Everybody was Kung Fu fighting!

The Tuesday before last my social life in Ulsan took a giant leap forward when I screwed my courage to the sticking place and joined the Ulsan French Conversation Club.
It's so me, when you think about it - for years I dreamed of moving to France but was too chicken about my language skills - now here I am in Korea, gamely trying to learn a whole new alphabet, and I join a club to practise my french!

I was very nervous going in, as it's been a good ten years since I was fluent and these days I am barely above tourist level. However the gods were smiling on me and when I went into Momo's Cafe in Mugeodong I met four lovely Americans with great french and forgiving natures!

This week at French club one of the girls announced that she could not stay long as she had a Tae Kwon Do belt test later on and would any of us like to come and watch? I jumped in with an emphatic "Mais oui, bien sur!" (But of course!)

I got the chance to watch white, yellow and orange belts testing and best, oh by far the best of all, I got to see four black belts sparring! They were frckin' amazing!!
At the close of the session there was meditation, which joined in for. I sat cross legged on the floor getting all Zen to the sound of Korean traditional music and couldn't help smiling to myself. It felt like I was in one of the opening scenes for the make-over montage of a martial arts movie: Irish girl does Karate Kid!


Anyway, I was hooked, and as we left I told the Sah buh nim, (Master), "I'll see you on Thursday!"

And so it was, on Thursday I duly returned.
I was shocked and giddy with delight to discover that he had a uniform that fit me. You would probably have to be here to realise quite how suprising and delighting it really was!!
I was called up to the front of the class to introduce myself and got a round of applause merely for saying "Annyong ha sayeo" (hello). Talk about an easy room! Though it will make practising my Korean much easier if it greeted with clapping rather than giggling!

Then as class started, came the surprise bonus - it turns out that my years of ridiculously infrequent yoga and pilates have done enough good that my Sah buh nim wa impressed with my flexibility and balance. Go me!

Later on, when we were practising forms (the punches and blocks), as I was the only White Belt (total beginner) one of the Black Belts came over to coach me individually. I had seen this guy sparring on Tuesday, this guy was a regular Jet Li! After a few practise runs he looked over to me and said, and I swear I'm not making this up: "You watch a lot of Kung Fu movies, don't you?"

Ha ha!! NOW tell me that TV is uneducational!

I had my second class on Friday night and I am thoroughly loving this sport. It's a good hard workout without the boredom of the gymn. The class is roughly half foreigners and half Koreans, so I get to make new friends, both domestic and international, as well as having a safe place to practise my Korean.

AND, on top of all this is the reason I wanted to learn Tae Kwon Do in the first place: access to the culture. It seems to me that Tae Kwon Do is to Korea what hurling is to Ireland - an integral piece of the national identity.

I have always wanted to learn a martial art and it seems deliciously efficient of me to learn one that will also give me an 'in' to Korean culture.

So watch this space - in about a month I should be reporting the acquisition of my Yellow Belt! Huzzah!!