All these years of dating and blogging, I have (finally!) learnt to not kiss and tell ALL (kesian Supertall, korang masih lagi Search dia). And for those who looked out for ‘moving out sale’, e-mail me at ninie.ahmad@gmail.com for details with ‘The Banned Yoga Instructor’s Moving Out-Of-The-Country Sale‘ as subject title. For those who have my number, SMS might not be entertained!

I am sorry to disappoint you but I don’t think you will ever find any more photos of Ninie Ahmad’s boyfriend online, at least not here! And I will pretzel and hang them upside down those who do post us in their blogs / Facebook, LOL.

But what I can’t help to not share is – why I fell for (let’s just stick to calling him) Mr Petrovsky.

• His ‘platinum’ hair that makes him look errr, wise.. Not Mikhail Baryshnikov 60-years-old old wise, but you get the picture.
• He is NOT on Facebook, dude (don’t get me started with Twitter)! Who else can say as much?
• He took me to watch Sex And The City in New York City (that’s 3 million brownie points!)
• He speaks French, jangan marah. Ok, you can come back to envisioning Aleksandr Petrovsky.
• He loves yoga and is ZOMG good at it! Plus he looks so good on his mat, it tingles my orange chakra
• He makes pancakes! And cooks, yo! Fancy dinner! For me!
• He recycles! And uses organic everything!
• Since he cooks and recycles and DOES YOGA, it’s a no-brainer that he is not our typical Malaysian man (fine, he is French not Malaysian – happy?)

As much as I can’t wait to leave KL, I don’t know how can I leave such a wonderful man here when I am not sure if I want to ever come back, when I don’t know where my next home is..

‘And the wheels just keep on turning,
The drummers begin to drum,
I don’t know which way I’m going,
I don’t know what I’ll become.

For you I’d wait ‘til kingdom come,
Until my days, my days are done,
And say you’ll come and set me free.
Just say you’ll wait, you’ll wait for me.‘

~ COLDPLAY

LDR is.. (almost like) doing yoga with a DVD,

• might still deliver promising result
• it will still hurt (whoever says yoga AND relationships are easy?)
• can be boring, if not thoroughly challenging
• and – you might just get used to doing it alone after some time (wait, that doesn’t sound right..)

I can’t wait to leave this city of no-angels but I don’t think I’ll ever be ready to part with the one who’s got my heart.

by Kim Casali, conceived by and drawn by Bill Asprey

So help me God..

As much as I feel good about my body and loving (almost) everything I see in the mirror – I have insecurities about my body too, trust me!

While I think I look better without clothes (who else will say that about my body, right ?), I can’t help but to feel like giving up TOO whenever I come across this beautiful set of low-key studio photos of LA yoga teacher / arm balancing rockstar  Kathryn Budig by photographer Jasper Johal for Toesox.

Heck I’d pose with nothing but engineered socks too if I looked like THAT!

And so to regain my confidence (you know how it feels like when people say you look so fit but you feel sooooo fat), I checked back my Asana studio photoshoots done with a couple of photographers some time ago posing almost unintendedly similar poses!

1st & 2nd photo by Napie Moksin, top & pants by adidas for Stella McCartney; 3rd photo by Joe Low, top by adiShe & pants by adidas Techfit Powerweb

Ok ok, I take that back.

I forgot that I love my body and what I can do with it but I (like, really) hate my STRETCHMARKS!

the home of Lululemon, M.A.C, Alanis Morissette, errr.. Justin Bieber and the one who’s got my heart

where 10,000 New Yorkers performed sun salutations at Times Square

..survived Dharma Mittra master class

where everybody tucked their leg behind their head (standing up)!

..and survived

meeting the parents .

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Pheww!

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5 Things You Should Know & Be Prepared Of in New York

• Lotsa small bills for tips (in hotels, tip bellhops at least $1 per bag and tip the chamber staff $1 to $2 per day if you’ve left a disaster for them to clean up. Tip the doorman or concierge if they have provided you with special service, like calling a cab. In restaurants & bars, tip service staff 15% to 20% of the check and tip bartenders 10% to 15%. Tip cab drivers 15% of the fare.)

And TIPPING IS A-MUST except at cafeterias & fast-food outlets only!

They said only share this photo on Facebook if they look cute, how cute!

And yes, the American jargons – check (instead of bill), bill (instead of notes), change (instead of coins) & drugstore (instead of pharmacy)

• There is almost no free Internet / wi-fi service anywhere except for some smaller parks! Yes, not even in Starbucks or McDonald’s. I heard some American birds tweeted and celebrated the news that Starbucks will start offering free wi-fi from July 1st. And we complain on the limitless places (mamaks also have wi-fi now ya?) albeit slow connection in KL.

How have I been blogging & tweeting, you asked? iPhone around town & $19.95 PER DAY (about RM70 sehari!) for Internet in my hotel room.

• Lotsa practical scarves if you weren’t prepared for summer to be this cold!

You’ll want to wear your scarf like this too after you watch Sex And The City II!

• Sunnies for the summer. And to hide undrawn eyebrows for the walk back after yoga..

I brought FIVE from home, just in case . And say nothing about the bangles & dangles please.

and comfortable walking shoes. See how I bold the ‘comfortable’?

Listen, I need to match different yoga pants & those heels are for fancy dinners!

•  Walk, walk, walk, walk (I took the yellow cab to yoga at 5th Avenue every morning. When I finally use the Map on my iPhone,  I realize 5th Avenue is just 5 minutes walk from the hotel I’m staying at )

Look who’s walking too behind me?

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5 Things To Do On Your First Day In NY Manhattan

•  Watch Sex And The City II movie, D-U-H! With typical American junkfood overload.

•  Dump your LUXE New York guide & buy TimeOut New York For Visitors

•  Hate yourself a little for packing only summer dresses & hot pants when the weather is 22ºC in the afternoon (except that they use Fahrenheit here). And you thought it’s summerrrrrrrrrrrrrr..

•  Eat lotsa crispy big apples. Usually they are complimentary by your hotel’s concierge.

•  Don’t forget to make reservations for all the fancy schmancy restaurants to have dinner at (the famous restaurants get booked by months ahead sometimes, yes. So we have to give up on Pastis, Nobu and Le Bernadine)

At La Grenouille, one of the most romantic (and expensive) dinner I ever had.

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5 Places To Go On Your Second Day In Manhattan

•  World Trade Centre ‘bathtub’ site

•  Empire State Building’s observatory deck

• Statue of Liberty via Staten Island Ferry (it’s my fifth day and I still haven’t )

•  St Patrick’s Cathedral on 5th Avenue (although I bet, you’d end up spending the rest of the day on 5th Avenue. Who are these Americans kidding, the church is designated in between Versace, H. Stern & Saks!)

I swear I was IN FRONT of St Patrick’s Cathedral! Can I blame St Patrick the photographer? Anywayyyy, if you take a look across, that’s the very Bergdorf Goodman which they shot the opening scene of SATCII in

•  Picnic (or yoga) at the park

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5 Places You Have To Try And Go Anyway Anytime In Manhattan

•  Museum of Modern Art, West 53 Street

•  Museum of Sex , 5th Avenue

•  Chrysler Building

•  Classic movie screening at Bryant Park

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5 Things You Just Have To Do In NY

•  Dress up for the ballet at Lincoln Centre on Thursday night

•  Stand-up comedy at West Village (I didn’t dare snap photos, I was being made fun of for coming from Malaysia enough..)

•  Shake Shack at Madison Park – some New Yorkers swear that the burgers at this food stand are the best in the city. I only tried the ‘Shroom Burger (for vegetarians) on the second day and I have been coming for more almost every evening! The queue is absurdly long though but it only proves its NYC’s best dine in small parks.

•  Be amazed at the abundance of naked man figures on the street and on top of every other building

•  Yankees game (yes, God is punishing me for making my boyfriend watch Sex And The City II)

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5 Shops You Don’t Want To (or shall I write, Wanna) Miss In Manhattan

•  H&M, H&M, H&M, H&M, H&M – there is (at least one) H&M in almost every block you wouldn’t miss missing it

•  Prada flagship store Soho at Broadway

Yes, it’s the very Prada Carrie took Berger to.

•  Forget SAKS at 5th Avenue, go to Century 21 at Financial District instead. They carrie carry seriously discounted designer clothes, but – expect crowd & next-to-nothing-at-all service

•  Steve Madden flagship store Soho at Broadway

•  HBO Official Shop, 42nd & Avenue of the Americas where they house original merchanchise of True Blood, The Sopranos, Entourage, Big Love and of course, Sex And The City takes the biggest section of the store.

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5 Yoga Centres You Want To Check Out In Manhattan

•  Kula Yoga Project, Warren St

•  Yoga Sutra, 5th Avenue (highly recommended for practicing Ashtangis)

•  OM Yoga Centre, Union Square

•  Dharma Mittra NY Yoga Centre, Third Avenue

•  Bikram Yoga NYC, 5th Avenue

•  Jivamukti Yoga, Union Square

What.. that’s SIX already? I have been refraining myself from going to corporate yoga centres to why I am not suggesting Pure Yoga & Exhale but I gave in for YogaWorks as I signed for 2-weeks unlimited classes and I’ll write another entry on who was in my class in YogaWorks Soho in another entry hopefully.

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5 Things You Don’t Necessarily Have To Do

•  Empire State Building Skyride & 3D Movie. Unless you are a kid with kids.

•  The overrated Sex And The City tour. The bus only takes you to FOUR locations in the series / movies and you can’t take photos in the bus, I am not kidding! We are better off googling ALL the tour locations (because they rotate them and only go to selected four spots each tour) and walk to the locations, better still – on our heels!

•  Madame Tussauds – they don’t even have the SATC girls! And they are Madame Tussauds New York, what a shame..

•  Yes, I put much hype in Magnolia Bakery because of SATC & The Devil Wears Prada, but if you don’t have all the time in the world New York, try Katz’s Delicatessen instead. Movie lovers would know that it is the famous site for When Harry Met Sally.

•   Use the subway, maybe because I still can’t figure out how to!

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Stay tuned for my next entry on my famous encounter(s) in New York City.

Love and big apples!

Srikandi Dila, Ninie & Juita (May 2010)

We left school 11 years ago (if I haven’t shared this here, our beloved school is on top of the list for 20 most elite schools in Malaysia [SBT] ahead of even MCKK and TKC ) and got very much involved in each other’s their wedding.

I was Dila’s maid-of-honour during her wedding, Dila was Juita’s maid-of-honour during Juita’s wedding and I was Juita’s emcee during Juita’s wedding. Did I get that right?

January 2010

June 2007

We have known each other since we were 13 (which was like, 5 years ago ) and we have witnessed each other avant discovery of contact lense, highlighted hair and possession of yoga body – you name it, they have the photos I’d trade my spine with, just to not have them tagged on Facebook.

D1-7 Dorm Party (1996). I swear I’d make whoever posted this on Facebook stand on their hands for 2 minutes!

A visit downsouth for STF 50th Anniversary (2006)

So during our coffee and cupcake (DELIcious uses Magnolia Bakery cupcake made famous by SATC, yeap!) catch up last Sunday – of which Dila and Juita referred to as, Ninie’s last Sunday In The City,

Not that I won’t come back, girls!

..we updated our LBB list of our batchmates that are, (*chuckle*) still single.

Brace yourselves, girls.

Out of 118 SPM candidates for SPM ‘99, we listed that ONLY 18 of us – are not married. Yet.

Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong or keep me posted if any of you are getting hitched anytime soon!

Love and cupcakes.

Chris Martin in Baddha Konasana (heh, listen to me..)

My favourite yoga playlist  is my favourite 28 songs of Coldplay on iTunes to accompany my (on good days, errrr.. 110 minutes?) Ashtanga self-practice.

As many of you might have heard of my infatuation over Coldplay and its frontman, Chris Martin (no thanks to CLEO Malaysia MAY 2010 Page 125) – the more I listen to them especially when I almost died was resting in Balasana in between Bhekasana and Dhanurasana during my Ashtanga Second Series practice this morning particularly, all the more I (make) believe he was high on yoga (we yogi wannabes call it ‘yoga hangover’) while writing music and lyrics for their more recent albums (FYI, I read that he started yoga some five years ago and turned vegetarian + gave up coffee and alcohol eversince).

Just listen again to these tracks from X&Y (I’m going on the defensive here, ‘Y‘ stands for Yoga )

Fix You

And high up above earth or down below
When you’re too in love to let it go
But if you never try you’ll never know
Just what you’re worth

Lights will guide you home
And ignite your bones
And I will try to fix you

(It is such a soundtrack for yoga instructors I can’t help to not have quoted this to introduce BE Yoga’s teachers in BE Yoga’s website!)

Twisted Logic

Ask who does this belong to
It belongs to all of us

You go backwards but then you go forwards again
You go backwards but then you go forwards

X & Y

You and me are floating on a tidal wave… together
You and me are drifting into outer space
and singing

Oooohh, oooohh (feel free to finish your exhalation with additional “mmmm..” after “oooohhh”  )

and VIVA LA VIDA (which is still on heavy rotation in my car – and irritates my friends)

Life In Technicolour II

Oh love don’t let me go
Won’t you take me where the streetlights glow
I could hear it coming
I could hear the sirens sound
Now my feet won’t touch the ground

Strawberry Swing

Cold, cold water bring me ’round
Now my feet won’t touch the ground (two ‘now my feet won’t touch the ground’s! I’m pretty sure he was on One Elbow Pincha Mayurasana while WRITING this!)
Cold, cold water what ya say?
When it’s such…
It’s such a perfect day
It’s such a perfect day

I remember
We were walking up to Strawberry Swing
I can’t wait until the morning
Wouldn’t wanna change a thing

People moving all the time
Inside a perfectly straight line
Don’t you wanna just curve away?
When it’s such…
It’s such a perfect day
It’s such a perfect day

Notice how their songs are ALWAYS if not ever so positive, very optimistic, very ‘we-live-in-a-beautiful-world, yeah-we-do, yeah-we-do’ – SEE WHAT Y O G A DOES TO ROCKSTARS?

By the way , Chris Martin was voted one of Greatest Frontmen ever by Q magazine last month.

Now – remember the MTV World Stage’s COLDPLAY – Viva La Vida: Tokyo in which I raved on seeing him rolled back to Chakrasana (Rolling Wheel posture) in between the finishing of Viva La Vida and to start Lost!?

Guess what, I FOUND the Youtube (don’t blink during the first 6 seconds!)

.. and my very own Chris Martin here. Oh, I did share that too, didn’t I?

Three-Stripes intended

Love and ‘Til Kingdom Come.

It is not a secret that I founded BE Yoga with my ex-boyfriend, the Supertall one.

Someone pointed to me earlier this morning before I left to BE Yoga’s 1st Anniversary Celebration, “Wow, it’s almost like you have a 1-year-old BABY. With your ex-boyfriend..”

Oh well..

(as quoted in Sex And The City The Movie)

Be calm,

only by a calm consideration of our existence can we achieve our purpose to live together.

Be calm – love me – today – yesterday

what tearful longings for you – you – you – my life – my all

farewell.

Oh continue to love me – never misjudge the most faithful heart of your beloved.

Ever thine, ever mine, ever ours..

BEETHOVEN from Love Letters of Great Men

Happy birthday, my love.

And farewell, baby..