Move Over, Goat Yoga. Alaskans Now Have Reindeer Yoga
If you want to incorporate quality time with animals into your yoga practice, you have a lot of options these days. There's puppy yoga, cat yoga, and perhaps the most famous — goat yoga.
Now, in Fairbanks, Alaska, there's a new offering: a yoga class with fauna particular to the cold northern climes of the subarctic. Reindeer.
In a grassy pen at the Running Reindeer Ranch, adult and baby reindeer are milling around — grazing, nosing curiously at water bottles, and pawing yoga mats as people shake them out for class.
The air is buzzing with mosquitoes, and the sky is threatening rain, but a good two dozen or so people have shown up for this petting zoo and exercise experience.
"I've wanted to do goat yoga, but this is like one step up," says Tarah Hoxsie, one of the attendees. "This is like the ultimate, OK. So while everybody's doing goat yoga in the lower 48, we're doing reindeer yoga, which is way cooler."
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[Ed. Note: Yes, this story submission has nothing to do with STEM. But, it did give me a chuckle. And it reminded me of a quote by George Carlin “Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that.” So it's good to be aware of what some people think is a "good idea(TM)" and have a good laugh once in a while, too.]
(Score: 2) by edIII on Monday June 24 2019, @09:45PM (1 child)
You should be fair here, and while I also laugh at the ridiculous pretentiousness of reindeer yoga being cooler, I also know there are clinically substantiated medical benefits to animals being a part of medicine.
Years ago when I was hospitalized for a heart "event" there were specialized animals brought in specifically to spend time with patients. I was offered time with a golden lab that was pretty sweet. There really is loads of scientific data that show decreased blood pressure and heart rate, among other benefits, in response to petting animals.
All of this being said, actually paying for yoga around animals for its coolness factor is still funny. Especially when they're apparently in "arms race" to do yoga with rare and/or deadly animals. I'll be impressed when the first class of aquatic yoga students survive a session in the river next to Hippos.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Monday June 24 2019, @10:05PM
Fair enough. And if that sort of thing can help folks, that's great.
What's more, I never said that animals weren't useful in many ways.
But what about the folks in hospital who are counting on me to provide them with humorous stuff to give *them* some medical benefits?
Should I deprive them of the opportunity to use laughter as a path toward healing because some other folks have no sense of humor? You might as well be putting a gun to their heads and pulling the trigger.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr