Camp Rockey By Jill Weiss Ippolito I was warned when we got the call to teach yoga at Camp Rockey. “It’s the worst of the worst. Really. It’s where they dump the kids, the staff…it could really use some yoga and meditation” Okay, I said hesitantly. Where is this place again? I asked. Camp Rockey is a Boys Correctional Facility located in San Dimas, up in the mountains across from a Girls Group Home we taught at a couple months prior. I was told “it’s not that far” from Pasadena on a good day. Neil was a matter of fact program director who sought us out after hearing about UpRising Yoga, a program I started which brings yoga to juvenile hall and at-risk communities, where people cannot easily get to a class, let alone pay for one. Of course I was intrigued and had a yoga teacher in Claremont that was eager to go. Neil explained what we were up against; a pretty rough group of rowdy kids, disengaged staff in the middle of nowhere. Forgotten about. I liked Neil’s spirit and set a date to go teach three yoga classes with Nikhil, who has been teaching with UpRising for a while. Once we arrived, we met Neil in the parking lot and lugged piles of new mats I just bought from Marshall’s that smelled like plastic, much better than the used stinky ones I get donated from generous yoga studios around town: “Ewwwww, they smell like feet!” I hear a lot! Nikhil, Neil and I juggle piles of mats in 300 degree mountain desert weather, I swear I hear rattle snakes shaking in the fields..after being screened thoroughly, we walk across football fields of grass, through clanging doors and gates, menacing barbwire fence circles our heads above the vicious blue sky, so crisp and pretty this day, taunting freedom and beauty, but eerily caged we walk on. Half an hour of key jumbling with various characters that may or may not have the ability to open the door to the gym, a janitor, a supervisor of something, and another teacher besides Neil roam around wondering if we can open the door, it felt surreal. Andy Griffith’s Barney Fife friendly but not getting the job done, we walk another great length to a classroom. Nikhil is in awe of some giant screen in the middle of the room and glides over enamored, “Wow, that’s a projector board they have in colleges, man, that’s nice! You can barely get this high technology in boarding school!” He went on to explain the fancy stuff this thing does and how hard it is to get in classrooms while we moved the desk and chairs setting up mats and preparing for our students. Once ready, we had all the mats laid out, so pretty with harmonious colors, some had corny quotes that said stuff like: Find Your Bliss or such. We had smiles and were ready to start. Next thing the door opens and a crowd of rambunctious boys come tumbling in with a large short loud woman behind them yelling at them to “Get in there! It’s Yoga Class!!” I see Neil talking to the officer who will be “watching” us with his newspaper pile and clipboard, he is a hundred and ninety seven years old and looks more punished than the kids. I start to worry. “Hi welcome to yoga! Hey there, I’m Jill and this is Nikhil, please take your shoes off and hop on a mat…” I try to say cheerfully. Shaved heads, baggy grey prison clothes, slouched shoulders, tattoos, posturing with glares, snickers, laughter, boisterous behavior so undisciplined I wonder how am I going to offer my gift, the seeds of yoga healing I’m hoping to share? I move into authority role and start to barrel through like a commander. When it’s loud, I get louder. “Ok, class, how many of you have ever had yoga before?” One hand when up out of twenty-two. He was the shy quiet one in the back. I think of my training at UCLA when teaching kayaking to the mentally challenged, find the alpha kid..win them over and you got it..ok, not this guy. “Anyone injured?” 82% of the hands went up. Miss, miss, look- here’s where I was shot! Check out my shoulder, my knee..I just had surgery, they took some of the shrapnel out, you know how a bullet explodes? I get more taken out when I get out of here.. So many little boys had bullets lodged in there body. Pain. Suffering. Gang members acting tough. Rows of boys on pastel mats hitting each other through the class I stumbled to teach, some seeking attention trying to get it right to show me, most too distracted by the sight of a female. Nikhil taught the next two classes and one of them went surprisingly great. We had a sense of order and curiosity and there was a definite interest in yoga, the postures, the history, but most of all that they noticed that they felt better at the end of class, than when class first started. That magical shift happened. Yoga’s healing worked and the boys left calm, tranquil and thanked us for coming. It was so inspiring and hopeful. The last class was so awful I had to go get extra security and pull Nikhil out of there. You never know what is going on with kids in juvenile hall- what sticks or what doesn’t. I know that teaching yoga to a group of kids locked up for something helps. I know that one boy that was being transported somewhere in handcuffs across the field next to us walking out, who was being taken somewhere else to be locked up, that looked over at us and smiled and said, “Hey, Namaste” I know that bringing yoga to that one boy provided just a little bit of peace that he can take with him in his heart forever. THAT brings me a little bit more peace too…
Posted on: Mon, 10 Nov 2014 19:45:31 +0000
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