It’s a Bikram post today!

So this weekend past has been pretty indulgent booze-wise, celebrating the Christening of my beautiful niece L, even yesterday I think that my molecular structure hadn’t altered from equal parts Hendricks Gin and Sauvignon Blanc. Throw in seriously dehydrating journeys to and from Birmingham, three late nights and the delusion that I would be fine in the hot room and what happens? Well, read on....

I lay down for my 10 minute snooze/acclimatisation before class and did a massive hypnic jerk awake just as the lights came on, nearly clouting the poor bloke next to me. The first step of the class is Pranayama Breathing. ‘Prana’ means breath and ‘yama’ means master, so you are becoming the master of your breath. When you breathe in the hot room, it’s almost always through the nose. During the exercise, you stand, your palms are interlocked under your chin, elbows together, heels and toes together with your quadriceps engaged, tummy sucked in hips forward and back straight with your weight in your heels. When you inhale, you do so deeply, lifting your elbows out and up to frame your face. When you exhale, you force every last drop of air out of your lungs dropping your head back and stretching your optic nerve to look (eventually) at the back wall whilst moving the elbows down into their original position. How well you do this, indicates how well the rest of the class is going to go, and what I have described is what happens in an ideal world.

However, in my world, I arranged myself into some semblance of Pranayama and wobbled and chuntered and wheezed my way through the first set, noting with horror that aside from the usual bikram funk, my sweat had a definite toxic tang of gin. With the hope that the second set might be a great improvement came the realisation that despite the three litres of water I drank during the day, and the healthy lunch, the weekends excesses were coming back to haunt me and there was nothing I could do except sweat it out.

The first three poses were slightly laboured but they didn’t make me want to do a fairly accurate representation of that bit in The Exorcist where Reagan’s head spins round and she voms everywhere. I thought this was an indicator that I could push myself a bit more so when I got to ‘standing separate leg head to knee’ otherwise known as Dandayaman-Bibhaktapada- Janushirasana, and was rewarded with one of those burps that deposits a little acidic present in your mouth.

From there on in, it only got worse. Every time I attempted a Bikram sit-up or Situpsana as it is commonly known, my head spun and I had to hold onto my yoga mat for dear life whilst inwardly chanting “Please don’t puke, please don’t puke”, my head pounded with a ferocious headache and my sweat, thick and syrupy with toxins, tickled and irritated as it trickled slowly down off me and formed a squidgy pool on my towel that made flatulent sounding protests every time I moved.

By the time we got to Savasana which translates to dead body pose – a state of total relaxation, I was convinced that my mat had taken flight with me on it and not in a ‘ooooh, I’m having an out of body experience’ way, it was more of a ‘why have we left terra firma to execute loop a loops? I’m about to barf and cry’ way.

Anyway, if you are thinking of starting to practice Bikram yoga, please don’t let this put you off – just don’t be a moron (like me) and expect to feel awesome after a weekend of late nights and booze. Hopefully you will learn from this epimyth. Even if I do not (wedding next weekend).

R x

If you are here, it may possibly be because you hate commuting as much as I do....

and probably live and/or work in London. Or you are stalking Bikram blogs (as I do).

Moving from a small town in Kent where the only affordable travel option was the relative luxury of coach travel, to the far away land of Zone 6 of the London Underground (Blunderground) I find the tube as exasperating as it is convenient (although sometimes, it’s not even that).

And onto why I have decided to blog; well, firstly, my other half (we’ll call him E, for that is (sort of) his name) thinks I need a creative outlet (place to vent) from being an office drone other than bawling drunkenly into a karaoke mic. And because I think, I *know* that there are others like me out there; the ones who scoff at the idiot tourists who do not hold on to the thoughtfully provided handrail. Those whose blood boils at the lack of personal hygiene. Those who oft wonder: why is that seat wet?

Well, I am here to share my tales, commiserate with you about slipping over in the cold sick of an office manager named Dave and maybe form some sort of TFL Curmudgeon Club.

So without further ado:

THE DRUNK

So one morning, E and I got on at our usual stop and found ourselves sitting opposite a man who appeared to be fast asleep reclining across four of the six seats, until the doors shut and the aroma of stale vodka and bizarrely sugar puffs, started to make my eyes water.

As our train passed though each zone, the train started to fill with commuters, one game girl decided to sit at the head of the snoring gentleman: schoolgirl error. In response to this move, the man proceeded to rest his head on the lap of this poor woman, much to my delight and her horror.

By the time we reached zone two, the emergency alarm was pulled and two station attendants had come to wake and eject the drunk man from the train and normalcy was restored...Or so we thought.

A corpulent gentleman in a pinstripe suit sat and unfolded his broadsheet (We’ll get to those duvet sized papers people insist on reading in another post), started to read and then sprang up with the speed of a champion pole-vaulter. Thinking that this was her lucky day, a lady wearing extremely high heels immediately moved to take his place only to hear the rounded one utter “I wouldn’t sit there if I were you; it’s wet”.

The entire carriage groaned their choral disgust, and more than one person probably went to work that day with a drunk mans rheumy, vodka tainted wee permeating the seat of their pants. So, commuters beware the wet seat, it may not be a leaky window.

A GENERAL RANT ABOUT EATING ON THE TUBE

There are a number of highly offensive things I have observed, not to mention smelled people eating on the tube. But my personal favourites are as follows:

Cool Doritos – Does anyone else think these smell a bit like vomit? A very hungry lady whom I was lucky enough to be sitting next too opened a family bag of these and managed to destroy most of the bag between Bank and Mile end. She liked to share though and do you know how she did this? By showering me with crumbs. Lovely.

Pate – Though not on the Blunderground, the DLR is still part of TFL’s conspiracy to MAKE SANE PEOPLE CRAZY and this is where I bore witness to the sight of a woman (Ladies, why?) tearing chunks of a baguette and dipping them into a slab of stinking, barf inducing duck liver pate.

Burrito – Don’t worry ladies, this time it was a man committing the cardinal sin of making every other person on the carriage breathe through their mouth. Burrito man spilled guacamole on my coat. I fantasised about killing him and making it look like an accident.

Here’s a list of other things I have smelled people eating on the tube: miso soup, donner kebab, something with pesto and my personal favourite and least offensive the humble jacket potato.

Anyway, I shall leave you with some food for thought (ho ho ho):

“In 2000, University College London’s Department of Forensics removed an entire row of tube seats from a Central Line train, in order to subject it to a series of rigorous tests.

The results? …

These scientists discovered hairs from humans, dogs, rats and mice, in addition to seven different types of insect… fleas amongst them, and most of them alive. There were traces of vomit from at least nine different people, in addition to the urine of four different people, both human and rat excrement and traces of human semen on the seats.

Inside the seats themselves they discovered the festering remains of six mice, two rats, and even a previously unheard-of fungus growing in the warm, dark and damp conditions of the underground. They found that the armrests in the London underground can be smeared with the sweat and oils of as many as 400 different people.”

Still hungry?

R x

I am generally not the athletic type

I'm more known to buy all the gear and then bask in the glow of intention until I lose interest.

So, how is it that for the last 2 months, I have religiously attended Bikram Yoga (and by this I mean willingly), contorting myself into various pretzel formations and balancing on one leg in a room heated up to +40 degrees and 30% humidity, 3-4 times a week for an hour and a half at a time?

Well, many friends and colleages have given me that raised eyebrow, pursed mouth expression which suggests that I might be out of my tiny mind.

My other half has implied that I have become a yoga bore (my reason for starting this blog, and E, I am still going to make you read this) and our flat is constantly covered in drying lycra and airing yoga mats.

Aside from being a sweaty yoga bore, I think the reason that I am obsessed with Bikram Yoga is the way it has changed my mind and my body.

There has been weight loss and toning and inch loss and I am eating what I want, but what I want to eat has changed. Gone is the stodge and the junk and I have found myself craving salad and lean meat and drinking upwards of three litres of water a day.I will be using this blog to chart my yoga journey and also as a place to vent about my other journeys, yes commuting on good old London Blunderground.

So folks, I hope you enjoy this first post, there will be more to follow and I hope you find something there that interests you.

R x