WEBVTT

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We are in Paris in the year 2019.

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Ashley says that she just got off the train and is greeted by a lady

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And we walk through the station.

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Just outside. And there is a car parked on the street.

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The woman opens the trunk of the car.

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The girl reaches into the trunk of the car and brings out a rose and some chocolates.

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And she says they are from him.

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The rose and the chocolate are from him.

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The 67-year-old guru, Bivolaru, whom Ashley has come here to meet.

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She gets into the car.

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The man behind the wheel starts the engine.

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And then the woman does one more thing.

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She gives Ashley a hat.

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And a pair of sunglasses.

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Which is covered with gaff tape so she can't see out. 

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They said it was their need to protect him

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Here in 2019, Bivolaru is wanted by both Interpol and Europol.

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They have published him on their most wanted lists with his name and face.

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Finland has already accused the guru of human trafficking, several years before the French case.

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Ashley knows he's wanted.

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But she says that she is told that he has been persecuted for many years because of his spiritual practice.

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Therefore, only very few people are allowed to know where he is.

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But Ashley begins to have doubts.

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I am scared.

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It doesn't feel right.

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But I'm in this constant state of

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to suppress my thoughts, to suppress

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my emotions, shaming myself

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tell me it's my ego,

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and tell me not to question

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and not to doubt.

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And just keep going,

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turn the blinkers on, turn the tunnel vision on

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and just focus on the goal of evolving

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and become a more kind, and loving and spiritually evolved person. You are listening to Vejen til Paradis from DR Dokumentar.

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My name is Merle Barré.

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Episode 4. The Initiation.

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Ashley has been part of the yoga movement for about a year,

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when one day she is invited to Paris to meet with the guru, she says.

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When she receives the invitation, she has just been on a retreat in Denmark,

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where Mihai Stoian, who is called the guru's right hand

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has talked about how important it is to have Bivolaru as a spiritual guide.

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Now, several months later, she's sitting in a car somewhere in Paris,

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without any way of seeing where she is going.

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Suddenly the car stops.

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They are here.

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She takes off her glasses and hat,

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and can now see that she is facing a three-story house.

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As she steps inside, she is led up a spiral staircase, the steps of which are covered in purple fabric.

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Everything is being carefully studied.

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The pockets in her clothes.

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All toiletries.

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Electrical items are put in a bag and placed in a locked cabinet.

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They are looking for any USBs,

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computers, tablets,

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straightener.

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Which Ashley doesn't have access to.

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It's all put in a bag and locked away

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And I don't want access to it,

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until I leave.

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She gets the impression that

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that there is a small group of women,

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who takes charge in this house.

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She has never seen them before and doesn't know their names.

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As her bags are searched, she is asked to sign a series of documents and make a promise not to tell anyone about what is about to happen, which is not new to Ashley.

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She and many others have experienced this in other contexts.

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This applies to Sofie when she is invited to meet with the guru.

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The very first thing to do is to study the Bible.

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That this is a secret and I won't tell anyone.

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For Pernilla, as she is on retreat in Denmark.

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And for Amanda.

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It's video footage of me sitting on a bed reading some kind of statement or consent.

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When she's at a yoga festival in another European country. I can't even remember it verbatim,

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but the essence is,

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that I promise on my health

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and my spiritual development,

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that what is happening,

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it is secret,

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and I must not tell anyone.

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As Killa has previously said,

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that they must be photographed in underwear or naked as an admission ticket to retreats in Denmark,

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The video has the same function during the yoga festival, says Amanda.

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And since they have it on video, they can prove that I promised that.

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And I also remember feeling like my life is on the edge.

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Many of the things that go on in the yoga movement are secret.

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And only a special insider can access it.

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This also applies to the meeting with the guru that Ashley has gone to Paris to experience.

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After Ashley promises that she will never tell anyone about this,

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she is shown into the room she is supposed to be in, she explains.

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There are several bedrooms,

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where in each room there is

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a couple of women. She has

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not the full overview of how many

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there is, but she considers,

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that they are between 15 and

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20 women in the house from

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different countries. I think there must have been two or three Germans. A few people from Hungary. Of course many from Romania.

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One from England.

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And one from, I think, Lithuania.

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And one from Scandinavia, at least.

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Some people are waiting to go and see him.

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Some have already been here to see him, and they are waiting to be summoned to go back.

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Some have been there for months.

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Some have been there for weeks. Some have been there for days. The house Ashley is in, she calls it, or the holding house.

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When the guru is ready, the individual woman will be notified.

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And is taken to another, unknown address, she says.

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It can happen at any time of the day and there is no advance notice.

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But until then, they wait here.

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However, nothing is left to chance.

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There are rules about when you can sleep.

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When should you meditate

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And then there are rules about what to read and watch while staying in the house.

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Some of the films the women will watch, according to Ashley, are pornographic films, like the ones the other women were watching in the house when she arrived. Some of the other videos are footage of women who have visited the guru.

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In a form of witness, naked women talk about their spiritual experience.

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When Ashley sees them, she has difficulty decoding what the women are saying.

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So, how sincere is what they say?

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Have they had a good and

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spiritually developing experience?

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Or have they been forced?

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to say those things?

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At home she learns,

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that the guru will never ask her to do anything,

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she doesn't want to. But the longer she lives in the French house,

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the more she begins to think that there is only one reason she is here.

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If there's one thing Ashley knows,

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then it is that she doesn't want to sleep with the guru.

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But she becomes afraid that she won't be able to speak up if she faces him.

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Because of what she herself calls the indoctrination.

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Like many others in the yoga movement, she has taken numerous courses and been on retreats,

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where she has been told over and over again that she must destroy her ego.

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She must surrender to something greater.

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So right now she's in a mess.

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Because what should she do?

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What is the right thing to do?

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If you want to communicate with the guru, according to Ashley, you have to write a letter,

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which one of them from the house will then transport over to the other secret address he is at.

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So she grabs a pen and paper. She writes that she regrets not feeling ready for the initiation ritual that awaits him.

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She doesn't have the letters today.

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But she says she gets a response back from the guru, where he singles her out as if she were a spoiled child.

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This is the final piece in the increasingly large puzzle that enables her to see clearly.

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So now she makes a drastic choice. It becomes clear to Ashley that they won't just let her go.

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At this point, she has nothing on.

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She doesn't have her phone, her passport, her key.

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She has no idea where she really is.

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So the only solution she sees is to wait until they have a car,

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to take the letter and add it to him.

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And then I had to wait for them to get a response, and then get a car to bring it back.

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And when it happened, it had been a whole day, and it was close to evening.

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It was probably almost the middle of the evening.

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And they said we can't take you out now, we can't just take you out in the middle of the evening.

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So you have to wait until tomorrow. The rest of the night and the next morning Ashley tries to keep her head as clear as possible.

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She tries to remind herself who she is, and is she wants to be out.

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It takes about a day from the time she says she wants to go out until something happens.

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She is told that there is a car ready for her.

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She is asked where she wants to go.

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A little suspiciously, she tells the driver that she just wants to be taken to the cheapest hotel in the city center.

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She gets her passport and the rest of her things back.

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The car starts,

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and to Ashley's great surprise,

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drives it away from the house and over to a hotel.

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So I'm back at the reception,

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and I'm just back to the room with my bag.

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I don't really remember it

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I remember collapsing on the floor

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when I close the door

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I buckled and started hyperventilating,

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panicking and crying

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It was a state of breakdown. Ashley is one of several women we speak to who are in Paris.

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But she's the only one who makes it out of the house,

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before she goes to visit Bivolaru.

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We also talk to a woman,

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who ends up visiting the guru twice.

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For privacy reasons, she only wants to use her first name.

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She was part of Natha from 2014 to 2017. Over the years, she took courses in Sweden and started training as a yoga teacher in Denmark.

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at Paradise Growth Center,

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she says.

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Since she has been a part of Natha for a year, she receives an invitation to visit the guru.

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The invitation comes from a teacher and close friend from Sweden, Andrea says. I was invited to go, and she will go with me and recommend me every time.

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In contrast, Ashley tells Andrea that she is being meticulously briefed on what is going to happen.

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She has her friend with her all the way to Paris.

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The friend is also in the first house, The Holding House, or Ventehuset. I felt ready. I felt ready to go.

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After a few days, she receives a notification that the time has come.

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Someone will come pick me up and take me to a car.

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I get blindfolded and told that it's being taken into the guru's apartment. A door opens, and Grieg stands there, greeting us with a big smile and open arms, and he's wearing a bathrobe.

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Andrea is greeted by the guru in a long, slightly dirty robe.

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He has sunken cheeks and wears a pair of metallic aviator glasses.

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She feels immediately repulsed at the sight of him.

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But at the same time, she tells herself not to be superficial.

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After all, he is the greatest spiritual authority in the movement,

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and the one who can lift her to a higher spiritual level.

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The apartment is small and dark.

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Andrea says she is there with six other women.

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They must be in a room, while Bivolaru has his own room.

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In turn, they are then called in to him to complete what is called the initiation.

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You could also call it an initiation ritual.

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I know what's happening and I know what to do.

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It is now Andreas' turn to go into the teacher's room.

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She will now have sex with the guru. More specifically, they will go through seven different sexual positions that symbolize the seven chakras, she says.

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Chakra is the energy system that members of Natha have previously been introduced to, which is used to create harmony and balance. It's not like you would consider a normal act of making love with someone from a romantic point of view.

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I saw it as an extended yoga practice in many ways,

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because there was no attraction from me to him.

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There's no chemistry, there's no passion, there's no lust.

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Andrea says that at this point she is having a really good experience with Bivolaru.

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A spiritual experience that can be difficult for outsiders to understand. I begin to move in a way that I am not familiar with

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And I'm in this blissful state,

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looking at my body, which reacts to all these energies.

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Her experience is not so much about the guru,

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but she talks about something that is going on inside her.

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An important occurrence in my life. Andrea goes back to Sweden and Denmark.

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And suddenly she is looked at with completely new eyes.

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from the other

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members of Natha. and there is a deepening of sisterhood,

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of having been part of something big and something special.

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Six months after the first visit to the doctor,

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she will be invited again, she says.

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How do you feel about it? I don't want to go. 

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So at the end she leaves. Can you tell me what's different? The difference is that it's not a full yes for me.

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This time, Bivolaru welcomes her in a completely different way.

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I walk with a little resistance, and when I enter the apartment, I am also felt in him. Now he begins to criticize her. He notices the frustration with me, that I am very different from last time.

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He tells me I'm a hypocrite.

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So I just choose to go through with it because I felt like it was my duty

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I didn't experience any of those things.

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that I experienced the first time.

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After that he says to me,

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that I have a resistance to the masculine.

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I don't say anything, and I don't think I have a resistance to the masculine.

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It's that I have a resistance to coming here right now

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She never, ever wants to go back to that apartment.

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In the time that followed, she gradually stopped her involvement in school,

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which is also due to some things in her private life. My colleague and I speak to a total of seven women who have been to France at different times in the period from 2013 to 2019.

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One of them is Ashley, who comes out of the house.

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Another is Andrea, who has a good experience during her first visit but doesn't want to go a second time. The other women who end up in guru's apartment,

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have not been able to give an interview about their experiences,

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while the recorder is running.

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It's too violent for them to talk about.

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Several women say they have to go through the same so-called initiation,

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as Andrea describes.

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Several say they are unable to speak out against Bivolaru

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and feels deeply manipulated.

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And they are not the only ones.

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Stories about the yoga movement are popping up all over the world.

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And women in Germany and Great Britain, among others

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have come forward and told about their meetings with the guru.

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Some of these women that we or other journalists are talking to are part of the basing case in France.

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This is true for Ashley, for example. Others are not.

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This is the case where Bivolaru is currently in custody and is charged with rape, kidnapping and human trafficking.

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We have contacted Bivolaru's lawyer.

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The lawyer writes to us that it is not possible to get a comment.

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In addition to Bivolaru, Mihai and Adina Stoian are also charged with human trafficking and kidnapping in the French case.

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In the arrest warrant we can read that several women say that it was Adina and Mihai Stoian who invited them to meet with the guru,

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and helped them organize the trips to Paris.

00:30:22.480 --> 00:30:25.440
According to the couple's lawyer, they are innocent.

00:30:28.920 --> 00:30:30.319
In the arrest warrant

00:30:30.319 --> 00:30:31.160
it also says,

00:30:31.880 --> 00:30:34.279
that the international yoga movement

00:30:34.279 --> 00:30:36.160
is under suspicion of

00:30:36.160 --> 00:30:38.579
to use manipulation techniques

00:30:38.579 --> 00:30:40.299
towards their members.

00:30:49.759 --> 00:30:50.180
We don't know how many women have been to Paris to meet the guru,

00:30:53.059 --> 00:30:53.880
in the hope of achieving spiritual development.

00:30:59.519 --> 00:31:08.640
But Killa tells us it's been going on for at least two decades. And then we start taking you down especially during the Christmas holidays.

00:31:09.500 --> 00:31:11.440
You've heard from Carsten before.

00:31:12.799 --> 00:31:19.180
He is a sociologist and was part of Natha when his right-hand man, Mihai Stoian, came to Denmark back in 2002.

00:31:20.200 --> 00:31:25.700
He says that around 2005 he already heard that Bivolaru was in Paris.

00:31:26.559 --> 00:31:31.779
No one was allowed to know where he was, so only special insiders had access to that information.

00:31:32.440 --> 00:31:36.839
Also with summer vacation and things like that, where Mihai and Adina especially, and sometimes Mihai, go there.

00:31:37.759 --> 00:31:43.720
Carsten has entered the inner circle and is close to Mihai and Adina's door.

00:31:44.259 --> 00:31:46.119
And even join the trips

00:31:46.119 --> 00:31:46.880
to France.

00:31:47.960 --> 00:31:50.279
At this point he has actually become a boyfriend.

00:31:50.279 --> 00:31:51.460
with Adina, he says.

00:31:52.559 --> 00:31:53.920
The school encourages:

00:31:54.059 --> 00:31:56.119
that you have multiple partners, so many

00:31:56.119 --> 00:31:58.140
are in cross-sectional relationships with each other.

00:32:01.279 --> 00:32:02.759
On one of the trips

00:32:02.759 --> 00:32:04.700
he realizes that there are women

00:32:04.700 --> 00:32:05.779
from the yoga movement,

00:32:05.900 --> 00:32:08.920
who comes to France to meet with the guru.

00:32:10.220 --> 00:32:13.980
There's an apartment where those girls are, where they have a man who kind of takes care of them.

00:32:19.180 --> 00:32:25.119
Carsten says that at one point he and Adina Stoian were inside that apartment.

00:32:25.880 --> 00:32:28.180
As I remember, they were mostly sitting around eating chocolate,

00:32:28.619 --> 00:32:31.740
because it was supposed to awaken the sexual energy from the story,

00:32:31.799 --> 00:32:33.119
and then they sat and watched a lot of porn movies.

00:32:34.180 --> 00:32:35.599
That was one thing. Then there was something like that.

00:32:36.799 --> 00:32:37.460
What the hell is this?

00:32:37.859 --> 00:32:39.640
But let's think about all the women I saw down there,

00:32:39.839 --> 00:32:40.619
all the women I met.

00:32:41.140 --> 00:32:42.960
These were people I thought were strong, independent women.

00:32:43.380 --> 00:32:46.440
That's the whole set of eyes I saw this through,

00:32:46.599 --> 00:32:48.240
and thus it still sees through,

00:32:48.900 --> 00:32:50.500
when I think back on the specific things.

00:32:51.099 --> 00:32:51.799
But there were some things.

00:32:51.900 --> 00:32:52.759
For example, there was that part.

00:32:53.519 --> 00:32:55.559
Another part was that the apartment they lived in,

00:32:55.599 --> 00:32:57.339
There was no handle on the inside

00:32:59.680 --> 00:33:03.119
That handle, it was him who took care of the girls in his pocket.

00:33:04.500 --> 00:33:06.019
So you can say, no matter how you

00:33:06.019 --> 00:33:08.220
Turn it around, it's some kind of test of freedom.

00:33:10.000 --> 00:33:11.880
They were also a place they couldn't just get away from,

00:33:12.259 --> 00:33:13.599
because I don't even know if they had their phone,

00:33:13.720 --> 00:33:16.279
or if they were confiscated. So if they wanted to get out of there,

00:33:17.279 --> 00:33:17.900
then it is actually difficult

00:33:17.900 --> 00:33:18.859
to understand if they could.

00:33:21.640 --> 00:33:23.539
When I talk to Carsten about Paris,

00:33:23.539 --> 00:33:26.539
It is clear that for him there are two ways of looking at it.

00:33:28.960 --> 00:33:33.619
There's the way he saw it at the time, and the way he justified it to himself.

00:33:34.660 --> 00:33:36.920
And then there's the way he sees it today.

00:33:37.920 --> 00:33:42.640
And what about this, you see that there is no handle on the inside of the door,

00:33:42.640 --> 00:33:44.880
the apartment where these women are sitting?

00:33:45.599 --> 00:33:48.339
Do you think this is something we should talk about?

00:33:48.420 --> 00:33:49.920
Do you shout about it? Do you tell them?

00:33:51.400 --> 00:33:53.500
Well, at least I remember paying a lot of attention to it.

00:33:55.279 --> 00:33:59.940
And I don't remember if I said anything to Adina about it.

00:34:00.099 --> 00:34:02.019
I can't remember exactly what it is I'm doing.

00:34:03.180 --> 00:34:05.039
I just remember paying close attention to it. And again, that's it. I didn't see anyone, specifically, what exactly it is that I do. I just remember paying close attention to it.

00:34:05.640 --> 00:34:06.720
And again, that's it.

00:34:08.079 --> 00:34:09.760
I didn't see anyone who didn't want to be there.

00:34:10.679 --> 00:34:12.579
I talked to them, and then you can say yes.

00:34:13.599 --> 00:34:15.239
And then you wonder if I should have done something or what.

00:34:15.280 --> 00:34:19.420
No, no, I'm just thinking, can you assess whether they wanted to be there?

00:34:20.219 --> 00:34:22.219
I can only judge it with the eyes I had there.

00:34:22.420 --> 00:34:24.739
And that's why you might say, why don't I do something?

00:34:25.079 --> 00:34:27.400
That's because I don't see anything to be alarmed about.

00:34:27.659 --> 00:34:32.079
Because you have to think, here we are dealing with a way of being together,

00:34:32.239 --> 00:34:35.559
where the usual norms are gradually being broken down.

00:34:36.719 --> 00:34:38.539
So it was also long before MeToo and things like that.

00:34:39.239 --> 00:34:43.480
So all those norms there, they are not present in the same way at this time.

00:34:43.840 --> 00:34:45.519
So there are basic experiences, well that's cool.

00:34:46.239 --> 00:34:47.880
But when you look at it

00:34:47.880 --> 00:34:49.739
today, so all that stuff like

00:34:49.739 --> 00:34:51.599
took place in Paris, and you know

00:34:51.599 --> 00:34:54.059
today, that now there are a lot of women,

00:34:54.179 --> 00:34:55.940
there are big parties. Well, just when I look at it

00:34:55.940 --> 00:34:56.900
without that. Okay.

00:34:57.639 --> 00:34:59.940
Now I tell in the present tense, as I told myself before in the present tense

00:34:59.940 --> 00:35:00.960
about how I once experienced it.

00:35:02.000 --> 00:35:03.260
When I look today

00:35:03.260 --> 00:35:05.400
on what was happening in Paris,

00:35:06.900 --> 00:35:10.739
So it seems to me that all that stuff with a sack over your head,

00:35:10.880 --> 00:35:13.380
and a door you couldn't get out of, all that down there,

00:35:13.579 --> 00:35:19.539
it was part of making the choice so ultimate for people.

00:35:20.860 --> 00:35:21.519
Do you know or don't you know?

00:35:21.860 --> 00:35:23.980
You can meet your great ones now, but you have to sacrifice all of this.

00:35:24.139 --> 00:35:26.699
It was such a completely ultimate choice that it didn't have to be at all.

00:35:27.300 --> 00:35:27.780
That's the one.

00:35:28.099 --> 00:35:32.940
The second thing was that you erase the person in all those little rituals you do all the time.

00:35:33.260 --> 00:35:34.639
And thus also the person's judgment.

00:35:34.900 --> 00:35:36.880
And thus also the person's belief that I can speak out.

00:35:38.059 --> 00:35:40.820
And what do you think about all these accusations surrounding trafficking?

00:35:41.719 --> 00:35:46.639
Well, it's an organization that operates in a very, very, very fine way,

00:35:46.880 --> 00:35:48.260
and also crosses a boundary,

00:35:48.800 --> 00:35:51.139
When do you actually know if that's what people want?

00:35:51.480 --> 00:35:52.460
How can you be sure,

00:35:52.559 --> 00:35:55.179
that they actually give their permission for this,

00:35:55.320 --> 00:35:58.460
when you consistently work to limit yourself to

00:35:58.460 --> 00:35:59.139
to be broken down?

00:36:00.460 --> 00:36:02.219
And therefore I can easily understand,

00:36:02.659 --> 00:36:04.880
that there are women who have subsequently come forward

00:36:04.880 --> 00:36:07.059
and said, well, I wasn't myself at all.

00:36:08.039 --> 00:36:13.420
But do you regret not speaking up or doing something about what you saw in Paris?

00:36:14.679 --> 00:36:19.519
Well, I may regret a little that I didn't tell anyone on the right that it's not a little far outside, that there was nothing to talk to.

00:36:20.159 --> 00:36:22.360
It's like, what kind of cause was there to fight for?

00:36:23.880 --> 00:36:25.820
Well, because if I said something like, hey, what's that,

00:36:25.880 --> 00:36:28.460
So with that little wonder, it's just been colored by the field.

00:36:31.179 --> 00:36:34.860
Carsten says that at that time he was so deep into the organization that

00:36:35.219 --> 00:36:37.519
that he didn't really realize that something was wrong.

00:36:39.260 --> 00:36:43.579
Because like everyone else who says they slowly eroded their boundaries,

00:36:44.079 --> 00:36:46.760
their perception of when something has gone too far,

00:36:47.300 --> 00:36:48.280
then it also applies to him.

00:36:49.119 --> 00:36:51.380
But today he sees it completely differently.

00:37:03.239 --> 00:37:09.300
Back in the cheap hotel room in Paris, Ashley sits and tries to understand what just happened.

00:37:22.920 --> 00:37:25.900
It feels like being at war with yourself, Ashley says.

00:37:26.900 --> 00:37:29.760
She has sworn on her health and her spirituality,

00:37:30.320 --> 00:37:33.820
that she will never tell anyone about what happened in the house.

00:37:40.980 --> 00:37:44.800
She has a desperate desire to return home to Australia.

00:37:45.539 --> 00:37:49.739
So she books a ticket for departure the very next day.

00:38:03.099 --> 00:38:07.079
Time passes. She gets worse and worse.

00:38:09.880 --> 00:38:13.539
And still doesn't know if she can talk to anyone about what happened.

00:38:14.940 --> 00:38:35.360
Only after a year is she ready to reach out to Ziggy. It was he who recommended she try a course at the yoga school.

00:38:35.920 --> 00:38:40.139
But at this point he has no idea what Ashley has experienced.

00:38:40.920 --> 00:38:45.840
He continues to involve himself more and more in the environment.

00:38:51.980 --> 00:39:26.300
So when Ashley tells him, shit, what is this? Natha in Denmark doesn't want to do interview.  Natha in Sweden writes that they are an independent yoga school,

00:39:26.780 --> 00:39:31.860
without any legal, administrative or financial connection to Bivolaru.

00:39:32.500 --> 00:39:38.159
And that they strongly distance themselves from any form of abuse, abuse of power and manipulation.

00:39:39.320 --> 00:39:42.980
The Swedish teacher, who Andrea says she was invited by,

00:39:43.619 --> 00:39:47.239
denies having invited anyone to meet Bivolaru.

00:39:49.039 --> 00:39:58.599
Natha's sister school in Romania, which Bivolaru founded, writes to us that they deny all accusations against Bivolaru and call them absurd.

00:39:59.400 --> 00:40:08.320
They believe the accusations are based on statements from, quote, a handful of individuals who are likely motivated by personal revenge motives.

00:40:08.940 --> 00:40:12.340
or a need for attention, end of quote.

00:40:12.940 --> 00:40:17.300
They also write that the claim that the yoga movement is under suspicion

00:40:17.300 --> 00:40:21.340
to use manipulation techniques against their members,

00:40:21.719 --> 00:40:23.420
is, quote, literal.

00:40:24.099 --> 00:40:28.099
They place great importance on respecting people's free will.

00:40:29.320 --> 00:40:32.519
DR has contacted Mihai and Adina Stoian's lawyer.

00:40:32.519 --> 00:40:35.440
and presented our guys' statements about them.

00:40:36.099 --> 00:41:05.599
But we have not received any answer to that. Danish texts by Jesper Buhl Scandinavian Text Service 2018