(I should preface this entry, it is actually Day 2 at 4:30 am. My sleeping schedule is all outta whack and I don't foresee getting anymore sleep any time soon so apologies if I'm all over the place.)
Day 1 saw Brendan and I roll up to the camp with Pii Mot (not only was he punctual, he was exactly where we were told he would be in the airport, anxiety steadily decreasing!) at the ungodly hour of 3 am after sitting on a plane for 17+ looooong hours. Suprisingly, Abigail (the camp's contact for anyone wishing to stay) and Kru Mee had woken up and come to greet us with sleepy smiles. Talk about dedication. After showing us to our room, Brendan and I dropped our stuff, explored the room and hit the sack...
Ok, not so much. Brendan hit the sack facefirst and konked out quick. I struggled with the zipties (next level anti-airport staff thievery prevention, thanks Dad.) on my bag as I wanted to unpack, finally laying down after 20 mins of figuring out a wire hanger would do the trick.
Just as I thought, I laid in bed restless super amped up at the thought of meeting new people, kicking pads and sparring with nak muays that I have spent countless hours of my last year watching on youtube and eating strange food with names I couldn't possibly pronounce. I figured it must've been about 4 - 4:30am when I finally passed out after setting my alarm for 6:10am, excited to join the morning run.
Still running off of tired energy, I laced up my runners and headed out to the main area. As some of the nak muays were still waking up, I was greeted by Pornsaneh and Apisak. Pornsaneh was getting ready to go home for the weekend to celebrate his birthday. Some of the other foreigners began to emerge from their rooms and headed straight to the community fridge to put something in their bellies before the run. Wyatt and Jen, both from 5 Points Fitness in New York and then several Norwegians would soon follow.
Once the remaining nak muays were ready, Kru Mee hopped on his motorbike and led us on a 20 min run (3-4k maybe?) done at a pretty relaxed pace. I kept stride with Wyatt, talking about home and wasted youth the entire run making for an easy time. The morning running path brings us past some open fields to one side and a river to the other, some food stalls and some very relaxing visuals. One of the dogs from the camp ran with us, keeping an eye on the other local dogs who all seem to have an issue with human beings running past them. Grumpy bastards.
We returned to the camp and some wrapped up and hit the bags, some stretched. I was called into the ring after a few rounds on the bag to hit pads with Kru Daam - something I was looking very much forward to prior to coming to the gym. Known for developing KO-worthy hands amongst other things (See: Pornsaneh's career) I was siked to be able to focus on something I need to improve while being here. Kru Daam immediately started working with me on my left hook through his very limited english skills but his very easy to understand body language.
sidenote: One thing I've learned about myself through the last 5 or so years of Muay Thai is that I love learning. Any way, shape or form. I love learning brand new new techniques, I love learning the smallest little nuances to the techniques I may already have. I can't say it enough - whenever anyone even remotely better than you (or even your equal) attempts to teach you something, open your mind completely whether you think you'll use it or not. Sometimes being taught one thing will spark up the necessity to be taught something else or expose a hole in your game you never knew you had. On the same token, allowing someone to teach you something is a sign of trust and helps build confidence in both the student and the teacher whether they know it or not. Never shut that 'learning' door and be entirely satisfied with what you know, in and out of the ring. Shoot to be more knowledgeable than the next guy. Toot toot, enough about me.
I think I went 2 maybe 3 rounds on pads before Pii A (camp owner, more on him to come.) gave us the "OK, OK...more for afternoon training, Jek."
The rounds are called out by some of the younger nak muays...how they keep track I'm not sure but the rounds seem to all be the same length. In between rounds, they give you a tall bottle of cold ice water to either drink too fast or clumsily spill it on yourself - I know I'll get better at this whole 'drinking water' thing soon enough.
Bren hopped in the ring with Kru Mee, a bigger pad holder fit for handling bigger guys. I think Brendo went 4 rounds before Pii A gave him the 'good enough' as well. I noticed while Brendan was hitting pads, Kru Mee was taking time to work with Bren on his knees. While these little mini-lessons mid-pads may not seem huge to some people - this is the stuff that matters for a few reasons.
1. You are paying for your training. When you leave, do you want to be as good as you were when you came, equipped with the same knowledge you arrived with or would you rather leave smarter, stronger and little more ready that before?
2. The trainer, who may have absolutely no stock in you, is taking his time to make sure you're doing something better - something that does not put more money in his pocket at the end of the day (remember, this is their job).
3. It's too easy letting someone suck. As a padholder who enjoys keeping track of his student's progress, I want everyone I hold pads for to be a direct representation of my skills and my ability to teach.
4. INJURY PREVENTION, need I say more? Go check out some videos on youtube - figure out who's gonna have bad knees or bad shoulders in a few months thanks to their "kru" just thinking about getting through the next 3 minutes mindlessly.
After pads we were kind of left to our own devices, back on the bag for a few rounds, 3 sets of 100 knees (Kru Daam appeared out of thin air to show me a variation on the skip knee). We didn't spar or clinch but I think it's on an 'ask and ye shall recieve' basis here. I'm ok with that, just gotta remember it on Monday.
After some core and stretching, shower time and then the part we have been anxiously awaiting...BREAKFAST. It did live up to all it's hype, as would dinner. The food here is 100% heavenly. I don't know how I'll go back to eating Thai food at home! Brendo and I walked (5 mins) down to the Tesco Lotus to grab some lunch/snacks and admired all the funny labels and interesting foods. Nothing too outrageous, just enough to get a chuckle.
There was still much time to kill before afternoon training session, we spent some time in the common area watching Channel 3 fights on the television and spoke to one guy (20 years old constitutes 'guy,' correct?), Matt who hails from "oh, in the sticks man. little bit ah' nowhere," England. Matt had saved everything he had for 2 and a half years and up and left for Thailand to live and train. Unfortunately, a few months in he found out he needed chest surgery (I didn't really delve too deep into that one) and hasn't been able to train for a bit. Still a pretty inspiring story that he ended with "Yeah man, I don't know. I guess I'm a little cold-hearted coz I don't miss much at home...so much nicer here."
What started as a 3 hour nap turned into a 7 hour slumber resulting in us missing our afternoon training session, complete failure on that one. Luckily Jen came and woke us up and said Pii A wanted to make sure we got on a decent sleep schedule and adjust to Thailand time which I thought was really nice of him - that and it was dinner time. Oh, sweet sweet dinner.
Alarms have been set on the phone and there will be no excuse missing out of training now.
Tomorrow: Erawan falls and street meat!
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