Swami Sarasvati

Sun Herald

Sunday October 15, 2006

Interview Alex May

The television yoga guru was born on an ashram in India but married a good-looking Australian surfer who produced her body-bending shows.

I still say I'm 39. I like that age. It is old enough to tell people what to do but not too old. I've been doing yoga since I was three. I was born on an ashram and my father was a holy man. I came to Australia to do a lecture tour and met my husband, Darryl Hackett. He was a yoga teacher and surf-lifesaver - also very good-looking - so I stayed and married him.

This is the picture that started my television career. Channel 10 approached us after they read a story [accompanied by this photograph] about me in the newspaper. In that story, I told the reporter I was 38. I would meditate and swim at Newport Beach every morning. Someone rang the paper and said, "A woman swims in a sari and walks out of the water dry." There was nothing magical about that - the sari would be dry by the time I walked to the road.

My first program went to air in January 1968. I didn't know what to say or what camera to look at but they gave me half an hour a day, five days a week [on Channel 10 at 10.30am], so I must have done something right. I used to take my Afghan dog, Laxmi, and Siamese cat, Sadhu, on set with me. Not many people knew about yoga before that. People would come up to me at shopping centres and tell me how much they loved the show. I've never watched myself, though. I don't watch television at all.

I always live a good lifestyle. I get up at 3am or 3.30am and meditate. I am vegetarian and eat one or two meals a day. I eat all kinds of things: lentils, rice, grains, fruit, vegetables and yoghurt. I hate sleeping; I always think I will miss out on something. I usually sleep between 1am and 3am but sometimes I don't sleep at all.

I don't drink coffee or alcohol. I sleep less and eat less, breathe more and laugh a lot. Laughing is like internal jogging.

I've been to hospital once, to have Sanjay, my son [now 28].

Darryl was a wonderful husband. He produced our television show. All I had to do was get in the car, go to the make-up room and go on set. Darryl had brain damage in a bad accident in 1996, then in 2002, he passed away. He had pneumonia. Before my husband's accident, I was looked after like a princess at the maharaja's palace. After his accident, I had lessons to learn.

I couldn't just take money out of his back pocket. I didn't know how to put petrol in the car. I can laugh now but it was hard.

When you are stressed out with worries, that's when you start looking old. When you meditate, you are calm and relaxed. Everyone has worries. Since the world was created, wars and tension and poverty have been everywhere. It's how you deal

with worry - that's what counts.

Fast forward

I gave up the show when I became pregnant with Sanjay. My pregnancy was special and I didn't want to be on television looking fat. When Sanjay was 15 months old, we did some five-minute fillers for the regional stations, which went to air all over Australia. I had a show on SBS for a while and did a segment for Adelaide television. Sanjay has been

to university and studied two degrees in commerce and law. He became a qualified

yoga teacher when he was 11 and works with me, at our home and health resort on

the outskirts of Sydney. I teach yoga five days a week and train yoga teachers. There is a Swami Sarasvati skin-care range and I take yoga tours to India. I like my lifestyle.

© 2006 Sun Herald

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