Wednesday, March 3, 2010

... ... ...

Guess what?

Today's my birthday. I am 33. On the 3rd day of the 3rd month of the year. Hmm. It's probably one of the most surreal birthdays ever. To the point where I almost forgot about it. I mean, my family in Singapore had made me a special dinner and had planned the menu with my veganism in mind which I really appreciated.

And that, was pretty much my little celebration on Sunday before I left. So I forgot today is the day until Kelly had wished me a Happy Birthday today. I guess spending all that time flying also kinda made me unsure what day it was.

I calculated that from when I left my parents' home in Singapore to when I arrived in Cape Town, it was a 30-hour journey. I had to fly 12 hours to Amsterdam, with a 2.5 hour layover there, and then another 12 hours to Cape Town. A direct flight would've just been 12 hours.

By the time I had heard the news of Kelly's dad, there was just not enough time to re-route flights in time, what with the time I had left to jump on the flight to Amsterdam (that had already been booked) to the time difference between where the travel agent and I were and partial ticket/ one-way ticket costs and blahblahblah...

So my tailbone really felt it on this journey.

What was great is I found a Meditation Centre in Amsterdam at the Schipol Airport. A beautiful, light space that had shelves with every kind of religious book that existed, and space for me to plonk down my black mat (good thing I hand-carried it). So I had a super light asana practice, with some pranayama and meditation thrown in. Check out the signboard. Kinda cool to see it in an airport.


I was next to a Muslim lady praying on her mat and another yogi who was using a prayer mat as her makeshift yoga mat. I think she was an Iyengi as she was using a little prayer stool as her makeshift prop. And I swear she was in a headstand for at least 10 minutes. Not that I was watching her. She was just in it for sooooooooo long that I noticed.

So, here I am in Cape Town. There's quite a bit going on here now as you can imagine, so I'm gonna have to jump off the internet now.

9 comments:

  1. Happy Birthday, hope the year takes a better turn for you, last month or so sounded too messed up. best wishes and all that.

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  2. Happy Birthday. With all that you've been going though of late, may your upcoming year be filled with light, peace, and love.

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  3. Happy Birthday! Hope you have a chance to celebrate, even if only to hop on the mat for an inspired practice. Namaste :-)

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  4. Happy birthday! I hope at some point you can take a day just to rest and pamper yourself, god knows you deserve it. I hope the next few days pass as smoothly as possible. Take care of yourself.

    Check that, a meditation centre - aren't the Dutch awesome?

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  5. There is a multi-faith prayer room at Changi Airport I've used where people pray and do yoga too - makes you think peace is possible in the middle east - just for a minute :)

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  6. Happy birthday, glad you had a nice meal with your family. My mums birthday today too!

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  7. THANK YOU, EVERYONE. You are all very sweet. x

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  8. oooh, I'm late! Happy Birthday!!

    Great things are in store for you, I know it.

    LOVE the meditation area at the airport. How awesome. Glad it helped you out. I would have been in headstand with Iyengar lady.

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  9. hi Skippetty
    happy belated birthday.

    whenever i pass thru Miami airport, i know where the chapel is. it's a good place to meditate.

    i like that in the one you visited you could spread the mat.

    in airports being designed for the middle east there are prayer rooms for the muslims.

    hugs
    Arturo

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