I've been thinking about it for a while now. I've been curious for years but due to the lack of available opportunity I never pursued it. Now that I have the time I've decided to take up a rather physical hobby called Haidong Gumdo, or Korean sword fighting. It's similar to Japanese Kendo in that it uses a curved sword, but the Korean sword is a wider blade and the fighting focuses more on battle tactics and multiple enemy attacks rather than one on one.
I asked my co-teacher Kate to help me sign up with a local school, and after a week and a half she was able to help me out. So on Monday we went to the school and met with the master of the school, who surprisingly turned out to be a young woman about my age. She was very amiable and seemed quite excited to have me as her student. We agreed to start my training on Thursday.
So Thursday rolled around and I arrived 20 minutes early in an effort to impress upon my new master my desire to learn. She was not there (she was driving students home) so I waited alongside another student in the office. A few younger students arrived and were completely surprised to see a waegookin (foreigner) in their Dojang (school). One of the boys, dressed in a bright green shirt and possessing a cute slightly chubby physique, was most curious about me. My master arrived and she began fitting me out in my uniform, the pants of which turned out to be too long so she sent them out to be hemmed. While I waited for my uniform I caught out of the corner of my eye little Green Shirt taking a picture of me with his camera phone. So I turned, made the peace sign and smiled for him. He smiled and ran away quite pleased with himself.
I was assigned a wooden practice sword and the lesson began. We all stood at attention with our swords on the floor next to us and bowed first the Korean flag and then to our master. The hand gestures of the bow are very different. You put your right hand in front of your chest vertically and your left hand horizontal, palm down, at your waist before bowing. Then we did tons of stretching exercises. I had a difficult time with the jump rope because the rope was too short but I pushed myself on anyway. After exercises, my master had me sit at the back and watch her give out commands as the students followed. When their formal instruction was over, they all practiced individually their own forms they were working on (they were all different belt levels) while our master taught me the parts of the sword, one of the stances and some basic slashing movements. These I practiced for a long time though I kept my eye on some of the more advanced students to try and memorize more movements. I hate being a white belt...I'm back at square one, but I don't plan on being at this level for very long!!
After our practice we did more exercises where we broke up into two teams. When little Green Shirt saw which team I was doing to, he immediately jumped over next to me and smiled. He also showed me where to hang my wooden sword and tries to help me understand commands. Once in our teams we lined up facing each other and the first two opposing members did rock, paper, scissors to see which team would do the decided exercise. It was great fun and I felt like a part of the group as we cheered and grumbled after winning or losing. What I enjoyed was that my master joined and did the exercises too. She's very involved in everything we do rather than just shouting commands at us.
After the lesson my master asked me if I would stay for the next class. I was surprised but agreed. The next class was also the last of the day and there was only one student, a young girl name Yuri. We exercised and then practiced the sword a bit. Afterward my teacher told me we were going to work on concentration. She rolled out a mat, placed a stand in the middle, and lit a single candle before having us sit down. Yuri went first, holding her sword above the flame, then making a striking motion without touching the candle in an effort to extinguish the flame. It took her a few tries but she managed it. Then it was my turn. I held my sword above the candle, reached back and thrust my blade forward with a loud yell.
The flame remained.
So I tried twice more and was able to extinguish it. Then we used our fists. It took the other girl several tries to do it. I did it in one go, so I was quite proud of myself!!
I'm really looking forward to where this will take me physically and mentally. It's really nice to feel athletic again, and it's also good stress release after work. But that's another story...
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