WHAT STEPS YOGAJAYA IS TAKING IN RESPONSE TO THE CORONAVIRUS SITUATION

CORONAVIRUS INFORMATION

UPDATES

1/28/2022:

In-person studio teaching update

From our last update in June of 2021, we’ve continued to monitor the developments of Covid-19. Although certain aspects of the progression with Covid are looking positive, the emergence of the Omicron variant has had a major impact on the world.

Although vaccines are now more widespread, and there is some speculation that we could be moving toward herd immunity, it is still not clear about how and when we will be able to restart and sustain in-person public classes in Tokyo.

Since the start of the Pandemic to now, many in-person businesses all over the world have failed in staying operational. Sad as this may have been for many great businesses and organizations, it is very important that we continue to serve our community. In this way, YogaJaya will continue to focus on what we can sustainably offer to support both our community and our business operations.

In this way we will still not yet be able to commence with in-person teaching until the global situation and government advisories have presented clear options toward a safe, sustainable and financially viable resolution.

Virtual Session Launch

As a part of our ongoing developments, we are very happy to announce the launch of Virtual Sessions on the Baseworks Practice Platform. 

UPCOMING:

 

The Virtual Sessions will act as companion content for the online practice in the form of live practice sessions with Baseworks teachers. Virtual Sessions can be purchased and booked from the Baseworks Practice Platform Website.

You can see all upcoming Virtual Sessions by visiting our events listings page.

If you have not yet taken advantage of the YogaJaya Account Balance Transfer Program, it was set up to allow for all our students holding active passes and memberships from YogaJaya to transfer the value to the new Baseworks Practice Platform. 

To find out more or to get started, please login to your YogaJaya dashboard. Once you complete your YogaJaya Account Balance Transfer Program, login to the Baseworks Practice Platform to begin practicing on the platform and book any upcoming Virtual Sessions. 

For all other students (old and new) interested in picking up your practice with us again or to get started, visit this page to learn more.

6/16/2021:

In-person studio teaching update

From last April to now, we’ve been keeping a very close eye on the developments of Covid-19.

We were monitoring how it spreads and the emergence of new variants (some of which are now appearing to be seriously affecting a much younger demographic).

We were also monitoring how different countries are applying measures to attempt to mitigate the spread.

Although these measures are in place and vaccines are slowly being distributed around the world, it is not certain when these efforts are going to present clear results.

All of this directly relates to when and how we will be able to restart and sustain in-person public classes in Tokyo.

Although many in-person businesses around the world are persevering to maintain operations, we will not yet be able to commence with in-person teaching until the situation has moved towards a safe, sustainable and viable resolution.

Online Practice Platform Launch

With this being said, we are very happy to announce the launch of our new Online Baseworks Practice Platform with online classes as well as some very unique new content to support your progress.

We’ve been working very hard over the past year to develop an effective alternative to the in-person teaching experience that goes much deeper than a lot of what’s typically offered online.

The platform offers a realistic opportunity to maintain your practice and also accompany the eventual in-person learning experience into the future.

As we also know just how isolated everyone has been due to the pandemic, we developed a community within the platform that allows you to connect with students and teachers from YogaJaya.

 

As the platform is available internationally, you will also be able to connect with other teachers and practitioners all over the world.

The new online practice platform launched on both desktop and mobile/tablet websites with plans on our development roadmap to launch an accompanying APP on iOS and Android.

Account Balance Transfer Program

Since the situation with Covid-19 has no clear resolve, and we are still unable to confirm when the in-person classes in Tokyo will resume, we are presenting  our students holding active passes and memberships the ability to transfer any remaining YogaJaya tickets/memberships to our new Baseworks Online Practice Platform.

In order to complete your YogaJaya Account Balance Transfer Program, login to the YogaJaya site dashboard for a video preview of the platform along with details on how to get started.  

For all other students (old and new) interested in picking up your practice with us again or to get started, visit this page to learn more.

5/21/2020:

COVID 19: Impact on the Studio

As you all know from February to now, the studio operations were subject to the developments of COVID 19, which had lead to studio temporary closures in accordance with “kyugyo yosei” (government requested shut-down). 

In combination with both students and teachers also desiring to implement “jishuku” (social distancing), there was a steady progression toward a 90% decrease in both student  attendance and scheduled classes since late February. 

By the time that we closed the studio on April 11th in accordance with “kyugyo yosei” (government requested shut-down), we had suffered the most significant loss in sales in the history of the studio operations. 

Reality of the Pandemic

We seriously considered the following points in relation to how we continue to move forward and serve the community:

  • COVID 19 is globally recognized as being more deadly and more contagious than any flu and has been labeled as the worst global pandemic in history. 
  • Currently, there are no officially documented cures, treatments, or immediately effective tools to mitigate it. Even if a treatment/vaccine was developed, the trial protocol requires 12 to 18 months from now of testing before anything can be disseminated globally.
  • People of any age seem to be able to contract it, in any environment, and may not show any symptoms, which requires measures such as social distancing and social isolation.
  • There is no natural immunity yet in the population because it has not been circulating for the extended years required for this to happen. 
  • The world has entered the worst historically unprecedented economic crash that has no clear solutions with predictable timelines.
  • There are elements of the situation that are still very ambiguous and it is difficult to determine how things will unfold over time.

Taking everything into consideration, we decided to leave the physical building space in Daikanyama as of May 15th. 

This was a tough decision. We could have continued to wait for another month or 2, absorbing the losses of the high cost of the rent. However, considering the lack of clarity about the timing at which the situation will go back where both our students and teachers can feel safe to regularly participate in public classes, we had to make changes in order to continue offering our programing in an economically sustainable way. 

YogaJaya: From Now Forward

We are currently looking into other physical practice space alternatives in the same neighborhood. Of course, the re-opening of a physical practice space will only take place once the pandemic has been clearly announced as being under control.

Until then, as we are dedicated to continuing to serve our community in offering learning opportunities related to what we have built with our programming, we are committed to allocating all available resources to the following:

1. Launch of an extensive online learning platform. We have already filmed and produced this and we are in the final stages of launching it publicly

This is an extensive library of hundreds of pre-recorded sequences, practice tips, and individual form/pose videos filmed from multiple-camera angles, offered by different certified teachers for the purpose of maintaining a high level of diversity in the delivery.

2. Creation of a new format for live student-teacher sessions. This is meant to accompany our pre-recorded online content mentioned in point 1, and will be facilitated by certified teachers.

Different from a live zoom class, this will be a live session that focuses on offering targeted feedback and answering questions that come up on technique and further developing practice quality. Similar to that of the Baseworks Master Classes.

3. Whereby possible, to offer in-person teaching in the form of regular public classes, events, courses, workshops, and specialized training programs in venues best suited to provide a healthy and safe environment.

4. Continue to offer teacher training programs by changing the format of delivery to suit the circumstance, from virtual/online, hybrid (combination of virtual/online and in-person), to fully in-person.

Our teacher trainings are an important part of our programming. Because we had already built an extensive online learning platform specifically for the teacher training, we were invited to do a webinar on online/virtual learning for the Yoga Alliance to its global community of over 100,000 members. The webinar was presented in Japanese to people in Japan and in English worldwide in April. You can watch the archived recording of that webinar here to get a glimpse of how we have been using online/virtual learning in our teacher trainings.

With everything highlighted here we aim to create a more inclusive and flexible platform to learn, allowing anyone to participate in our programming at a place and time of their choosing. 

In this way, YogaJaya still is and will continue its operations in serving our community, implementing all mentioned here to best adapt to the current and ongoing set of circumstances.

Please stay posted for more updates very soon and thank you all for being such an integral part of our community.

4/10/2020:

Due to the current coronavirus developments and the announcement of the national state of emergency, we will be temporarily closing the studio until further notice from Saturday, April 11. Subsequent studio schedules will be determined promptly in response to local government requests and future changes in circumstances, and will be announced. We very much appreciate your understanding on this matter.

3/27/2020:

Based on Governor Koike’s requests to refrain from going out on weekends due to a response to the new coronavirus infectious disease in Tokyo and other metropolitan areas, the studio will be temporarily closed for this weekend (3/28, 3/29). Passes will be extended for the time that the studio is closed.

3/11/2020:

We will be opening the studio again for regular classes as planned on March 12. However, as the situation with the coronavirus is still developing, we will reopen by adapting the regular studio policies to best match the current situation so as to keep the practice space as safe as possible for everyone to continue practicing. We very much appreciate your understanding on this matter.

We ask that you please carefully review the following points pertaining to changes in practicing at our studio before visiting the studio so we can work together to create as safe a practice environment as possible:

3/11/2020:

Studio Hygiene Measures:

  • If any teaching staff is experiencing any type of common cold symptoms, even mild (such as cough/sneezing, sore throat, phlegm/runny nose, experiencing respiratory symptoms), and or fever, their classes will either be substituted or canceled. Please carefully check the schedule before coming to the studio to make sure scheduled classes have not been canceled.
  • Continued installation of alcohol disinfectant.
  • Continued provision of hand washing soap.
  • Continued provision of mat disinfection spray made of germicidal ethanol, citric acid, and tea tree oil that can be used to clean your own yoga mats. PLEASE NOTE: you will need to bring your own mat as well as towel to wipe down your mats.
  • We will perform regular studio cleaning/disinfecting.
  • We will regularly implement ventilation before, during, after and between classes.
  • We will be using ultraviolet-C lamps periodically at the studio for cleaning/disinfecting. 
  • Teachers will continue to keep physical assist to a minimum, and use alcohol disinfectant if any physical assist/contact with a student is made.
  • Teaching staff and students may be wearing masks.

IMPORTANT: Changes in relation to Studio Use

Class Capacity:

Classes will be limited to 14 students per class. We highly recommend you to book in advance. If you see that a class is fully booked, you may come to the studio and wait on standby, though we cannot ensure you a spot. Please book online to secure your space advance and if you need to cancel, please cancel within the 3-hour class cancellation window to ensure the ticket to be credited back and to open the class attendance for others to join.

Mat and Mat Wiping Towel:

We can see no fully hygienic and safe way to keep providing mats for use at the studio under the current situation. Measures such as covering the studio mats with a towel, skidless, or mat rug would not be fully safe unless it was immediately washed and disinfected after the use of both the mat and the mat wiping towel. As this is impossible for us to monitor, we ask that all students prepare and bring the following:

  • Please bring your own mats. You are also welcomed to practice directly on the floor, as we will be disinfecting the floor regularly. (Many of our students and teachers do not use mats.)
  • Please bring 1 to 2 hand towels. One for perspiration and one to wipe down your own mat with our mat disinfectant spray.
  • Blocks will be provided, but all other props such as straps, bolsters, blankets will not be provided. If you need any of these items for your practice, please bring them with you.

Other Considerations:

  • If you have any type of common cold symptoms, even mild (such as cough/sneeze, sore throat, phlegm/runny nose, experiencing respiratory symptoms), and or fever, we ask that you please not come to the studio until you are clear of all such symptoms. 
  • If you develop any of the above symptoms during any class, we ask you to please leave the class, visit the doctor and return home to recover properly, and not return to the studio until you are clear of all such symptoms. 
  • As we will regularly opening the windows to ventilate the practice space both before, after, during and between classes, and as we will not be providing blankets, please bring layers of clothing to stay warm.
  • We will be removing the lost and found basket and all items that are left behind will be disposed daily. Please ensure you do not leave any forgotten belongings in the studio when you leave.

Final Considerations:

YogaJaya urges that you carefully consider everything stated here and to stay as safe and informed as possible on the developments of the coronavirus situation. 

Note that everything we have implemented here is subject to change. As all students will be notified of changes via email, we ask that you please whitelist the yogajaya.com domain from your email spam filter so as to receive the most current updates, and or check this page daily. 

Please also visit the WHO site to understand basic protective measures.

Also check the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare Homepage:

 

Japanese

English

Further consideration for all flu-like illnesses

This notice pertains to recent coronavirus outbreak and all other flu-like illnesses. 

At YogaJaya students and teachers all work together in the same spaces at the studio. This increases the chance of coming in contact with people who are sick.

We are setting the protocols are in place to help decrease the spread of illness during practice and would like for everyone to consider the following.

  • If you have flu-like and or symptoms (such as fever, respiratory symptoms, chills, body aches, headaches, fatigue, vomiting, diarrhea) within 24 hours of any class, please stay home and rest.
  • If you have had the flu recently, you should be fever and symptom-free for at least 48 hours before coming to the studio.
  • If you arrive at the studio on any given day and you are ill, we will ask you to please return home.
  • If you develop flu symptoms during any class, we will ask you to please leave the class and go home to recover properly.
  • If you are too ill to go home on your own, we will notify your emergency contact to come and help you get back home.
  • To clarify, if you are sick, please stay home and take care of yourself and help to prevent the spread of illness to others at the studio.
  • If you need to cancel your class due to being ill after your 3 hours free cancellation refund window, you can contact us and we will be very happy to return your ticket for that class.