Well, that’s not Bikram Choudhury.
Yep, it’s Day 3, and I don’t have a picture of Bikram doing this pose. His official web site has a picture next to Hands to Feet. Just one problem: it’s not Hands to Feet. You can see from the above that you have to be standing to do Hands to Feet. But on Bikram’s web site, he’s clearly sitting on his ass.
Lazy bastard.
There's a very simple explanation for this: somebody managing Bikram's web site dropped the ball. The photo next to Hands to Feet pose is of the very similar (but seated) Stretching pose, which is the next to last posture in the class. It could be that there's no good picture of Bikram himself doing the posture, so they subbed in the next best thing. I certainly hope that's the case.
This is a good time to mention one of the idiosyncrasies of the Bikram dialogue--the many, shall we say, interesting and colorful phrases that crop up during the class. In Half Moon you are commanded to open your chest "like flower petal blooming." In Awkward pose, you're asked to get on your tip-toes, "max-i-mum, like a ballerina." (A teacher at the Harlem said, "like your wearing stilettos--you too, boys!" Yes, there can be humor in the hot room, in case you thought it was all suffering and serious gazes.) In the balancing postures, you will be told, "Knee is like the lampost. Lock the knee. You have no knee." (As you can tell, dropped or oddly placed articles are also a mainstay of the Bikram patter.)
But the most baffling of these commands occurs during Hands to Feet, when you are told to "wrap your forearms behind your calves... press your stomach to the thighs... chest to the knees... face to the shins... [You may be getting the impression of heard this a few times.] No room for light or air, like a Japanese ham sandwich."
To this day, I am convinced it's a rite of passage for every new Bikram student to get into Hands to Feet, here that phrase, and bob their head towards the teacher ever so slightly, thinking, "What the hell is a Japanse ham sandwich?
The answer? It's something Bikram says. You know how Bikram says, "You have no knee?" Well, Mr. Choudhury, you have no sandwich. The first eight Google results are for blogs and sites related to Bikram yoga; so is the ninth, a message board that posits the idea that a Japanse ham sandwich is all ham, no bread, no cheese. Which sounds suspiciously like Scott Ian's famous baloney-in-hand sandwich--the lunch every young, poor touring band has to eat because all they can afford is the meat.
And speaking of lunch, try not to have yours within two or three hours of class. With your stomach pressed against your legs, and your torso pitched towards the floor, Hands-to-Feet can very easily turn into Lunch-to-Floor. If you think it's odd that you would undertake a regimen that routinely burns a thousand calories per session, but would restrict you from eating within a couple of hours of class, well, that's just one of Bikram Yoga's many quirks.
Yep, it’s Day 3, and I don’t have a picture of Bikram doing this pose. His official web site has a picture next to Hands to Feet. Just one problem: it’s not Hands to Feet. You can see from the above that you have to be standing to do Hands to Feet. But on Bikram’s web site, he’s clearly sitting on his ass.
Lazy bastard.
There's a very simple explanation for this: somebody managing Bikram's web site dropped the ball. The photo next to Hands to Feet pose is of the very similar (but seated) Stretching pose, which is the next to last posture in the class. It could be that there's no good picture of Bikram himself doing the posture, so they subbed in the next best thing. I certainly hope that's the case.
This is a good time to mention one of the idiosyncrasies of the Bikram dialogue--the many, shall we say, interesting and colorful phrases that crop up during the class. In Half Moon you are commanded to open your chest "like flower petal blooming." In Awkward pose, you're asked to get on your tip-toes, "max-i-mum, like a ballerina." (A teacher at the Harlem said, "like your wearing stilettos--you too, boys!" Yes, there can be humor in the hot room, in case you thought it was all suffering and serious gazes.) In the balancing postures, you will be told, "Knee is like the lampost. Lock the knee. You have no knee." (As you can tell, dropped or oddly placed articles are also a mainstay of the Bikram patter.)
But the most baffling of these commands occurs during Hands to Feet, when you are told to "wrap your forearms behind your calves... press your stomach to the thighs... chest to the knees... face to the shins... [You may be getting the impression of heard this a few times.] No room for light or air, like a Japanese ham sandwich."
To this day, I am convinced it's a rite of passage for every new Bikram student to get into Hands to Feet, here that phrase, and bob their head towards the teacher ever so slightly, thinking, "What the hell is a Japanse ham sandwich?
The answer? It's something Bikram says. You know how Bikram says, "You have no knee?" Well, Mr. Choudhury, you have no sandwich. The first eight Google results are for blogs and sites related to Bikram yoga; so is the ninth, a message board that posits the idea that a Japanse ham sandwich is all ham, no bread, no cheese. Which sounds suspiciously like Scott Ian's famous baloney-in-hand sandwich--the lunch every young, poor touring band has to eat because all they can afford is the meat.
And speaking of lunch, try not to have yours within two or three hours of class. With your stomach pressed against your legs, and your torso pitched towards the floor, Hands-to-Feet can very easily turn into Lunch-to-Floor. If you think it's odd that you would undertake a regimen that routinely burns a thousand calories per session, but would restrict you from eating within a couple of hours of class, well, that's just one of Bikram Yoga's many quirks.
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