Korean cultural identity is often discovered through ordinary moments, unexpected relationships, and the search for belonging. Meeting Hana Through Yoga is a personal essay exploring spirituality, love, and self-discovery in South Korea.
Meeting Hana Through Yoga:
Her name was Hana.
I was searching for Enlightenment then. Or at least, I believed in such things. I was transitioning from Jesus to Buddha, would eventually go back to Jesus, but mostly I was hungover on any given afternoon.
I had just broken up with a girl I thought I might marry, and I was getting closer to 30, moving up the ladder in a career I didn’t really want. It was the kind of situation where a fellow might walk into a yoga studio thinking this will change his life, particularly after having read The Gita.
I moseyed into her studio, hopeful, but unexpectant. The yoga studio was on the fourth floor of a newly built high-rise near my apartment, replacing an old gimbap restaurant I went to once and never went back to again, despite enjoying the food. I was walking my dog, Max, when I decided to investigate this source of spiritual Enlightenment, mostly thinking, “Where’s my gimbap restaurant?” despite having only eaten there once.
Max was a key part of this story. Any white fluffy dog should be, especially when dealing with an attractive woman. I don’t think I’ve ever used a pick-up line in my life other than, “What are you drinking?”
She had just opened, so she was rather surprised to see me, but pleasantly so, since it had been a few weeks and the lack of customer curiosity was making her nervous.
We spoke about India–which neither of us had been to–and about different kinds of yoga–which neither of us really knew about, and she petted the dog and sipped tea as I explained my search for Enlightenment, and wondered if she might provide guidance in such matters.
Hana explained that her version was the “hot” kind. It was supposed to make you sweat. You were going to be filthy, disgusting, and vile to the touch, and this was supposed to feel liberating.
“But we can do yoga in the park,” she offered. “The fresh air changes the experience.”
I knew we would never do this, but I signed up anyway, perhaps encouraged by the discount she offered, or maybe the splendor of her thick thighs squeezed by tiny shorts. Max panted happily, and I became the only male pupil in the class.
For weeks, I bent and grunted, and wondered if it was my imagination that Hana had patted my ass more than once as guidance, or was it affirmation, as I did a downward dog?
Max was a good sport. He lay in the corner and let the older ladies coddle him and rub his belly. He was a total whore.
Most afternoons, after class let out, Hana would invite me to tea. She talked about the dog she had lost, one of those overgrown rat-things with bulging eyes, but I acted sympathetic. I didn’t yet know how much it would hurt to lose a dog. I didn’t know much about losses yet.
I can’t say if our relationship escalated, or hers and Max’s did. She asked if she could walk him and I shrugged, saying that that’s all we did anyway. I joked that he was my boss and I obeyed his whims, and we both looked down at Max, eyes bright, panting, and he yipped in protestation, knowing he was being used as a foil.
“You should never tease them,” Hana told me seriously. “They’re very sensitive beings.”
Admonished, I let her lead, until she admonished me again and told me that I had to show Max that I was in control.
“It makes them calm,” she told me. “If you don’t lead, it gives them stress. They want you to be in control.”
We walked around Seolleung Park, which was near my home, and I explained that I was new at the dog-owner thing, that Max had entered my life not long ago. My friend FCNI (that’s pronounced “Fettuccini”) and I found the Japanese Spitz outside a bar. We adopted him like a gay couple that didn’t live together, shuttling the dog from FCNI’s place to mine. We were drinking buddies, and when we found the dog we were drunk, and where we found Max was outside a bar.
I left most of those details out.
Hana told the story of her own dog, which was more tragic. She had been gifted the dog by her then-boyfriend, who was supposed to be her soon-husband, and then one day found the bastard with another woman, in the home, in front of their dog, and it destroyed everything.
“I couldn’t even look at my dog anymore,” she admitted quietly. “I felt so betrayed, even by him.”
“By him” meant the dog. I suppose she would have wanted the dog to, like Lassie, run and tell her what was going on, but he simply watched her soon-to-be-husband defile their bed with some other bitch, letting it happen, not saying a word.
“I’m sorry he hurt you,” I told her. I wasn’t sure if I meant her ex or the dog.
We watched some actors on set repeat a stroll down the lane, under the cherry blossoms. The director wanted them to look more in love. The scene later became part of a hit K-drama. We were in Gangnam. You saw a lot of that.
“I guess it still hurts you?” I asked her. “When will it stop?”
Hana looked at the tombs where the kings were buried, behind the park’s gilded gates. Cherry blossoms adrift in a pink swirling breeze.
“I just want to be soft,” Hana said after a while. “I don’t want to be tough, like a scar.”
I asked her if she wanted to stop by my place. She said that she was thirsty.
We spent the rest of the afternoon making love. She introduced me to positions that I wasn’t prepared for.
I was always terrible at yoga. I could never master anything more than the downward dog.
I felt so much silence as she lowered herself onto my face. My ears were covered by the press of her thighs against my skull. I imagined being inside her forever, listening to the sounds of ocean in my head.
The spring flowers bloomed and wilted with the stifling summer heat. I was nowhere near Enlightenment, but I did feel closer to being trapped. I started to panic, and though I tried not to show it, Hana had her third-eye open.
“How much longer are you going to play with me?” she asked in Korean.
Then she lifted up our hands, as if to envision rings there.
The next morning, we woke up and I offered her breakfast, but she said she had plans for brunch with a friend.
Hana played with the dog and I defiantly told her that I was quitting yoga, but there was too much growling between her and the dog as they romped around on all fours.
I would probably never reach Enlightenment.
I would never know what lay beyond the fullness and emptiness of her Spandex. When one day she wore something softer, like a wedding dress.
I leashed up Max and we went down to the street. We walked Hana to Seolleung Station where we said goodbye. Fuck lotus positions. I hated New Age music anyway.
“She really liked you,” I said to Max as we watched her disappear.
I wasn’t sure if I meant her ex or the dog.
“This personal essay explores Korean cultural identity(Korean literature), spirituality, love, and belonging through an unexpected connection with Hana. It is a reflection on human relationships, personal growth, and the search for meaning found in the moments and people who shape our lives.The story also reflects how Korean cultural identity can be connected with personal memories, relationships, and the search for belonging.”