Some Experience as a Yoga Teacher, Jelena Snauc
I decided to volunteer with VIN while I was doing my 300 hours of Yoga Teacher training in Rishikesh. It seemed like a great opportunity to explore Nepal and get some experience as a yoga teacher and most importantly I wanted to help others, I wanted to make a difference. To be honest I didn’t know what to expect but I was looking forward to it. It was challenging, first of all most of the people I was teaching did not speak the English language, sometimes I would have the help of a translator but sometimes not, so I learned how to teach without verbal instructions. Second of all, there were no yoga props no yoga mats or even very inadequate space to do yoga, for example in somebody’s front yard. But none of these things mattered to me. Every day more and more people showed up for my classes. People of all ages, kids, men and women, even my colleagues from VIN who were also volunteering in this area. The enthusiasm of these people was more than enough to keep me going.
What did you do as a Yoga Teacher?
I had three classes a day one was at 5 am, the second at 12 pm, then later they switched it to 9 am and third class at 5 pm. It was not easy doing three yoga classes a day, but as I said just seeing how well they responded to yoga was everything that I needed. I gained a lot of experience if I can work in these conditions I’m sure I can teach anywhere. They gave me the confidence that I needed to continue with my work as a yoga teacher. Thank you for this VIN and a big thank you to all of my students that came to classes even in bad weather and some of them even two times a day. Thank you all and love to all.
– Jelena Šnauc (Volunteer)