Sunday, May 21, 2006

Black Thursday

Irrelevantly:

In an unprecedented event, the Sensex (the Bombay Stock Exchange 30 share sensitive Index) fell by a massive 826.38 points on Thursday, the 18th May 2006. This was the highest ever fall recorded in the history of Indian Stock Market. The financial experts and the newspapers promptly dubbed this day as Black Thursday.

Relevantly:

I first had that itch to try this out when I was a teen-ager. I think it was normal for any teen-ager, influenced by the movies and what that hero [1] had done. Since then, it was something that I have always wanted to do but never had an opportunity to start. Our “out of town, in the middle of nowhere wilderness” college did not provide any such opportunity. When I was in my mid-twenties, I was so immersed at work and at things that bachelors do after work-hours (I’m talking about hanging out with friends at movies and such) that I had no time for anything else. However, the innate desire still remained. Then the thirties came. I was at a place where I had an opportunity next door. I went to that place and checked it out; the place was full of energetic kids. I shied away from that once more, since I did not want to be sticking out as sore-thumb amongst them and with my conditioning, I was pretty sure, I would be; and be an embarrassment to myself and a joke to everyone else around.

Then towards the late 30s, when I was in the US, I finally found a perfect place – it was in the work place and the participants were all around my age; at least they were colleagues. If I was making a fool of myself, it was contained amongst my peers and now I had a safe excuse of being old enough not to be good at it. In fact, some were amazed that I had started at this age! Then I came back to India and was lucky enough to find an arrangement where I could continue the same at my new work place. It was just that I had to switch from one style to another.

Yes, I'm talking about Martial arts - martial arts that everyone got inspired by that one guy [1]. On my return, from being a green belt in Taekwondo, I started again as white-belt in Karate. After 5 years of being at it, I finally passed my black belt test in Dec 04, 2005, in presence of the founder of our style. A lot of people have asked me as to how I manage to balance work and find time to stick to karate training with regularity. My answer to them is always: “that’s why”. I very strongly believe Karate has given me a outlet for de-stressing; so much so that, in spite of the pain that our sensei puts us through, at the end of it, I always feel more lively, inspired and fresh. The tougher the class gets, the better I feel at the end of it. As an added bonus, I’ve been fortunate to find a good and dedicated teacher. Also, I quickly realized Karate alone will not succeed; it has brought in associated paraphernalia – the workout regimen; I found that it is highly impossible to stay through a karate class without being fit; that now has ensured me that I have some kind of workout at least 5-6 days a week.

The 18th May, 2006 was indeed a personal Black Thursday for me. On this day, it was a culmination of almost a life-long dream and some commitment of six years. I was awarded a Diploma Certificate and my black belt. I was now officially a Shodan (first degree) in Shotokan Karate.


Notes:
[1]: The hero was, ofcourse, Bruce Lee and the movie was “Enter the Dragon”
[2]: If you want to find more about our Sensei and the founder of our style, check out links on this blog site

2 comments:

Tyler Durden said...

you feeling fresh and rejuvenated is all fine. what about the others you have to spar with ?? someone should should put a rule that you should spar only with prashanth, hamsa or sensei for life.

Anonymous said...

Oos Sempai :-) - sg