Showing posts with label Inspiring people. Show all posts

Rise and shine

Even though I've practiced yoga now on an off for the past few years, I have only taken 10 lessons at the max. I have always preferred doing things alone. I am not a fan of group activities, and especially not such where a bunch of people are crammed into a small room, which often is the case with indoor yoga classes. At least the ones I have had the misfortune of attending in the past. I need space; mental, physical, spiritual, and so it has only fallen natural to me to practice by myself on the boat, or in the splendid room that I used up in MA. But arriving in Miami, I knew I had to attend my friend Ewa's yoga class on the beach. A class she holds twice a week, Tuesdays and Thursdays on 3rd st & the beach. Her class begins at 7 am, so I woke up at 5.50 to be sure to get there on time. A 45 min walk on the beach for me to get there, and 45 min back. Perfect exercise!
Sure I've practiced yoga on the beach before on many different islands in the Caribbean, but always alone so this was something new to me. And I did like it, a lot! Primarily of course because someone else guided/made sure you went through all the poses and stretches that are so good for waking the body up after a long nights sleep. But I also did not feel congested and the air was as free and neutral as a windy outdoor space near water always is. The other peoples presence didn't distract me as they might have done indoors, but rather it felt like all flowed easy and smooth and any possible noise was washed away by the calming sound of waves crashing on shore.
Ewa has a very calm and gentle voice which is all you really want this early in the morning.
This is Ewa. Although we used to call the same Swedish city "home" and have many friends in common, we actually met in New York the first time, while we both worked in fashion many years ago. I like her personality so I figured I ask her a few questions in a new interview series I will begin here on the blog.

Ewa, you have lived in the US now for 8 years… why America?

I had just turned 25 when I left the Swedish city Gothenburg for New York, I had lived my whole life in Gothenburg and knew that a change was needed. This was 2006. After three years in New York City I had burned out from working too much but wasn't ready to go back to Sweden so I moved to Miami instead. Honestly I thought I would go back to New York soon, that I only needed a bit of relaxation before I could return but once here I changed. I started practicing yoga daily instead of weekly. I became a yoga instructor. I think Miami beach is a wonderful location for this lifestyle, in New York I was wining and dining and woke up late, here I'm in bed early and wake up to watch the sunrise on the beach.
What is the biggest difference between Sweden and the US, would you say?

The biggest difference to me is that in Sweden people tend to find comfort in the idea that we're all the same, whereas in the US people find comfort in the idea that we're all different. If you feel different this is a wonderful place to be!
How did you slip in on the yoga path, coming from the stylist world you worked in previously?

When I started practicing every day I became aware of myself, my thoughts and habits. I saw myself objectively without any judgement: this is how I am and I am actually OK with that. I think that was the most useful realization I could have gotten at that point. From there on I could move forward without any animosity towards myself.
What gives life meaning, and what has your yoga practice given you?

I recently did a personality test and it said that I'm not driven by material things, security, or success, but by the urge to make a difference. I was often called naive in school, and my previous jobs, and I found it difficult to stay focused on things that according to me "didn't matter". But as a yoga teacher I get to focus exactly on what matters to me.
What does a normal day in your life look like, what gives you harmony? Also, what do you eat during a day?

I wake up early, go teach one or two classes then come home to my dog and we have breakfast, I make an acai bowl every morning. My mode of transportation is by scooter, and stand up paddle board! I love the mornings on the beach watching the sun rise! I eat mostly vegetarian and try to avoid too much grains and dairy. However I often eat wild caught fish, especially ceviche.
You are incredibly healthy and always look so fresh, but what not-so-healthy things can you not resist?

My hardest habit to kick was the cigarettes. I smoked for half my life and I still feel the urge all the time. I used to drink alcohol but realized I don't really like it.
Before you became a yoga instructor, you tried different things/lifestyles. Can you give any advice for the ones that are still searching for "their thing"? What should one focus on?

If you want to find your path in life you have to disregard your fears - these decisions are too important to be made based on what you've been told is practical, safe, or what you're expected to do. I always thought I needed to be an intellectual, use my brain more, funny thing is that once I started to listen to my heart instead I became so much wiser!
And a final tips for the ones that wish to live a healthier life, but might have hard to get the ball rolling? 

In order to be healthier you must first love yourself, find out how you can love yourself more. Yoga is one of the practices that really helps with that. A good way to start is to lay on your back with your legs up the wall, viparita karani, for ten minutes every day. If you're stiff put a pillow under your butt. Just be there. See what shows up. It's an enquiry, we spend our lives exploring the outside world but the inside world must be explored as well. Know thyself. Breathe deeper. Start to make a distinction between your thoughts and your soul. You are not every single thought that pass through your mind. You are the witness watching those thoughts. This is yoga. All the exercises we do are ways to try and grasp that.
Thank you lovely! Follow Ewa on Instagram here.

Besides the Tuesday and Thursday sunrise classes on 3rd St, Ewa also teaches at Green Monkey on Purdy Ave Monday and Wednesday at 10.30am and Sundays at 9 am. On Skanda Yoga Studio Mondays at 12.30, Equinox SoBe on Tuesdays 9 am, and at the Standard Hotel Spa Thursday evenings at 6 pm. 

I know how my Tuesday and Thursday mornings are going to look like from now on!

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Sailing on ice


The other night, we went over to our friends Jeff and Meg's for dinner and a few drinks. Jeff was kind enough to let us use his mooring the first two weeks after we had arrived to the South Shore of Boston, before we moved the boat over to our town a bit further down South. Always love hanging out with our American friends. Our different cultural and social experiences are the base for many a conversation, and the best thing with having good friends from places I or we weren't brought up in, is that there's always something new to learn. I think we can all agree on the fact that there's good and bad with any culture and country in the world (imagine if there were such a thing as a perfect state!?) - but people are just people wherever they're from, and when you connect with one, it rarely matters what country it's saying in their passport. 

I've spoken a lot about differences in culture and traditions both here on the blog and elsewhere as that is what often times is most interesting with traveling in my opinion. I know my sarcastic humor and love of irony doesn't always transmit through every computer screen the way it was initially meant to, but the point of my ramblings, observations and sometimes complains, is that I want to show a realistic side of the world as I see it. Some things in life aren't always as glorious and sugar coated as some people might want to pretend the world to be, but for sure there's always something beautiful to find in any society. 

If we get back to the main subject of this post, I wanted to share this crazy video of our friend Jeff. He's a former world champion in ice sailing, and sees no problem in jumping into a light carbon boat and fly above ice at 80-90 mph. Insane and impressive all at once. As Jeff knows how much Alex loves ice and cold, he's promised to take him out for a spin this winter. No one is looking forward to that experience more than me!


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Aletta's goat farm

Another inspiring person we've met while on Bonaire a couple months ago, was Aletta van Beeck, a physical therapist born in the Netherlands. Without any prior background in farming but with a lifelong dream of living self-sufficiently and in close connection to nature, farmland and animals, she today lives in Bonaire where she manages her own "Kunuku" - the local name for a farm. Aletta is strongly committed to her daily work with lots of love, care, attention and affection for the nature and her beautiful group of animals.

Her farm is literally off the grid on the inside of the island. A jeep is much recommended for transport through the brushy cactus scattered road that leads to her land. The farm has no electricity, all is obtained by solar power, and water is collected off the roof. Aletta cares for about sixty goats today and she has no other help than from the occasional volunteer who picks up extra tasks like bottle-feeding babies and clearing cactus, as well as family and friends who occasionally visits from the Netherlands.

At 4.30 each morning she wakes up to call for her goats to feed them breakfast and to milk the females. Twice a day for a period of five months after they've given birth, the female goats are milked by hand. Besides concentrated goat food the goats are provided with natural greens and homegrown corn for higher milk quality, and they keep themselves happy and in good shape by roaming the wide meadows. In the evenings they are called back for shelter in the open air stables. 

 Twice a year Aletta calls for reproduction by hiring male goats to keep the milk production running. She has two groups of female goats to circle in pregnancy, milk production and pausing. The little ones grow up close to their mothers and have, as part of Aletta's philosophy, their share of the natural mother milk. The goat cheese is turned from milk to cheese during a five day procedure of draining and turning in a cooling room with a constant temperature of 20 degrees Celsius. After this five day procedure the finished cheese is ready for final control and packing.

Having eaten chevré all over the world, this was without doubt one the best ones I've ever had. To be able to see the whole process and understand how content the animals seem to be and how well taken care of they are, made the experience all that much stronger. Aletta also serves coffee with fresh goats milk which Alex said was very good, and she also produces goats yoghurt which we also had the great pleasure to try out.

The produce is sold to most restaurants and grocery stores on Bonaire. Would have been wonderful if she could export to the neighboring islands too but it would probably not be financially feasible with the expensive air transport required. If you ever visit Bonaire, which I wholeheartedly recommend you to do at least once in your lifetime, you must visit Aletta and her charming goat family. It was a true pleasure meeting someone so genuinely passionate about her land, the animals and the simple living that she so profoundly stands for.

Check out her website here.

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The driftwood queen of Bonaire

We met so many fascinating characters while in Bonaire a few months ago. Germaine Nijdam is one of them. Born in Curacao (of Dutch descendent), now living and working on the most beautiful of the ABC islands. Germanie is well known in Bonaire and beyond for her charming driftwood art. At least a few times per week, she walks down the rugged East side of the island with her partner and dogs, in search for whitewashed bits of driftwood, fragments of old broken furniture or pieces of old sunken sail or fishing boats. Plastic toys, bottles and discarded remnants of island life washed ashore by the tides, they all are welcome attributes in her studio.

It struck me how incredibly romantic Germain's work is. How things that weren't meant to continue life in the way it was first set out to, is now being revitalized by her fascinating art and passionated interest in preserving what is found by the water. Her studio had such a winsome atmosphere. From the recently retrieved driftwood that has been washed and now drying in the sun, the many cases of collected plastic toys in all shapes and sunburnt colours to the completed artwork hanging on the walls. The lush green garden surrounding her house and the natural sunlight breaking through the jalousies bathing the studio in a crisp glim only enhanced the purity and realness of her work. 

Isn't that one of those few jobs that are so genuinely pure in a way to support oneself? Collecting what others abandoned while helping in cleaning up our nature, adding beauty through colour and an artistic vision and handed over to new happy owners who prolongs the life of the bits and pieces even further, all the while adorning their homes. Such a beautiful genuine circle.

Germaine might be best known on the island for the bright blue oil and watercolour paintings with driftwood frames and they can be found in many a restaurant and villa on Bonaire and worldwide.

Go have a look on her website for more info.

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S/Y Quest

I promised to tell you more about our neighbors boat. Göran has now sailed further towards Panama, but if you'd be interested in good diving charters around Western and Northern Caribbean, he's the man to get in touch with.

His boat S/Y Quest is a custom made 64 foot steel boat which Göran have spent the last fifteen years to build by himself. The boat is impeccable and extensively equipped, and like Göran said, it took such an extended time because he didn't want to add any equipment nor material that were't the best he could find on the market. Quest was built to the highest specifications for sailing and diving as an expedition yacht. It's designed with a fully insulated hull, central heating system with radiators through out, as well as being air-conditioned which makes the boat a very comfortable yacht in any part of the world. The boat rooms comfortably eight guests. 

Göran started his ocean career on a fishing trawler in Sweden at the age of 16, and has since spent most of his life at sea. After graduating from the Merchant Marine Academy in 1979 he has worked as a captain and chief officer in commercial shipping throughout the world, including eleven years on an expedition cruise ship covering Indonesia, The South Pacific, and later Antarctica and the Arctic. He has also been captain on 160 foot Mega yachts and a live aboard dive vessel. When he hasn’t been working on ships he's been sailing his own yachts, including six Atlantic crossings. 
Görans extensive experience of ocean sailing and traveling all over the globe makes him a tremendously valuable guide and he sure has some great stories in store!

Since we'll be around the Caribbean sea for a few more months we're hoping to run into him again one of these days. Maybe in San Andres and Providencia?

Check out his website here and if you're looking for an amazing diving holiday on a super comfortable boat with a knowledgeable guide and captain, you know who to get in touch with.
these last four images are from Görans website.

P.S: Funny side note is that Göran was neighbor with this world cruising sailing family in Sweden back in the days. Another great sailing blog, if you know Swedish.

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