Chatting with Germany's Amrit Stein

Amrit Stein is from Germany, dances Kathak but her focus is on yoga. She runs the BKS Iyengar brand  of yoga at her centre in Munich.

This was her first Natyanjali recital and for the exacting German it took some patience to let the musicians from Ahmedabad fall in sync, the sound to be arranged and to get into a rhythm.
Chatting with her and her sitar player, Tetsuo Nihei, a Japanese settled in Germany Amrit said she enjoyed the experience but bore a nasty injury in her sole when a piece of jewelry that had fallen earlier tore into the flesh.

Amrit learnt Kathak in Pune while Tetsuo learnt the sitar in Pune, Mumbai and in Delhi too besides stints in Calcutta. He says he has been with the sitar for three decades now; he learnt the sitar from Shahid Pervez and the surbahar from Imrat Khan.

The duo work together and obviously are on familiar terrain in North India. Amrit says they now have friends in Chennai and hope to see more of the south in the years ahead.

On Sunday, they desperately tried to fix a guide who would show them the Nataraja Temple closely. And they were headed to Thanjavur on Monday.