By Joe Anuta
On a recent Thursday in Flushing, a group of people including two neighborhood politicians and a man dressed as a human-sized pork bun were learning the art of secret yoga.
“I dropped a pen. I’m not really doing yoga,” instructor Michelle Cavanagh said, as she touched her toe while demonstrating a series of desk-appropriate stretches.
Cavanagh is one of the many instructors culled from the five boroughs who will teach at a new yoga outfit in Flushing called Yumcha Studios which, oddly enough, also doubles as home base for an internationally acclaimed comic book series.
The spousal team of Yen Yen Woo and Colin Goh are the creative minds behind “Dim Sum Warriors,” a bilingual comic series chronicling the exploits of expert martial artists who happen to be anthropomorphic versions of Cantonese food.
That explained why the human-sized pork bun, a mascot for the series, was hanging out in the building.
But why was it doing yoga?
The answer, according to Goy and Woo, is the entrepreneurial spirit of Flushing.
A few months ago, the duo was looking for new space and happened upon the second-floor of 33-59 Farrington St.
It was a little too large, but they liked it enough to try and fill the space with something else. Woo often had to travel outside the neighborhood to attend yoga classes, away from their 4-year-old daughter. So they did some research.
“Every time we saw someone carrying a yoga mat, we’d ask, ‘Where do you go?’” Goh said. “The answer was always Astoria or Bayside.”
So they took the space. A room off to one side is full of computers, stacks of comics and posters depicting karate-kicking dumplings. The other is a simple, sunny room with pristine hardwood floors and a wall of mirrors.
Yumcha offers all manner of yoga styles for anyone looking to relieve stress, improve flexibility or lose weight. A schedule and pricing can be found at yumchayoga.com.
If the leap from comic book raconteurs to studio honchos seems like a stretch, it is not the first time they couple has reinvented themselves.
Originally from Singapore, Goh and Woo moved to New York in 1998 to pursue graduate school at Columbia University.
Woo is a teacher while Goh has left his career as a lawyer, a topic that actually makes him cringe when recalling the courtroom.
By the time they moved to Flushing in 2007, they had already written, directed and produced a successful feature film and were planning on resting for awhile.
But the neighborhood inspired them.
“To us, Flushing is a place of possibilities, reinvention, rolling up your sleeves and getting things done,” Goh said. “It’s not a town for wimps.”
Caught up by the culture, food and the gritty determination of many entrepreneurs in the neighborhood, they decided to launch their comic series, which has been favorably reviewed by publications all over the globe.
The Dim Sum Warriors’ next adventure was already being hatched in Woo and Goh’s heads as the yoga studio held its grand opening earlier this month.
As people milled around, munching on actual dim sum, a woman slowly walked in the door, looking confused.
She had already heard about a new studio in the neighborhood and, after eyeing drawings of dumplings doing yoga hung on the walls, wanted to know when she could sign up.
Reach reporter Joe Anuta by e-mail at januta@cnglocal.com or by phone at 718-260-4566.
