Budapest: Bikram Joga Budapest.

Let's see... At this point, I've been to nine cities. And out of those nine cities, I have practiced Bikram yoga in seven of them.  And out of those seven cities, I've taken classes in six different languages. Five of them not English...

• Dutch
• Spanish
• French
• German
• Hungarian

I wasn't sure if I would get to practice here in Budapest. For some reason, I thought the studios here were very far away. But a little research on Google indicated that there was actually a studio very close by to my hotel here on the Pest side of the city. And I could walk to it in less than 10 minutes.

The studio sits in a corner unit of a floor in a typical city building. If you're not careful, you'll walk right past it.

It took me a few minutes to figure out where the entrance to the building was. And then once inside the building, I still needed signs to navigate me to the right floor...

Eventually I found it. The studio felt very new. It was very clean. No carpet on the floors (YAY!) and a good temperature. 

It was a 7pm class on a Saturday night, and to my surprise it was packed! Mostly women. And the age range was all over the place. I practiced in the front, near some very young women. But behind me were women who looked to be in their 50s and 60s. The teacher indicated to me that most students in the class were still fairly new to the practice. 

When I travel and visit studios, I never mention I am a teacher. I like to be incognito. Just be in my practice. And practicing when it's being taught in a foreign language allows me to focus more in my practice than a class taught in English. And while in Europe, my practice has gotten a lot better.

It's only if I know the studio owner/teacher teaching when I take class that I mention it - as was the case in Bordeaux. Or if the teacher teaching recognizes me - as was the case in Barcelona. ("I know you! I went to teacher training with you! You were that girl...") 

The Budapest studio had a great vibe. It was friendly. Students were working very hard, and it was obvious. The teacher, Veronika, was very kind and helpful. And listening to her do the Pranayama sequence in Hungarian was energizing...

"Inhalál!" she would say with perfect tone... For the inhale.

I knew it was going to be a great class.