Yoga Bear

September 15, 2010 10:15 PM

Behold Santra, the Yoga Bear.
posted by homunculus (32 comments total)

Related post.
posted by homunculus at 10:16 PM on September 15, 2010

birds are not meant for cages, boats not built to stay moored in harbors, and zoos were not meant to be at all.

what happened to the light in her eyes?

the article promulgates, at best, a self-serving anthropomorphism.
posted by simulacra at 10:26 PM on September 15, 2010 [1 favorite]

I wasn't expecting a shot of a bear flashing its crotch like that.
posted by Burhanistan at 10:26 PM on September 15, 2010 [1 favorite]

> and zoos were not meant to be at all.

I'm not so sure about that. Yes, zoos by and large are rather sad places, but the impressions that you can get there are kind of unobtainable otherwise. Besides, zoos raise all sorts of money and awareness for conservation efforts so the suffering of a few animals may net something good in the overall picture. But, I derail.
posted by Burhanistan at 10:29 PM on September 15, 2010 [3 favorites]

What's troubling Gus you sound demented
is it because someone talked and she told me
he no longer thinks anything that moves and
everything he sees is something to kill and eat?
What's troubling Gus is it nothing goes quiet?
the whip-poor-will at dusk...

What's troubling Gus overhearing conversations
that it's because you're too either them or me
when it's either them or it's us anything that moves and
everything you see is something to kill and eat
What's troubling Gus? Is it nothing goes quiet?
Is that what's troubling ya Gus the mere mention of the name
used to be enough to make every bird stop singing?
Is that what's troubling ya Gus? No is afraid enough?

What's troubling Gus is it nothing goes quiet?
Is that what's troubling ya Gus? The mere mention of the name
used to be enough to make every bird stop singing
the whip-poor-will at dusk tells you no one is afraid

no one is afraid enough
is it afraid
or is it afraid enough?
it's troubling Gus

Gus: The Polar Bear from Central Park
The Tragically Hip
posted by bwg at 10:38 PM on September 15, 2010

That first photo is one of my favorite animal pictures of all time - and that includes the monkey levitating the banana.
posted by queensissy at 10:39 PM on September 15, 2010

Organic, free-range bioparks of the 21st century.

please i am starting a fund for this, send me donations
posted by polymodus at 10:42 PM on September 15, 2010

but shells being twee... : )
posted by simulacra at 10:43 PM on September 15, 2010

> what happened to the light in her eyes?

And what haunts me, is that in all the faces of all the bears that Treadwell ever filmed, I discover no kinship, no understanding, no mercy. I see only the overwhelming indifference of nature. To me, there is no such thing as a secret world of the bears. And this blank stare speaks only of a half-bored interest in food. But for Timothy Treadwell, this bear was a friend, a savior.

posted by Burhanistan at 10:45 PM on September 15, 2010 [4 favorites]

Pics or it didn't.. oh, wait.. sorry.
posted by vidur at 10:45 PM on September 15, 2010

Would you like to have a bear like this in your shower? Or watching you eat?
I sure would.
posted by Sam Ryan at 10:46 PM on September 15, 2010

I feel like these bears are doing things no other bears would understand, or would even begin to understand, and that there is a kind of loneliness to their specialization of their hobbies and their dedication to them and that if Claude Bear and Santra Bear should ever meet they may recognize each other as masters of their domains but proceed, at first gently and then progressively more and more abusively, towards that special kind of fight, the ideological growling over the better hobby, the more fruitful one, the one that was generally a better use of calories and time, and all of this would culminate, as these things do, naturally, into mad mad passionate bear sex, the throes of which shake their rubber/plastic hybrid environments, these very cages that had once spurred them to their livelihoods now barely containing such explosive emotions, and the long, deep sleep afterward, the waking up to dry mouths and lingering headaches and unvoiced, unthought, ignored, but still present regrets of an existential nature, and now they both sit, hobbies forgotten, gazing blankly at the effervescent, colorful, and occasionally bright trees that have always made up the forests of their home, and they sit there, watching, silently, as the backdrop bends and shakes and creaks and groans under the weight of a wind that never comes.
posted by dubusadus at 11:01 PM on September 15, 2010 [12 favorites]

Nothing really surprises me after the rainbow vomiting pandas of interestingness.
posted by hypersloth at 11:08 PM on September 15, 2010 [1 favorite]

so, see, this is less pugilist, more poetry.
posted by simulacra at 11:08 PM on September 15, 2010

the previous comment brought to you by sooooo much wine
posted by dubusadus at 11:08 PM on September 15, 2010

Kristus, mikä perseenreikä.
posted by Crane Shot at 11:09 PM on September 15, 2010

bear-ly credible
posted by lalochezia at 11:18 PM on September 15, 2010

simulacra: “what happened to the light in her eyes? ¶ the article promulgates, at best, a self-serving anthropomorphism.”

I actually agree with you wholly on your point regarding the sadness and pointlessness of zoos, simulacra, but I've got to say that I experienced a pretty heady rush of cognitive dissonance reading those two sentences together.
posted by koeselitz at 11:20 PM on September 15, 2010 [4 favorites]

Not to raise undue alarm, but that photoset of her stretching routine is awfully reminiscent of a montage sequence in a film where the imprisoned hero gets into the kind of superhuman shape necessary to indiscriminately slaughter a dozen or two guards before escaping into the world to exact terrible vengeance upon the bad guys. It's probably advisable to stay away from this zoo and not be anywhere near whoever it was that caught her or her mother. In fact, stay the hell away from Finland, the body count has a way of mounting precipitously in situations of that ilk. And for god's sakes, if you do find yourself in the Ahtari Zoo, don't throw anything at her or mock her in any way. We all know how in these kinds of stories those who deal out petty humiliations come to an ironic and gruesome end.
posted by Kattullus at 11:53 PM on September 15, 2010

Captive bears are known for sterotypic movements, and while it's not clear that this is what is going on hear, but the Guardian citing a Yoga teacher as some kind of expert on animal behaviour is pretty obnoxious.
posted by tallus at 12:02 AM on September 16, 2010 [3 favorites]

More spiritual than the average bear.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 12:21 AM on September 16, 2010 [1 favorite]

Jebus - can't we allow animals any dignity?
posted by helmutdog at 12:28 AM on September 16, 2010

birds are not meant for cages, boats not built to stay moored in harbors, and zoos were not meant to be at all.

About 1% of the remaining Sumatran Tigers in the world were bred in one zoo in Wellington. The ones in Sumatra are almost gone. What's you're solution, champ? Release them into Sumatra and come back iun a couple of years to find them extinct? Or do you have some sort of magic wand that will make habitat descruction and hunting stop tomorrow?
posted by rodgerd at 1:58 AM on September 16, 2010

the article promulgates, at best, a self-serving anthropomorphism.

This.

From the article: Paul Harvey, a Bristol-based yoga teacher and trainer, said Santra was indeed practising the ancient Indian discipline.

and then Mr. Harvey expands to conclude with: "The bear's flexibility and balance, he added, marked her out as something of an expert: "These are not beginners' postures. Yogi bear is definitely an advanced practitioner."

What a dipshit. A what a dipshit reporter. This bear is not practicing yoga (may have heard somewhere, the blue? a New Age gateway drug), the bear has no conception of yoga. It's a bear, ffs.

That said the photos are pretty neat despite being used the way The Guardian is using them. Are there any British newspapers that don't suck?
posted by IvoShandor at 3:51 AM on September 16, 2010 [1 favorite]

Cute, but no comparison to Wojtek the Polish Soldier bear, featured here a while ago. I bet the Yoga bear ( not to be confused with Yogi Bear) doesn't even smoke or drink!
posted by mermayd at 4:39 AM on September 16, 2010

OH HAI R U MY FEETZ?
posted by Inspector.Gadget at 6:53 AM on September 16, 2010

"When you wake up in the morning, Pooh," said Piglet at last, "what's the first thing you say to yourself?"
"What's for breakfast? said Pooh. "What do you say, Piglet?"
"I say, I wonder what's going to happen exciting today?" said Piglet.
Pooh nodded thoughtfully.
"It's the same thing," he said.
posted by Fizz at 6:59 AM on September 16, 2010 [1 favorite]

Contemplating the Buddha nature of the pic-a-nic basket?
posted by stevis23 at 7:12 AM on September 16, 2010

What's all this about Santa Bear?
posted by Astro Zombie at 7:27 AM on September 16, 2010

So there is an actual yogi bear?
posted by acb at 7:37 AM on September 16, 2010

The Bear Who Loved Vodka
posted by The Whelk at 8:06 AM on September 16, 2010 [1 favorite]

What's all this about Santa Bear?

Santas and bears are actually rivals in the wild, and the Santas are much more dangerous. It's said that a large Father Christmas can easily tear apart a fully grown bear (nsfw).

But recent developments in ursine martial arts may have shifter the balance of power. What I want to know is, could a typical young bear, armed only with a staff, be trained to consistently "win" fights with a Father Christmas? Assume no element of surprise.
posted by homunculus at 11:25 AM on September 16, 2010 [1 favorite]