Last Sunday 6:30 class at the main Shala with Saraswathi. Facing the end of our trip – I felt low energy during class as I thought it is over now – almost-my dream is coming to an end and now what? We have 3 more days here. I was glad to get my photo with Saraswathi….. and I
stayed for the second class with her and wrote down the counts for the poses. It is such a precise form!
Onto Rangoli class . I learned about how it’s done. I was in a yoga shop and the gal mentioned that her mom teaches how to make Rangolis. So I sat on the side walk area behind their house and I had my lesson. With chalk, she showed me how the designs start with a basic tic tac toe design. Then you expand from there.
She demonstrated the powder technique, using stone powder or rice powder ( made in her blender) . And I tried it- takes a lot of practice, to get the feeling for it . You scoop some up , holding it between your thumb and index fingers and slowly release it by pushing the thumb forward. Tricky- and holding it slightly differently, you can make a double line. She explained that a girl who is going to be married needs to be able to do this. It is one of the basic skills of womanhood! With these designs in front of your home, it shows that you keep a clean house and you follow the cultural traditions of the Indian home. Also, each day of the week, a different Hindu god is celebrated and the Rangolis reflect that with the appropriate design. At big festivals, where a procession is coming down the street, the community creates giant Rangolis that cover the entire street! And people work together making these. She said for these large designs the rice or stone powder is mixed with water to make a paste, and it sticks to the pavement better than the powder. She also said that insects, birds and chipmunks enjoy snacking on the rice powder designs. Holy cow- how fascinating- how could I have lived this long with out knowing about this- it’s mind boggling.
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Lazy afternoon packing up stuff in our hotel room – getting ready to travel East to Chennai, then to Pondicherry and on to Auraville- still figuring out the details.
Tonight we got an auto-rickshaw to the Mysore palace. It is lit up on Sunday evenings from 7:00-8:00 pm. The scale of the place is mind boggling and the crowd was huge.
Hope my New York and New Jersey friends have enjoyed the cozy snow fall. Love to all of You!
Namaste, Annie