Wednesday 8 July 2009

Ayurvedics and Indian Idols

Well, what can I say? I have been in India for nearly a week and have been exposed to so many different kinds of food, dance, music . . . life! I won't bore you all with all the experiences I have had but I will tell you briefly about our first 'Kerala Special' Ayurvedic massage experience.

So, you walk into a room where your clothes are taken off your body immediately. Yes! All of them . . and your private parts are covered with a sort of tissue nappy. Very sexy. Oil is then poured all over you and you are then massaged into heaven for the next 45 mins. Anhil, my masseuse, noticed that I had tension in my back and thighs, so he focused on these areas, apparently not caring whether or not this meant he had to keep touching my private parts. With a considerable amount of force, I might add.

You are then steamed and medically examined. The examination consists of "Was that OK?" from the 'doctor' (bloke that just walks in the room) and it doesn't really matter if you reply or not because he doesn't stick around for it! Instead, Anhil just stood in front of my medieval steam box and smiled / stared right into my eyes for the full 10 mins I was in there. Very sweet of him but . . . slightly weird.

You are then washed and dried EVERYWHERE and various bits of dust and 'other strong smelling stuff' are placed on various points on your body. Job done. I'm a new man!

Anyway, back to the important stuff. Olivia and I have just about settled into our daily routine which consists of yoga at 7 in the morning followed by a swim (where they make me wear speedos, as apparently swim shorts don't count) and then lunch. After a brief snooze we then head to the school to teach from 3:30-8:00.

I leave the classroom 45 mins early to go back to our flat to give individual vocal training to 5 of their students, one each day of the week. Expecting a young student to walk through the door, I received a shock. I was greeted by a man in his 40's who was already an established singer. AAH! OK . . . Here we go. The lesson was successful as even though his voice was beautiful he didn't know how to support so I showed him a few things. What I didn't notice was that the lesson was being watched by a man called 'Alfonso'. After talking to Alfonso and exchanging pleasantries I was told that he was probably India's most famous male singer. He then asked ME for singing lessons . . . . Even more AAH! I agreed, only on the condition that he would teach me Indian singing, which he did.

After an exhausting day we sat down to relax and chat to Simi about the day. She says, fairly off-hand, "Oh, by the way, tomorrow you'll me teaching Amritha" I felt I should have known the person. "You know . . . the Indian Idol Winner". [Big smile] Here we go again . . .

Neil x

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