the others that I realized he was actually asking everybody to shut their eyes tight.
‘Bring awareness inward. Slowly assume mountain pose.’
Do not panic. Do not panic. Do not panic, I said to myself. Repeat aloud if necessary. No, don’t!
The butterflies in my tummy subsided when he moved away to instruct others in postures to improve digestion.
‘Poor digestion is the root of all sickness,’ he said. ‘Even if you don’t do anything else, you must spend five minutes every day focusing on how to clean up the digestive system.’
This was sure to benefit Mom who had issues with gas.
‘We fill our day with unnecessary worry,’ Dr Yuva said. ‘Empty your mind. Get rid of all useless thoughts.’
Does that mean getting rid of all thoughts or just the ones that are totally and utterly, i.e., 100 per cent useless? Which of the following would qualify as thoughts worthy of being chucked: ‘Is my mother’s dating life really worth all this trouble?’ or ‘Can she get rid of her gas problems?’ or ‘I wonder if Ali Zafar does yoga – I should find out,’ or ‘What would Dev think if he knew that the online profile he created for Venus has led to this?’ As I recognized the familiar flutter, I knew that the last thought wasn’t about to be tossed out in a hurry.
After taking us through a series of twists that apparently wring the toxins out of your colon in the same way that water is wrung out of a wet kitchen cloth, he got down to the nittygritty of the gas issue with something called the pavanmukta asana, the wind free posture. All this time, he had been strolling among the volunteers, stopping to adjust people’s postures as and when necessary. As if by divine intervention, Dr Yuva arrived by my side just as I struggled to get into the foetal balance that would free my wind.
‘More important than anything is to release the useless air that is old, that has been trapped inside your colon for a long, long time,’ his voice echoed in my ear.
First useless thoughts. Now useless air.
As we settled into shavasana, the last posture in the series, Dr Yuva tried to remind the participants about the philosophy behind physical practice.
‘It is these basic elements of yoga that sometimes lead people to ponder the meaning of life,’ he said, wandering over to the next person down the line.
I craned my neck to see how Deepali was doing on pondering the meaning of life and found her staring up at the sky with a blissful, yoga-drunk expression, the kind she has when she has a good manicure at Silloo’s. I returned to my shavasana and smiled to myself.
And in this state, I made a few mental notes to self: