Perfect Pratice Makes Perfect

It never seems enough for me. All that piano playing, scuba diving, kayaking, horse riding, shopping, snoring at home, no, they don’t seem to be fulfilling my time enough.

I have been playing piano too much. And eating and sleeping too much too. It’s not that I’m not passionate with the piano anymore. I still love ‘caressing’ those white and black keys. They give me sweet music (only if I hit the right keys and the play the right notes… he he he). But I need something that makes me work out. 

One day, I watched the Company’s GTF Tae Kwon Do students do their moves. All that punching and kicking and gruelling exercises, kind of beckoning me to join them there and then. It looked rough. They were tough. And I liked it!

Tae Kwon Do (also written as t’aegwondo) is a modern martial art originating from Korea and characterised by its fast, high and spinning kicks. The coloured belt system was introduced to represent the progression of a student from white, the innocence of a beginner, into the maturity of the black belt, who is impervious to darkness and fear (the sequence is as shown below). 

Kup	GTF Belt Color
10th	White Belt
9th	White with Yellow Stripe
8th	Yellow Belt
7th	Yellow with Green Stripe
6th	Green Belt
5th	Green with Blue Stripe
4th	Blue Belt
3rd	Blue with Red Stripe
2nd	Red Belt
1st	Red with Black stripe

Generally, a dan is used to represent the progression of the black belt holders. A dan is either an unadorned black belt (the same for all ranks), or has a stripe across the tip for each rank (usually gold, silver, red or white). If I am not mistaken, in the GTF, the maximum rank is 9th Dan.

During the classes I learn some Korean commands such as charyot which means attention, kyong ye for bow, baro for return and joonbi for steady. There are more Korean commands actually but I can’t quite make out what they are.

I’m just a beginner and I don’t feel enlivened by that white belt. The black one seems to be perfect on me, hehehe… But like what the sifus, Sir Sharifudin and Sir Faizal, always say, practice makes perfect and a whole lot of training can change the colour of your belt. So I have to be patient, pratise a lot more and kick harder.

Blast From The Past (1993 - 1998)

Back to the time when I was taking my Bachelor Degree in Civil Engineering at Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Skudai, Johor (1993 - 1998), I had a very difficult life to live. But I knew how to make my life more cheerful, fun and fulfilled.

Besides attending the classes and group discussions almost everyday, I also had to attend boring seminars and courses at least once a month. Feeling succumbed to the ‘extreme torture’, I decided to find something fun as a hobby.

And I didn’t expect it to become a habbit after I joined the university’s recreational club. Temporarily boycotting the books, I got really involved in kayak soon after signing up. My first kayak expedition was the ‘Jelajah Kepulauan-kepulauan Malaysia Barat’, an exploration to the islands on the west-side of Malaysia.  Second expedition was a more challenging one, ‘Jelajah Kepulauan-kepulauan Terengganu’ (exploration to the Islands of Terengganu). Here are some of the kayak and other recreational activities I had gone through between the year 1993 and 1998:

• Gunung Pulai Mountain Bike Expedition 1993 (Location: Gunung Pulai, Johor)
• Mersing Kayak Expedition 1994 (Location: Mersing, Melaka).
• Full Star Award (Placid Water) Certificate for Kayak Instructor by Kuala Lumpur Canoe Association 1994 (Location: Penyabong, Mersing).
• Johor Kayak Challenge 1994 (Location: Pantai Lido, Johor)
• Regatta Kayak Terengganu 1995 (Location: Tasik Kenyir, Terengganu).
• Regatta Kayak Johor 1995 (Location: Sebana Cove - Tanjung Belungkur - Sebana Cove, Johor).
• Kayak Marathon in conjunction with Canoe Fest 1995 (Location: Tasik Bera - Tasik Chini, Pahang)
• Kayak Regatta Melaka (Location: Pantai Klebang, Melaka). 
• Wall climbing competition (Location: Kompleks Kotaraya, Johor Bahru, Johor)

Still oblivious, or rather pretended to be oblivious that the mid-year exams were just about to come around the corner, I pushed myself further more into involving in other sorts of competitions such as the Iron Man Competition (1996) and UTM Mountain Bike Challenge (1995) and I had also stolen some of my time to climb the Mount Ledang, Mount Belumut and Mount Angsi. Life was beautiful back then. Nowadays, life is just about lying on the bed and looking back at the photos of the old times. I really miss that glossy black kayak and my cute purple booties and that shining yellow life-vest and the rough blue water and the playful dolphins and… and… everything! Hmmm… Look, look at the photo. The photo of me with some rugged water-demons.

Oh by the way, I did pass the mid-year exams with flying marks. Glad, glad!