An open and honest conversation about the health of adults in the Indian community led to a life-changing decision that could change the future for this community in Christchurch.

Motivated to help herself, Nalini Rama and her service-minded friends enlisted the help of Sport Canterbury, following a meeting at Pegasus Health.

Rama and friends wanted to create a Strength and Balance class for over 50s in their community. After attending the first session, Rama was inspired to spread the word and share her learnings.

“The way that Rebecca presented made us understand how important it is to keep up our stability – I fell in love with it.”

Held weekly at the Fendalton Community Centre at 6.30pm, the class, titled ‘Yoga and You,’ incorporates basic yoga movements along with strength and balance exercises to help with everyday stability. Light-hearted games are included to make sure the class remains social and fun. According to Sudhir Joshi, one of the original supporters of the class: “In the Indian community we don’t tend to be too physical in our activities. We wanted to develop this class for people to gain confidence with their balance and general health.”

Since its beginning, the class has grown through word of mouth and has now been extended to those in the community under the age of 50. They hope to reach more people who are seeking to improve their health since statistics show that balance steadily deteriorates from the age of 25 onward.

Nalini believes in the benefits of attending ‘Yoga and You’ each week. “The class has really affected me in a positive way, I have started to have better balance and awareness of my surroundings. The best part I like, is the social aspect, I have met so many people I didn’t know in my community – all of us are enjoying it. Healthwise, I feel much better; my posture has improved, and I feel much happier.”

Developing the class was only the first step toward creating positive change. Rama and Shilpa Shailaj, another class leader, have taken it upon themselves to upskill in order to lead the class and help others.

“I decided that someone will have to sacrifice a little bit of time and effort to make our community aware of what is available to them. I felt that if an organisation is ready to help us then we need to be willing to help ourselves,” Rama says.

Shilpa agrees. “I decided to be one of the leaders as I wanted to serve the community, especially senior citizens. I love supporting them and translating in Hindi for them.”

Rama and Shailaj both attended the Community Exercise Foundation course, run by Active Canterbury in order to learn how to facilitate the class in the future with the idea that it will be run for the community - by the community. “I think everybody should learn some of the aspects of the training,” Nalini adds.

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