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Párga (Greece), December 14th 2011 

One of the beautiful things about travelling is that you meet a lot of interesting people. Not especially local people, but also a lot of other western travellers. So far we met people who became Tibetans, a drug smuggler with an incurable disease, a guy followed by the intelligence services and Yoga-students who changed their way of living radically overnight.

In the category of Yoga-practisers we met a very interesting French couple. These very nice people escaped the cold French winter and decided to live for five month on an almost deserted camp site is Greece, to practise Yoga. They are followers of the so-called Ashtanga Yoga School. He went several times to India to study at the famous school of Guru Jois in the South Indian city Mysore. He is a retired Yoga-professor, taught Yoga himself, and is even allowed to certify Yoga students. Many of the Yoga exercises they do are done in the open air, which gives us the opportunity to see what it involves. We are soon convinced that they are serious about their Yoga. They spent most of their time on exercises, sometimes sitting cross-legged for hours, meditating with a basket of oranges on their head.

After a couple of days we start talking with each other. That is not very easy because they only speak French and our French is very limited. But the meetings are still very interesting. They talk enthusiastically about their Yoga experiences and what it brings for them. Their whole life is about bringing body and soul in the optimal condition. And that is something to have a lot of respect for. They are strict vegetarians which mean that they do not only skip meat, fish and eggs, but also milk products are avoided as much as possible. They eat a lot of vegetables, whereby the vegetables are preferably raw because they contain the best ingredients and give you the most defence. They grow their own sprout vegetables (alfalfa, fenugreek, lentils, and grains) because of their high concentration of vitamins, potassium and magnesium. They give us a detailed demonstration of how to grow these sprouts while on the road. It seems to be very easy and definitely worthwhile a try.

But their dedication to Yoga goes even further. They do not need the doctor anymore because they believe in the power of a small Indian made electronic device. This little black box with two metal electrodes to hold in your hands, is powered by a small battery and sends high frequency vibrations through your body. The idea is to create a resonance in your body which kills parasites, viruses and bad bacteria. They told us that it even cures cancer. In previous times, these vibrations where generated by rattling off certain mantras, but in the present modern times, they invented electronic devices for that. If you believe it or not, it seems to be helpful for them. His last visit to the doctor was in 1950! For those who are interested in the device, more information is available in French on this page.

At a certain moment, he started telling us about the idea behind Amaroli (urine therapy) or also called the ‘fountain of the body’. For a moment we think, or hope to think, that we understood him wrong. But when he repeats his story, including the associated sign language, we know that he is very serious. Amaroli is a very old wisdom in where human urine is used to strengthen the body by drinking it, using it for a shower or body cream, or even use it as eye drops (more information on Amaroli can be found here). The idea is very simple. If you treat your body well and take very good care of a good diet, your urine is very powerful due to the good contents of it. That’s why this powerful liquid should be reused to strengthen the body. Hoping on an acknowledgement, we mention that our urine is probably not good enough for this therapy, but unfortunately, the acknowledgement stays away. To the contrary, also we can use our urine for this therapy is what he says. We don’t think it is ever going to happen, but this conclusion was the end of some very interesting talks we had with them. It is an enjoyment to see how dedicated people can be and what power it can give if you really believe in something. Chapeau!