Day 10 (Aug 30)

We started with the fire ceremony, chanting and meditation (this time with Surya Bhedan). My practice started very slowly though, I felt somewhat tired. I think it's from eating carbs in the evening (i.e., two small servings of brown rice soaked in green curry).

After practice, I had two servings of papaya, green leaves with shitake, and michelle's left over scrambled egg and pechay. I had lots of pineapple and chrysanthemum juice, too. And a cup of organic coffee. That's when we decided to go for a swim in the sea. The weather was perfect, the water warm on the surface but cool beneath. We were happily floating (I am very, very buoyant) and, like silly little yogis, did the poses in the shallow part of the water. Jump backs, jump throughs, Mayurasanas are effortless in the water. Then we decided to paddle out and pretend to catch some waves using Simone's inflatable raft.

Here I raised my tankini to tan the stretch marks on my tummy, looking at the sky also stretch marked with cirrus clouds. The macrocosm reflects the microcosm, so they say.

We paddled from the boundary of rocks and back and just let the sun, sand and sea have its merry way with us. We went back for coconuts and summer rolls (oh so deliciously made. Sitaw, lettuce, carrots, cucumber, mango and wansoy in light egg wrapper and sprinkled with black sesame seeds. It comes with this fantastic tamarind dip). Then we took a dip in the salt water pool before taking a shower and coming to our afternoon session to finish chanting the Samadhi Pada. Jayashree and Narasimha are so funny. They always argue in jest and we all get a good laugh.

We continued our talk on pramana, viparyaya, vikalpa, nidra and smrti.
On all our so-called knowledge, wrong perceptions, illusions, sleep and memory. I knew that dreams could be borne out of memory but I learned today that they can apparently ease us out of our karma. (I'll type up some notes next time...)

I write this with a happy sigh. Glorious day. Even as I am quite toasted and covered in coconut oil.

In the evening, I had a bit of salad, a bit of soup, a roll of buttered wheat bread. And five chocolate chip oatmeal cookies. Yes, five. They're not that big. Let your thumb touch your index finger. Jnana Mudra. There. Five of those. Energy locked in to keep me warm the whole night through. Let's see how I feel in the morning.

I have Jayashree singing in my head yet again...