The funny thing was, in the end I had to persuade my friend to go to the Balinese shaking session she had talked me into. Friday night and she'd lost her keen, on the verge of bottling in the name of lassitude and a desire to sit in the park and talk about my writing instead. While this thoroughly appealed to my ego, fact is that having committed to the shaking idea, it sat ill with me to back out. So I suggested that if she hated it or if it hurt, we should leave. Thus, armed with excuses and get-out clause, we approached Brockwell Park Lido.

We went into studio 3 and shook. That's it really, we shook for 2 hours. 20 minutes in, I was looking around bored to death, bored even with the yelps, belches, squeaks, moose-like moans and hysterical laughter emanating from the shakers. Sometimes they used blessed liquid tobacco, shooting a little bit up each nostril with plastic syringes which were then placed in water. One lady was in paroxysms, stamping and rolling around in glee. I could tell she was more than a mere shaker; she had been to the Ashram in Bali, and done the five day course. Later, in the sit-down, she told us that the guru had appeared before her with a special simple message that she just had to share. She was nice, nicer than I am; but she had that air of a disciple, a vibe that makes me wary.

Still, I can't say that nothing happened. I did feel a sense of change on a psychic/psychological level. After a period of feeling strangely blank, suddenly I have the germ of an idea well worth following up. Perhaps shaking works in the same way that speaking in tongues or jiving around to the rapture works; whether the connection is to the subconscious, the divine or the dao, a loosening can occur, and it can be useful. It is an interesting method. As ever with such things, a belief system becomes part of the overlay, not necessarily useful or interesting.

Friend enjoyed it. Her eyes were sparkling and she was enthused, so I am very glad that we did it. Does it generate any change other than a sense of feeling good for a while? We'll have to see. It did not enhance my ever dubious sense of direction; From Herne Hill I found myself wandering round the desolation of Peckham, where a metaphysical understanding of London's night buses might have come in handy. There's never a guru around when you need one.