Well, I've done it! Completed my 200 hour Yoga Teacher Training and can now apply for my RYT 200 certification. It was a great experience albeit a bit controlling at times. I learned a tremendous amount and do feel ready to teach yoga although it is good to know that it involves a lot to be a good yoga teacher.
Another post without pics as the wireless connection here in Siem Reap doesn't seem able to handle the bandwidth.
http://picasaweb.google.com/hellokittyinlondon/Angkor#
The location of our training was a huge complex (Tao Garden) and rather remote. My room was completely austere and plain though functional. Bare white walls, a wardrobe, a bed, and a desk. The gardens and grounds were exceptional and the daily birgsong and gecko chirping was pretty amazing. The personal space was not luxurious but the complex was quite nice. The room was, at first, quite a shock from the lovely Dreamcatchers B&B with the personal items and antiques all over the house. In the end, the simple room at TG worked fine for the purposes of my stay which clearly was not for luxury.
My hatha yoga poses are very strong and I've learned many new tips that I use in my personal practice and will use in teaching some day. The sections of the course on yoga philosophy and history, taught by a UC Berkley professor, were particularly engaging. Somehow through all these years of yoga, I had not learned much on the history of yoga as a life practice, not just hatha yoga or asanas.
We also had a guest teacher for anatomy. A craniosacral therapist from LA with a sideline in sexology. Only from LA...right? She was incredibly knowledgeable with quite a unique angle on the links of the esoteric and physical aspects of deep yoga practice.
Our main teachers were very knowledgeable and led great classes every day. We were assisted with work in asanas (poses), pranayama (breathing), meditation, and self practice. I am quite fortunate that I have had a very strong self practice for awhile now but the help I received in that area was quite valuable.
Being marooned at a remote setting, seeing the same people day after day for a month, and eating the same food is a unique part the setup that I found quite restrictive towards the end. Thank goodness I had the sense to get a private room. I honestly don't think I could have survived the entire month otherwise. The people were great, mind you, but I have been living alone for a long time now and I have no desire to share a small room with someone I have never met...for a month. I loved having my own room especially for the silence requirement from 10 p.m. to 10 a.m. which meant completing the morning practice and breakfast in silence.
The last day felt like a whole new kind of freedom. I decided to leave Chiang Mai and head to Siem Reap (Cambodia) where I am spending my last day today. I actually needed about 3 days of decompression from the YTT experience and Siem Reap and Angkor have been the perfect place for that.
Fast forward to the fab Viroth's Hotel in Siem Reap. Siem Reap has clearly been living the tourist mania for years now and it shows. Walking down the street yields constant calls of "tuk tuk madam?" and many other attempts to get you to buy something. Thankfully, the amazing sites of Angkor make it all worth while. I spent the entire day seeing the ruins on Monday and it is spectacular. Known as the largest religious ruins in the world and the only ones visible from space, the complex goes on and on. I had a tuk tuk driver to take me around and arrived at Angkor Wat (the main temple) just before sunrise. The clouds at the horizon obscured a spectacular sunrise show but the temples did not disappoint. Much of Angkor has not been excavated and/or preserved and much of that work is going on now. I found myself particularly fascinated with the relief stone carvings which represent many Hindu gods. The additions of the Buddha images came later as the temples were originally dedicated to Hindu gods (11th century), then Vishnu, and finally Buddha (13th century) which required the conversion of many Cambodians to Theravada Buddhism.
Yesterday I had an amazing 3 hour treatment with scrub, wrap, and massage to ease my aching legs from hours of temple hiking. The coffee and cocoa scrub was particularly good and my skin is soft and smooth. I think perhaps a job as a spa reviewer would be good. I've become quite a massage connoisseur over the past couple years. From overpriced London massages in lovely settings by eastern European child like women with no hand strength to unusually large Thai women in Malaysia hell bent on showing you how they can cause severe pain in a single move of their elbow and EVERYTHING in between. In my opinion, the best massages and treatments are those where the therapist is skilled at sensing and treating those areas of your body that need it. I could go on and on but will leave it at the Frangipani spa in Siem Reap is lovely and is right up there with some of my favourites.
I am going to try to see one more part of the Angkor temples today, a remote area known for its pink stone bas reliefs. I am back to Thailand tomorrow where I will have a couple days on the beach before I join up with my CELTA training on Sunday afternoon. I do expect this next month of in depth English language teacher training to be quite intense but fun and exciting as well.
Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.__Mark Twain
