Light My Fire

Work beckoned today. This week is one of the major milestones on this project I'm working on, with a big client presentation on Friday. This means: early morning start, with a late finish. This means: NO SHALA PRACTICE TODAY.

Ah, life. It really does get in the way of my yoga practice.

But because I finished late and was taking a slow stroll back from work today, I was in a bit more of reflective mood. Almost like I was in a walking meditation.

And while I was taking time to "smell the roses" as they say (or more like enjoying the window displays at night), I came across this BEAUTIFUL candle store. It was shut already, as all the stores were, but lit on the inside.

I walk past this candle store everyday to get to work but I've never seen it before. Yeah, an ENTIRE store of only candles. Mostly long candelabra type of candles of all kinds of lengths, widths, designs and for different purposes. Imagine that.

Where's The Reset Button Again?

So I had to leave Cape Town for Amsterdam this past weekend. Work commitments for a big, tough week this week mean I'll be missing Kelly's dad's Memorial tomorrow. :(

I calculated that every single week for the past 5 weeks or so, I've been in a completely different country. OK, so I've been rotating between the 3 cities - Singapore, Cape Town and Amsterdam (and if you count my starting point as Sydney when this whole journey began, then that makes it 4 cities/ countries).

It was kind of surreal jumping back on the plane to come back here. I thought I was flying South for some reason... but I'd already done that the week before, so I was really flying North this time. And because I was so disoriented by the time I rocked up to my '80s Beige Heaven apartment in Amsterdam, I decided to roll out my yoga mat after unpacking.

I was convinced I could do a full Primary practice (after a 12-hour flight, without having practiced at all the previous week, except for the short practice I'd had in the Schipol Airport Meditation Centre the week before). HAHAHA. I got up to Paschimottanasana, and that was it. It felt like I needed more backbends and forward bends after that, so that's what I did.

And the tears came. I think I was just relieved to finally be on my mat again. Or maybe I was just relieved that I could finally be in one place for a longer period than a few days or for more than even one week. Or maybe it was grief at Kelly's dad's passing. Or maybe it was finally letting go of everything in the past month or so that had made its way at me, fast and furiously.

Interestingly, even though I got up to Paschimottanasana "only", it was a really good practice. Ha! Take that, EGO.

Yesterday, I went to check out the only shala in town that has early morning Mysore ONCE A WEEK. While I might have bitched and moaned about it before, now I am grateful that there's at least this one place. Coincidentally, the teacher who takes this morning Mysore class was also there yesterday evening, and we had a nice chat. I like her. She only teaches this one morning class, so I dunno why she was there yesterday evening. Maybe to tell me that I should get my bum outta bed tomorrow and get to her class before work. :)

I'm excited coz the space looks really beautiful. This is it, taken from their website:


Inspired by this, I got outta bed early this morning and finally practiced the full Primary series in my living room. Self practice is hard. I got up a few times to blow my nose, but that was the only physical distraction. The mental chatter was pretty loud initially, but that also died down towards the end.

Every single dropback had a bonk-on-the-head landing, and I could only stand up properly from backbends ONCE out of all 3 attempts. Wow. I wonder how long it'll be before I get them back to how they used to be.

I think for the rest of this week I'll keep practising the Primary series (at the shala tomorrow, then in my living room for all the other days), and I'll get back to the Intermediate series from Sunday.

There, I think I've just worked out some kind of self-practice plan. Dammit. Self-practice is hard.

Sunset Drive

One of the things Kelly's dad loved doing was driving around the Cape with the car roof down. So we took a sunset drive the other day with the roof of the car down in his memory.

Cape Town is stunningly beautiful.

Thank You!

I just wanted to thank EVERYONE for being so sweet and kind. Thank you for all your emails, comments on the last few posts, and also thank you for all who have sent messages via Twitter (condolences and birthday wishes alike). I have shared them all with Kelly, and he is also very touched. Friends and virtual strangers alike have shown such incredible love and support. Thank you.

It's interesting reading through the various comments... Maybe I should have mentioned that to me, birthdays aren't a big deal. I've never made a big fuss about them... maybe coz I don't like being reminded I'm growing older. HAHA! I'd already had a nice dinner with my own family in Singapore, so I honestly expected to be back in Amsterdam at work, on my own on my birthday and hadn't thought anything much to it. So although it was under really unfortunate circumstances, it was nice to have spent the day with my other family in Cape Town.

Kelly had organized an impromptu lunch with our friends for me, and we spent the evening with his mum who had also flown back from Auckland to be with the family during this time.

I couldn't have asked for a for a warmer birthday, surrounded by friends and family.

Here's a beautiful African sunset to share. These photos have not been enhanced, this is the actual colour.

... ... ...

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.

Not Good News From This Side

So I've just got my visa and was ready to head back to Amsterdam.

But I've had news that Kelly's dad has just passed away.

So I am now trying to re-route my flight out back to Cape Town.

:(