Okay, first off: the prospect that seemed so far off in the future, that would only happen to other students, has happened to me: first class as a teacher, coming up. Tell you what, that's one large ice cube of reality down the back of Teacher Training never-never land. Guess I'd better learn some dialogue.
A prevailing topic this weekend has been the spectrum of evaluators in the posture clinics. Some teachers are sublime, some are joyless, some are visibly bored, some are inspired, some are incredibly, almost pointlessly, picky. Which is to say that teachers are, y'know, human. There's a bulletin. But still: I had one clinic with three very different personalities (Joyless, Born Friendly, and Introverted), and although I delivered pretty tight dialogue for Cobra, Joyless lived up to her name (and what's worse, did not laugh at my joke, the bag). Born Friendly laughed and asked if he could steal it. Why, sure. Joyless went on to dismay and annoy several of my groupmates as the clinic wore on, so that by the time 4:00 p.m. chimed, the majority of students bolted from the room.
Later that night we had the first double clinic, and Born Friendly was back with us, this time with Aussie Dynamo. The emphasis was on energetic fun rather than verbatim dialogue, and everyone had a blast. A very welcome change of mood after the earlier session -- in fact, one of my groupmates, a poised and courtly gentleman, said he wished he'd waited to deliver his dialogue until the evening, instead of performing it that afternoon for that "f*cking b*tch."
Humorous update: despite reassuring us that verbatim dialogue was not the point that evening, the teachers assigned as homework "Work on dialogue" for most of us. I think that's teacher-speak for "cover your ass."
Halloween, Hot Style: I wouldn't have thought that skimpy yoga duds and 40 Celsius temperature would allow for much in the way of Halloween costumes. I was once again completely wrong, as my fellow students astounded me with their imaginations and senses of humour. Two brave souls (male and female) dressed up as Himself, complete with speedo briefs and samurai topknot. There was an array of amazing costumes, including the sublime Fed in gold lamé, pirates, ghosts, yoga zombies, angels, witches, Japanese ham sandwiches (funny only for those in the know about Bikram yoga dialogue) -- even a bottle of champagne. As for me, well: I did the dialogue/joke thing, drawing two padlocks in indelible ink upon my kneecaps in tribute to the oft-repeated line, "Lock the knee." Jane so funny! Still, I enjoyed it.
Week Six weirdnesses: I don't know quite what to say about this week's mood, which is mainly a ripening of all the previous weeks' moods. Rumours fly about various happenings, from tempers flaring in posture clinics to who's having it off with whom, and where, and when. I think it's fatal to take any of them even slightly seriously. And when I hear anyone grousing about Himself's idiosyncrasies, I keep schtum. After all, the man came from a fairly humble background compared to the lifestyle standard in the U.S. He created not so much a yoga kingdom as an empire. Is it any surprise that he sometimes acts imperially? I think it would be stranger if he didn't behave autocratically from time to time. And while he does shout at people in his yoga classes, he is also surprisingly tender with us. I can't figure him out -- but I do know that I admire his business acumen and his limitless energy. I always will.
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