(JP/J.B. Djwan)

The kids of Saren village in Karangasem would giggle at the brouhaha surrounding yoga.

It's something they have been doing all their lives in a tradition passed down for decades.

As tourists spend hundreds of dollars at Bali's yoga supermarkets and Muslim ulema debate the health benefits versus religious elements of yoga, these kids are simply getting on with it.

Dressed in sarongs and faded T-shirts, more than 150 kids from 10 local banjar in Saren village come together shortly after dawn every Sunday morning to learn and practice the yoga they believe builds good health and self-confidence.

Moving through ever more difficult asanas, the children breathe, groan, heave and sometimes fall on the pitted cement floor that is their exercise space when rains have flooded the lawns otherwise used. Even without yoga mats or leotards, the kids manage some of the most difficult positions of yoga, including the gravity-defying flying lotus.

To make this move, the kids sit in the lotus position, fold forward and place their chins on the floor. They then raise their crossed legs, forming an inverted triangle. The movement takes enormous abdominal strength and concentration - as 10-year-old Ida Bagus Argapata discovered as he lost his balance and flipped over Without complaint, Argapata dusted himself off and rejoined his fellow upside-down young yogis.

When the kids perform this move in a circle, they create a massive human lotus flower made of concentration, strength and self-confidence.

The climax to the two-hour session comes with meditation. There is a palpable shift in the atmosphere as 150 children move from the physical to the spiritual, chanting om in deep meditation. The single syllable vibrates through the open bale as kids as young as six journey through the psychic colors of black, red, blue and white with a focus rarely found in adults, as the deep concentration exercised through yoga's physical positions works on the control of the mind.

Even the youngest yoga students can see the colors during meditation. "I like yoga because it makes me healthy and when I meditate I see blue," says tiny Ni Komang Yasa.

Her teacher, 28-year-old Mang-ku Susenna, says the colors experienced during meditation are caused by an inner movement of the mind toward light.

"We see color *during meditation* because from the beginning we are finding the light. At first, it is black, then students move into red, then blue and finally to the brightness that is white light. At this level the light does not move - you have reached stillness at this point," says Susenna, adding it is much easier for children than adults to develop the necessary concentration.

"Kids learn yoga more easily than adults. They are more flexible in mind and body. Their minds are still clear, whereas adults tend to have a lot on their minds so it is more difficult to relax into meditation."

At just 14 years of age, Putu Natasya Himasyanti and her friends, Kadek Bagiasti and Sunariasih, are skilled yoga practitioners, capable of advanced yoga positions and of journeying deeply within during meditation.

"I can see a white light very quickly," says Himasyanti, who, like her friends, enjoys the benefits of yoga. "It's really good - I can do a lot of positions. The hardest is the sirsa asana - that's standing on my head."

The benefits of yoga are far greater than simply boosting the individual health of the yoga kids from across Saren village, which lies on the lower slopes of Mount Agung.

Banjar across Bali are well known for their occasional border skirmishes. Some villages have feuds that date back centuries and inhabitants do not speak with the neighboring village.

Yoga teachers in Saren believe that by bringing kids of different banjar together from childhood, there is a high chance they will remain friends into adulthood, derailing inter-banjar issues through friendships, explains assistant yoga teacher, Made Sri Darmayanti.

"The kids come from several different banjar in the area. Learning yoga together builds friendships between the banjar - they get to know each other. I think this also helps build healthy communities made up of people with focused minds who are more beautiful because they are healthy. This builds their self-confidence into the future and the concentration they develop also helps in their school work," says Darmayanti who also learned yoga as a child.

Susenna agrees the yoga lessons are positive for local communities: "Yoga shared between kids of different banjar makes for a more peaceful area and into the future builds healthier communities."

Both Susenna and Darmayanti are dismayed at the notion of paying to learn yoga. "It must be free *yoga lessons*. This is given to us so we have greater self-control and we feel closer to God," says Susenna.

Darmayanti also sees yoga as a gift from God for everyone. "Yoga can regenerate us all, so our country can grow stronger and we can work together. Because this is freely given from God it must be freely given to each other," says Darmayanti - and her 153 healthy and happy students agree.

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