An ant marches across my mat. I balance on two hands in the crow and watch her go. Don’t land on it! That would be bad for the ant – and for my karma. I am currently practicing Jivamukti yoga under a blue sky. And Jivamuktis are staunch animal rights activists. So I keep fighting for my balance. Not easy, because my mat is on a meadow slope. In this crooked position, the asanas feel quite crooked. But for this open-air class, I’m happy to forego comfort. After all, it is not a forest and meadow teacher who teaches here, but New Yorker Dechen Thurman, brother of Hollywood star Uma Thurman. The Mallorca towel syndrome is rampant even among yogis: there were already 200 mats on the 200 level places when I came. Rush hour at the Berlin Yoga Festival. Does not matter,
It wouldn’t work without it either. According to the organizer, there are 4,999 yogis in the Kulturpark Kladow besides me. Sounds like a mass event, but feels better. Everything is peaceful and relaxed, I only have to queue in front of the dixi toilets. Three days of non-stop yoga: If you want, you can do yoga from the morning meditation at six o’clock to the moonlight class at midnight, swim in the Wannsee during the breaks and camp in the huge park.
I would not like to. I put together a relaxed program from 68 workshops, lectures and concerts by more than 50 yoga greats from Europe, the USA and India. Otherwise let me drift. Stay where it seems interesting. go when i’ve had enough That’s how everyone does it here. Like in an anthill, only colorful.
Table of Contents
Devotion or Humbug?
At the bazaar I haggle with an Indian man about the price of a ring, buy self-adhesive rhinestones for my forehead and fall in love with a Shakti shirt. Trying on is in the middle of the hustle and bustle – Laisierfaire for advanced users. I’m getting a henna tattoo on my hand. I then sit in the grass at an Indian fire ceremony, incense scented – something else is smoldering somewhere – and sing along with hundreds of Sanskrit mantras at the kirtan concert in the evening. Sipping cups of yogi tea and chatting to strangers and friends among the vegetarian food stands. Enjoy an Indian dish I can’t remember the name of. Little India in Berlin-Kladow.
But for me, the stars of the yoga festival are the people passing by. A dreadlocked blonde jingles her anklets with every step. A washboard abs Asian struts by in a cowboy hat and shirtless. Many Indians wear turbans. Everywhere people in yoga clothes, many yoga teachers, even more families and romping children of all ages. Now and then an old hippie. A big yoga family. Nowhere else do you see so many people with individual charisma – and nowhere else do you get into conversation with someone so quickly. It’s easy to chat mat to mat. A woman, here for the first time, raves about the moving atmosphere and wants to come back in 2011. Me too. For me, the festival is a small yoga cosmos, removed from the normal world.
It’s sometimes difficult to distinguish between dedication and nonsense. But spirituality and skepticism are not mutually exclusive for me: At last year’s yoga festival, I sat in a crowd with my eyes closed and listened to an Indian. He claimed that he would mentally put his hand on each of us. In addition, we should please only pay homage to his ideas from now on. Grumbling, my own body of thought objected, preferring to pay homage to the right to self-determination. The self proclaimed guru walked through the crowd, I blinked and watched as he patted a few listeners on the head. Who felt my touch? he asked afterwards. I could hardly believe my eyes: people around me raised their hands. Oops, did I miss the shortcut to enlightenment?
I prefer to feel my own body
I prefer to feel my own body. At the legendary Kundalini Gong meditation, which is said to shoot you into the universe. In the festival tent, hundreds of yogis lay mat to mat, right out onto the meadows. me in the middle. Next to me strange feet. Just an anthill. For minutes, the carpet of sound of the huge gongs has been swelling. Suddenly, a booming sound surges through my body. It whirls me around like a surf wave, takes my breath away. Full yoga buzz! The gongs fade away, I land back on earth. Strange, my legs don’t quite reach the floor. I float a little more. Good for my karma – I couldn’t hurt an ant now.
