Dell's Tae Kwon Tournament Adventure

this past saturday i traveled with the howard university tae kwon do club to compete in a tournament at upenn (university of pennsylvania, that is). it was a great time.

first off, we met at howard u at 4:30am. yes, four thirty in theeeee A M. which means i woke up at about 3 am *insert gasp*. i forgot that time of day existed, and when my alarm went off i thought it was lying. i could've sworn that my clock was on military time, or perhaps it froze at 3pm the previous day and needed to be fixed.

or perhaps i could've not talked on the phone with Version 4 til 2am. but that's neither here nor there.

anyway, we met up and immediately got in the van. and even more immediately we all went to sleep. we thought it would take 5 hours to get there, but it only took 3. that made me mad because i wanted to make up for not going to sleep like i should have  rest a little more before the event. when we arrived we  ate at philly diner.

i was very happy that i wasn't sparring, because that meant that i didn't have to weigh in OR be bogged down by the breakfast that i would surely devour. i was up north for the day. how could i pass up a diner? anyways, we all ordered and of course, it wasn't without controversy. the university gave us a stipend for food. we all had debit cards to use, and the folks at the restaurant were like, "ummm we don't do split checks on the weekends."

that would've been cool, had we not ordered our food already. so my response was, "oh, so you just don't want our money? GREAT!" they eventually found it in their business sense heart to break the checks up so we could pay.

now, in terms of the food, that was interesting. one person ordered biscuits and gravy. now, if anyone knows me they should know that i'm against all notions of southern breakfast, simply because it looks like sunday dinner to me. however, even i know that having biscuits and gravy at most establishments above the mason-dixon line will result in a tragedy.

it did.

as for my food, well, it didn't taste bad. that's because it didn't have a taste. perhaps my taste buds weren't fully awake. who knows.

finally, we arrived at the tournament. after parking we looked for the building. our first stop was the university's gym which i confused with a bally's. and that's saying something, because the gym that i'm used to at rutgers was super great. but then we approached this door that you'll see in the picture that follows:

i feel like king koopa is behind this door. 

everybody else wondered how it opened. the first thing that came to my mind was this:

"thank you mario! but our princess in in another castle!"

moving on, we found the real place for the tournament and began to check in. i had to get ready and begin warming up, because my event was among the first ones to take place. it was a great scene. everyone was warming up, getting some final practice in. it's empowering to be around so many people that are doing the same thing that you are.

before the tournament officially kicked off. we got lined up. we performed the customary proceedings that you would at the beginning of any class. we showed respect to the masters that were in the arena. we bowed to the flags, the korean and united states. then someone sang the national anthem. i was in a good place. this is my super bowl. my nba finals. i worked hard to do well here, and i was happy to have the shot to show how much i improved since the semester began.

here are some pictures that show you what a day at a tournament is like. there are lots of people standing around. lots of noises. lots of EVERYTHING. you really have to be focused when you do your events.

The HU tkd team waiting in line.

(people getting used to the area and practicing their moves.)

More practicing. More fine-tuning. always busy and buzzing. tournaments are like airports.

in terms of my event, i competed in men's poomse green belt division. it was about 20 of us. poomse is what other styles would call forms or kata. you basically are performing a series of preset moves in a manner that shows balance, control, intensity, and precision. unfortunately, i don't think people take forms as seriously as they should. but that's how i was taught since age 12. mr. lewis, mr. miller, mr. ganguly, and mr. kim taught me that. everything matters, not just the sparring.

i competed, and just like 10 years ago i had the same mentality. i watched every one's form and noted things. i also judged if i could outdo their performance. yes, because it is a competition. and yes, because i want to win. i must admit that some of the scoring surprised me. no one in our division got lower than a 7.0 and i would have given out of 6.5's if i was judging. but that's a part of the slightly subjective nature of poosme judging. you can do your form in one tournament and come in first. you can do the same one in the same way somewhere else and not even place.

when i did my poosme, i was a little annoyed because i slipped a little. still, i managed to tie for 2nd place. so, we had to do a tie breaker. now, the second time i did my form, i think i ROCKED IT. unfortunately, the judges thought otherwise and i lost. i ended up with 3rd place. some of my teammates didn't agree with the score. by the standards that i learned, i sincerely do believe that at the very least i was ranked second. but, i understand that different places have different standards. i don't know any of theirs, so perhaps i just didn't mean their standards.

i was a little annoyed by that, but i looked at the silver lining. in my 9 years of martial arts, every time i've competed i've always placed. this was my first 3rd place. no reason to be upset. just more motivation to keep working.

after that, it was sparring time. i was excited to see ernest in action, because i knew he was really good. i never get a chance to see him in full flight in class, but since it was competition i knew he would swing for the rafters. watching him fight was inspiring. it's like he did whatever he wanted to. kicked the dude in the head TWICE. he could score at will. it inspired me to work on my sparring form. i think everyone did really well in sparring, especially the first timers. although in some matches i think we were cheated out of some points. at the end, we didn't win the sparring, and a lot of that was because we didn't have enough people for the team format.

here is a clip of some sparring from the day.

and yes, that's me in the background saying, "kick him. get him." neither one of these people are on our team, but i was glad that i noticed the openings while watching all of the fights. i just need to get in better shape and i'll do okay when i spar.

now, keep in mind that this is full contact sparring. and in the higher divisions you can kick folks in the head. that happened a few times. so this is why these folks were there...

you periodically heard the word "medic to court such and such." it's a reality of competition.

all and all, it was a great day. i even got an authentic philly cheese steak out of the deal! i'm inspired to keep training and to continue to push against my own barriers to see how far i can go mentally and physically.

oh, and here's the medal that i won. it's a bronze. i was going to wear it everywhere i went for a week, but i thought that was overkill. so i just sleep with it under my pillow.

3rd place ain't nuthin to funk with! or...just the second to last person to lose.