Let's Yoga: Twice the fun
As promised, today we're covering two lessons in our continuing yogathon. Lessons three and four combined for nineteen minutes of yoga (and many glorious minutes spent breathing and relaxing in Shavasana), and at this point, not only is it really starting to feel like a workout (albeit a more relaxed one), but I can get a little further in certain poses than before. Something's working here with Let's Yoga!
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Lesson three of the Naga class is subtitled 'Yoga of the Sun and Moon,' and the lesson kicks off with a short overview of different kinds of yoga, and what 'Pocket Yoga' focuses on. Since that isn't the title of the U.S. or European versions, we'll chalk that up to a translation error. It's not the first error encountered in the game, either; sometimes, the audio tracks run a little over one another. A new one will start when there's a word or two left to go in the old one. Fortunately, it's not yet been a problem, because the instructions get repetitive very quickly (this is a good thing), so you don't really need to hear all the words.
Let's Yoga
is apparently based on something known as 'Hatha yoga,' which is translated here as being about the sun and the moon, and the air we inhale and exhale. How very circular! But I wasn't feeling quite so pithy as we got into this lesson's standing poses, which was the focus of lesson three.
Naga Class 3: Full activity list
basic sitting position
ankle rotation
basic standing position (foundation for all standing poses)
foot to fingers forward bend (Padangusthasana)
chair pose (Utkatasana)
Crescent Moon pose (video how-to)
warrior pose 2 (Virabadrasana 2)
corpse pose (Shavasana)
Other than chair pose (owww), these were all pretty simple. Crescent Moon pose in particular feels very good, and after this lesson, I felt very relaxed and loose. At some point during, I hit the wrong button and got an amusing message: "Are you sure to quit your lesson?" It must be translation-error day.
Not this cat stretch pose (flickr user djimison)
After a short break, I returned for lesson four, which focuses on the eight pillars of yoga, which can be found here (scroll down to ashtanga yoga), but the focus of the lesson was 'relaxing yoga.' Sounds great!
Naga Class 4: Full activity list
basic sitting position
ankle rotation
basic standing position
sun salutation (Surya Asana)*
alternate leg stretch (Janu Shirasana)
cobra pose 2 (Bhujangasana 2)
vital air release pose (Vayu Muktasana)
corpse pose (Shavasana)
Note: Let's Yoga's Sun Salutation may be a mistranslation, error, or simplified version; other Sun Salutations I've seen are very different. This one is similar to the Crescent Moon pose from lesson three. I suspect it's just a simplified version, as there are several steps to Let's Yoga's Sun Salutation, but it's not as elaborate as some.
As promised, lesson four was very relaxing. It seems I picked a good day to try two lessons; neither was very taxing or difficult, though after the second lesson, I was starting to feel like I had actually exercised -- which is a good thing!
With lessons three and four down, there's only one left in the Naga class, and then we move on to Krishna. We'll also take some time to explore some of the other functions of the title, because there's a lot more going on here beyond the Master's Lessons.
The DS has a lot more to offer besides just traditional games, and we love to test the efficacy of training titles! Keep up with our yogathon as it happens, or for more features like this, check out our week with My French Coach.
