Yoga and meditation on Samui
By Mark Adnum
It's much easier to meditate in relaxing surroundings
Koh Samui’s waterfalls and coconut palms provide the perfect backdrop for yoga and meditation. Little wonder then that there are a large number of permanent retreats located across the island.
These venues attract some of the world’s top yoga and meditation instructors, as do the annual conferences and recurring events that are held at some of Koh Samui’s resorts and wellness centres.
Kamalaya Koh Samui is one of the island’s leading wellness centres. Its holistic spa is secluded among lush tropical foliage and there is even a peaceful cave in the heart of the resort that Buddhist monks used to use a meditative retreat. Kamalaya offers regular yoga retreats including its trademark Personal Yoga Synergy program where individuals are tutored by Indian yoga masters.
The Personal Synergy Yoga Program at Kamalaya Koh Samui runs for three, five or seven nights and is custom tailored to the individual’s skill level and goal. Packages cover accommodation, drinks and three meals per day as well as airport transfers. Naturally, visitors to the centre on program packages have full access to the resort’s faciltiies including the plunge pools and Ayurvedic therapy salon.
Yoga Thailand operates its Dedicated Yoga Retreat Training and Wellness Centre on the south coast of Koh Samui. This centre is renowned for its training programs and yoga instructors from all over the world come here to add some strings to their bow. Training courses of up to 1,000 hours are available and certified advanced training courses start at 100 hours. For more on Samui spas.
Non-instructors are well catered for too with a wide range of courses and residential retreats. The Wellness Centre here is particularly outstanding, though visitors to Koh Samui contemplating a course or program at Yoga Thailand should be aware that the centre only offers residential stay packages where learners stay at the resort, with everything included in the package price, for the duration of the course. There are no drop-in classes.
Yoga on the beach is even more beneficial
Absolute Yoga Samui is located in Choeng Mon and bills itseld as ‘Koh Samui’s favourite yoga studio’. It runs 29 classes a week and supplements its three full-time instructors with guest teachers from around the world. The resort itself contains 38 Moroccan-themed suites but walk-in guests are welcome – visitors don’t have to stay at the resort to use its facilities or partcipate in wellness activities.
Absolute Yoga Samui specialises in Hot Yoga and Hot Flow Yoga as well as Yin Yoga, Hatha Yoga and meditiation. The yoga studio is enormous and has smooth teak floors. Many visitors here add a visit to one of the colon hydrotherapy beds to their experience, or take a dip in the infiinity swimming pool.
The Dhammakaya Foundation offers a free-of-charge monthly meditation retreat that comes replete with complimentary vegeterian buffet lunch. Classes are taught in Thai and English and commence at 10:30, finishing at 12:00 when the buffet is served.
Dhammakaya’s superb free class is held on the 3rd Saturday of each month and teaches Dhammakaya’s body-mind meditation in which the centre of the physical body is seen as the true location of the mind. Practicioners swear by its ability to help kick bad habits, as well as provide general inner peace.
The Osho Paramdham Meditation Centre is within walking distance from the Suriwanaram Temple at Ban Tai. Daily classes in Chakra Breathing, Chakra Sound and Devavani are taught in the Zen Temple or other tranquil parts of the centre. Osho’s Dynamic Meditation is tailored for small groups and involves blindfolded participants, practicing frantic nasal breathing followed by primal scream techniques and combinations of aerobic mantras and freeze-frame stillness.
The Health Oasis Resort in Bang Po on Koh Samui’s southeast coast overlooks the beach and is primarily a resort and wellness centre. Its breezy teak bungalows are offered to class participants at a 50 per cent discount. Among the many health and wellness courses here are a three-day meditation course and a five-day yoga retreat.
Lamai Beach is home to Hom Samui’s The Spa Resort, which bills itself as Thailand’s ‘first detox resort’. It’s Walking Meditation program sees participants strolling on the beach or among the seductive grounds of the resort itself. The Raw Food and Organic Menu nutrition programs are designed to complement the yoga and meditaition classes and are part of most three or five-day packages.
Dharma Healing International has a resort in Koh Samui. Its meditation course is fairly strict and rigourous, with fasting and detoxification part and parcel of all of its one-week or longer programs. Iridology and reflexology are also built into the meditation course here, which is based on Vipassanatechniques and the more physical routines of Chakra-Qi Gong.
Of course, plenty of people take advantage of the largest yoga and meditation centre in Koh Samui that just happens to be completely free of charge – the beach. Yoga and meditation is practiced by individuals or small groups at all of Koh Samui’s beaches and dawn and sunset is when most people choose to salute the sun. For more about yoga on Koh Samui.
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