Practitioners describe hot yoga as if it were as powerful — and addictive — as any drug. First-timers enter a studio with empty stomachs (if they are smart), but nothing prepares them for the wave of 105-degree heat that refuses to subside.
Anxiety begins to gather in their chests well before the first water break at the 20-minute mark. By the sixth of 26 poses — as they try to balance on one leg while pulling the other leg into a standing split — black spots start to pop before their eyes. At the end of the class, students are left flat on their backs catching their breath, hair matted, and clothes soaked.
Outsiders might consider it a torture only a fool would choose to endure. But for true believers, something euphoric is delivered: They feel amazing. ... To the uninitiated, a Bikram class can seem like a cult. It's not uncommon to see girls brush the guru's hair or massage his body as he lectures, as if he were a deity.
One day, while struggling through class, Gumucio says he decided to take matters into his own hands. He signaled to one of the girls that he wanted to take over. "I decided to massage the evil villain in my life," he recalls, laughing. According to Gumucio, Bikram was impressed.
"From that day forward, he was nice to me," says Gumucio. "But I had to pay a different kind of, you know, penalty. Because then he made me massage him, like, every single day for, like, four hours a day. I would be dripping with sweat all over, just from working on this crazy man." ... Yet their friendship began to strain in 2000. That's when Gumucio met John McAfee, a software billionaire turned yoga teacher, and visited his Colorado estate. The pair immediately clicked. Soon McAfee was inviting him to teach at a retreat, spending several days in nature practicing yoga in complete silence. By the time it was over, Gumucio decided he wanted to teach multiple forms of yoga, incorporating McAfee's kriya method, which focuses on the spine.
"That's when things started to go south," Gumucio says. Bikram felt a sting of betrayal at seeing his protege take on a new mentor. "He said, 'You cannot be a ****ing prostitute. You cannot have your feet in two holes.'" ... Yet while philosophy remains the outer crust of the dispute between Bikram and Gumucio, at heart it's a battle over money. Lot and lots of money. The industry is growing so fast that it's expected to reach $8.3 billion in sales by 2016.
With that much at stake, it was only a matter of time until the lawyers showed up.
To most of the country, the yoga war may be nothing more than another mercantile fight between two titans wrestling over the spoils of their industry. Yet back at the banquet hall in Boston, Bikram frames Gumucio as a villain on par with the all-time greats.
"If you have a sick body, a screw-loose brain, you will only be surviving — that will be a man like Greg, Hitler, or Osama Bin Laden," he says, between bites of plump scallops.
Bikram now claims "zero feeling" for his old disciple and believes that the American courts eventually will decide that rectitude is at his side, where it rightfully belongs. ... Suddenly, there is the chime of a butter knife clinking against a wine glass for quiet. It comes from one of Bikram's close friends, who is standing with his arm around the guru's wife, Rajashree.
"Today is Bikram and Rajashree's 23rd wedding anniversary," the man announces proudly as the room erupts in applause.
"Oh, I forgot! ****!" Bikram exclaims as a large mango cake is wheeled to the center of the room. "I forgot completely! ****! Why you didn't remind me? ****! You keep me too busy!"
The yogis sing "happy anniversary" to the tune of "Happy Birthday." Then Bikram announces that, far from forgetting the occasion, he has bought his wife one of the world's most expensive cars, an $800,000 Rolls-Royce convertible. ... When he returns to the table, Bikram turns to me. "Greg Gumucio, he's finished," he says. "He's ass in the grass."
http://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/2012-...pile-of-money/
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Originally Posted by Shuddhasattva
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