I can’t believe I’m actually writing week 3 and we are still here with just under 2 weeks of training left! This week has been a tough one as exhaustion has set in. We’ve had a few really tired days and it was our first complete week. As usual we find that once you get to the end of training on Wednesday the rest of the week flies by.
The masters have definitely been having discussions as they are all becoming stricter and tougher with punishments threatened for lack of effort, not been courteous to tell them if you are missing class due to illness or injury, not standing up and showing respect during room inspections, plus anything else that generally shows lack of respect or effort. John’s master told them that the master he remembered the most from his childhood was the one that beat him the most and the forms taught by him are still the ones he remembers the best! Watch out John! Luckily he also added that the younger ones would be physically punished and the older ones, whose bodies can’t take it (not naming any names!) would have their names written on the board as bad examples to the school. Phew…that’s not so bad after all then!
Unfortunately I found this out all too soon on Wednesday after practicing the new form that 3 of us in my group were being taught. We were taught quite a few new steps which we practiced without mistake a number of times. At the end of the session we had what I call, ‘show and tell’ where we show our form to the rest of our group. Monica went before me and couldn’t remember loads of it because she was facing a different way. She received a kick to the leg from our Master. I asked if I could stand the way I had learnt it to learn from her mistake and even though I did this my mind went totally blank with the group watching and I made far too many mistakes. Annoyed with myself I was brave and took my punishment without flinching. He kicked me in the leg and then obviously decided the first time wasn’t hard enough (maybe I should have flinched after all) so he kicked me again. At the time it didn’t hurt but on returning to the lineup 2 minutes later I had a dead leg. He actually felt really bad when I was limping and I took great pleasure reminding him of my injury when I was still limping and couldn’t bend my leg properly for 2 days. As if I don’t have enough injuries of my own without him adding to them!! He said there was no power in his kick. I agreed but told him it must have been his secret Shaolin power as he obviously knew exactly where to kick and landed it deep in the muscle!
Most people here have injuries of one kind or another and of varying degrees and if they don’t have one at the start of the week they most certainly do at the end. This is from the challenging sessions and the sheer amount of training that takes place. Unless your leg is broken, they expect you to train! During John’s Wing Chun circuits on Thursday he injured his knuckle punching a stool! Yes it was probably always going to happen. We actually think he’s chipped the bone as he now has a little bit of bone missing! My knuckle on the other hand has been permanently swollen since day one. It heels by the end of the week and then during sanda on a Monday afternoon it swells up again and the bruising spreads down my fingers. No pain, no gain as they say! Let’s hope that’s true. You don’t get much sympathy for whinging here so you just have to shut up and get on with it.
I’ve had some pretty enjoyable sessions too this week so it’s not all been hard. Thursday morning is our Qi gong session and our master took us up the road to a small cove in the mountains where there is running water to practice our meditation. It was lovely as the sun was out and was warm on my face too.
After half an hour or so he took us up to the bridge to do some moving Qi gong and our conditioning. I suppose he thought the beautiful scenery might take our minds off the fact that we were allowing someone to punch and kick us in the arms, legs, stomach and back! John’s group does their conditioning by striking a tree and some of them even head-butt it repeatedly!
On Friday morning he suggested we play a basketball match to warm up. So our group split into two teams of 4 with Master Rong included and luckily my team won, hooray!!! Master Rong loves basketball and is always bouncing the ball and trying to shoot while he waits for us to warm up so he wasn’t happy to lose but he enjoyed the game, laughing hysterically every time he got the ball.
This meant we didn’t have time for power stretching (what a shame!) as there were a couple of people grading in front of everyone and then there was sparring. This was definitely the highlight of the week as people volunteer to spar in the ring in front of everyone for two 3 minute rounds. It’s an important part of the training as you can use all the techniques that you have been learning in sanda. You wear a head guard, body guard, shin guards, gum shield and gloves. There were some great fights and even some blood!
It has been a week of ups and downs and we’ve both had moments of being really fed up and then the mood will lighten and I will become hysterical with laughter during an extremely painful stretch. This was actually because I could see John stretching too and looking over at me and I think we could read each other’s minds – What on earth are we doing!!??? My Master thought I was extremely strange as he was looking bewildered and asking what I was laughing at. I really don’t know I replied. It is possible that some people react in some rather strange ways to pain!
A few people have left this weekend and John and I will miss two of them very much as they were our training partners. Monica has gone home and now I’ll be the only girl in my group and John has said goodbye to Peter who he was learning with. Four others have also left to go to the other academy at the Shaolin Temple now the weather is slightly warmer. Much more hardcore there and definitely not for the faint-hearted! Rather them than us! We went out for a leaving dinner on Friday which was a nice break from the awful food that they serve here. We are struggling with that and all we seem to talk about is food!!! Today we ventured out again for a long Sunday walk. In 4 hours we climbed the mountain that continues on after our mountain hell stairs and then walked to the base of Tai Bo mountain and back. It’s a gorgeous clear day and the views were amazing. We’ve been good and practiced our forms which I need as I’m being graded on Tuesday in front of everyone!! Aaggh!!
Now others have left we have also taken the opportunity to move room to the top floor and we’re much happier here; it’s warmer, lighter and an altogether nicer room so that should make the last ten days or so that we have left much more pleasant…we hope!
No comments:
Post a Comment