Dark Thursday

After a long day on the road looking for work I was looking forward to breaking a sweat in the dojo. I got dressed in my black gi and tied my belt so that the ends are exactly the same length, I was a deadly ninja once more, but fate intervened. As I locked the deadbolt closed on the security gate I got a phone call from the Sensei, he had bad news. The dojo was dark due to a general power Failure.

With disappointment I unlocked the gate again and told my wife the bad news. The guilt feelings were building up in my head, I need to train 3 times during the week to make my 5 session quota a week and I wasn’t about to go outside in 6 degrees centigrade and train for an hour while the rest of my family watches The Wild on TV. I was all dressed up and had nowhere to train... Then it dawned on me, there is a Kung Fu dojo just around the corner and a previous visit to the dojo revealed their training times to be exactly the same time as ours. I was back in business.

I quickly backed out of the kitchen again an jumped in the car. I was going to join the Kung Fu guys on Fridays in a general fighting class non specific to Kung Fu so with a little bit of luck the instructor would let me train with them.

I got to the Dojo and it seemed dark and bare, only one car was parked with the occupant still inside. I decided to wait a while. It was still early and eventually the Instructor I spoke to last time showed up and I jumped out and introduced myself. He remembered me and said that it was ok to join them. I had to take my belt and gi top off though, but it was a small price to pay.

There were about eight students and most of them quite young. They were all in good spirit. I kept to myself and stretched and warmed up a bit. The instructor called the class to session and we all lined up. We started off in frog... Grabbing your ankles and sticking your butt out like a frog... It’s a bit of an uncomfortable stance. We normally do them for about 20 seconds in the dojo, almost as an afterthought, but after a minute, it becomes quite painful. We stretched our hamstrings by straightening our legs while keeping the hands on the feet and back into frog. After a good couple of minutes my muscles were failing me and I had to rise up and then back down again.

After the frog torture followed a session of punching in the air coupled with various kicking combinations. There were slight differences in style but the Instructor was lenient with me and said he didn’t want to change my style. We did a bit of kicks and punches against the bags as well as a bit of shadow boxing. We ended the class with a bit of stretching again in frog and then greeted.

All and all my fitness level held up in the class, but I could definitely improve my legs a bit more.

Embrace the shadows.