The making of a young warrior

May 24th, 2006 at 3:47 · Filed Under Dmitry, Family, Karate 

I started my karate blog with a sick story. Fortunately, there are so many good things happen in our live. They are so beautiful and wonderful that often we fail to feel them.

The cool evening breeze blown gently when we reached the training ground at Bukit Beruang. Every Wednesday evening, I teach karate-do at an open-air field in my neighborhood. This was the 4th time my 4-year-old eldest son followed me to the training in his gi.

There was only one student from St. David High School. He stayed nearby. Until 5 weeks ago, my son wanted to join in the training. The 1st time he went for the training was uneventful. He followed the warming up by running around the small field together with my student and I until he complained about his aching tummy. After some rest, he tried to mimic my student doing kata.

We were actually thinking to stop training because of only one student. But I decided to continue because I saw the interest in Dmirty. I talked to my wife and she agreed.

The 2nd and 3rd time were unpleasant because he began to disturb the class with his tantrum. I lost my patience with him and I called my wife to pick him up.

However, I did not give up and I did not want to. I knew I needed to control my emotion and be patience with Dmitry.

Tonight was the 4th night he went for the training. To my surprise, he finished all the warming up and he mimicked all the kihon renshu I was giving to my student. The kihon renshu was not a difficult one today. After Dmitry took a rest, he took up my kumite glove and requested me to help him put on. I did and after a while he wanted to do kumite.

After my student had finished with his kata practice, I asked him to play kumite with Dmitry. Again, to my surprise, Dmitry was mimicking kumite he saw in the National Junior Championship in April. He was mimicking very well. I immediately took the chance to guide him to punch and kick at his karate brother. He learned fast. Then I guided him to block a jodan attack with a jodan age uke. Again, he did it very well.

At the end of the training, we did some tzuki and a kihon technique called yonkai uchi. Although Dmitry was not doing it as perfectly as his karate brother, he did it very well again. This was the third big surprise he gave me tonight.

I was so proud of him tonight. For the first time in my life, I saw myself in him. I was not only making a young warrior, I was also making myself, to learn patience. I realized my son was training me to the right budo path. He is my sensei now. Thanks, Dmitry. Daddy always love you!

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