Turn off Rivonia … go through the boom and turn to your left …” reads the SMS. The northern suburbs of Johannesburg seem an unlikely place to find the African experience of sweat lodges, more commonly associated with Native American culture.
‘Some people do find it weird that I’m running this in a city,” acknowledges Niyan Stirling. He has six lodges around South Africa — two at Rustlers Valley in the Free State and one each in Pietermaritzburg, Pretoria, Fourways and Rivonia. ‘But there’s actually more focus here than any of the other lodges. At Rustlers, people do it because there’s nothing else to do. Here people have to book and pay beforehand, which entails commitment.”
The lodge is a grass hut heated by stones that have been baked in a fire for about two hours. Stirling brings the stones up from Rustlers where the dolomite ridge provides stones that heat evenly. Heating slate, quartz and some river stones is dangerous as they can explode.
I arrive a little early to find a fire already baking the stones. The property is owned by Chris Stormer, a reflexologist, and there is a large thatch house, swimming pool, lapa, rolling green lawn and, in the brush near the fence, the soon to be sweaty grass hut. You can hear the traffic rushing down Rivonia Road, but it is an enclave of suburban peace.
A young girl tends the fire, pouring on mealie meal and tobacco, adding wood and rearranging the coals. The mealie meal and tobacco ‘acknowledge the consciousness of the fire by feeding it”, says Stirling. Later, a trail of mealie meal is made from the fire to the hut — ‘the lifeline”. We are asked to believe that whatever we release in the hut ‘travels down the lifeline and is burnt in the fire”.
Euphemisms do abound — menstruation is called ‘moon time”, toilets ‘sprinklings” and above the main house’s doors are signs reading ‘synchronicity”. But I’m trying not to be cynical, that’s far too easy. It is just another language. Besides, I’m reassured by the lack of fanaticism — it’s just a question of belief.
Stirling sums it up: ‘I can tell someone to sit with a plant and hold on to the plant and the plant will take your energy and release what you no longer need. That will happen because of the belief of the person. So we create a belief system that people can grow from. It’s manipulative in a slight way, but it’s positively manipulative.”
More people start arriving, many in business suits, some in gym clothes. A group of seasoned sweaters are already in their sarongs and costumes. There are security guards, teachers, housewives, car salesmen and more. I feel less nervous. This is not a religion, in fact, it seems more like an exotic sauna.
Sweating is considered a means of purification. By releasing the toxins in the sweat glands, one feels lighter, explains Stirling. For him, it ‘purifies mind, body and spirit”.
Stirling gives an introduction and reassures the newbies that it is natural to be scared. He gives us a brief outline of what to expect — there will be four stages, with three hot stones added after each. Each stage focuses on a different element. About 20 of us, skimpily clad, line up to enter the hut one by one. Soon we are breathing heavily and swapping sweat.
First is the air stage and everyone just breathes deeply. I sweat so much my eyes start burning and I fear fainting. Stirling says no one’s ever fainted. Even though it’s dark, he can hear from the breathing whether people are battling. Wish he’d told me that before. Stirling also tells me that sometimes companies use this as a team-building exercise. Personally, I’m reassured by the security of being strangers.
Next is the fire stage, where everyone chants the rainbow mantra, a Tibetan meditation that Stirling guides us through. This is followed by the water stage — a bucket is passed around from which everyone splashes water on their neighbour. Then everyone chants their own chosen sound for the rest of the phase. Although this can apparently be an amazingly harmonic experience, during my sweat it was a cacophony. Finally, in the earth stage, Stirling leads the singing of Mamalie, a traditional African song. I didn’t make it this far as my legs seized into cramps near the end of the water stage and I left the lodge. Once having left, one cannot return.
Outside, I am told to lie on the ground until my body temperature has normalised. I feel light and a bit spacey. Apparently we were in there for more than two hours, it felt like half the time. The stars look amazing and I have fleeting realisations that I promptly forget. One can then plunge into the pool and, afterwards, people linger for soup and bread. I don’t register much, feeling like a blank slate.
Website bookings: www.marimbanet.org.za. Cost: R170