kukkiwon

deery-lou.
first let me thank all of you who sent me emails, called, or left comments wishing me luck. i really appreciated that. it felt like you all were with me on saturday. as you can probably tell i survived my test. my nervous engery didn't implode inside me. my morning started at 8:30am. i tried to sleep a little longer but couldn't. i was actually surprised i got any sleep. it took an episode of survivor and 3 project runways until i finally drifted off into the land of dreams. not really sure if i had to be at my tkd school at 11am or noon, i decided i'd shoot for 11:30am. of course when i arrived my sahbumnim looked at his watch then at me indicating i was early. i went into the gym and started stretching and practicing. at around 12:40 horace showed up. he was going to ride with me and my class to the testing center. we left around 1 pm. we arrived at kukkiwon at 2 pm. shortly upon arrival christine and anna showed up. then a few minutes later young arrived. yes, my co-workers came to cheer me on. the testing center was not how i imagined it. i was expecting a gym of sorts. instead it looked like a school theater right now to the wooden movie theater seats. apparently this was a second testing site since there were so many people. there were at least 300+ at this site. the program didn't start until 3 pm. there were three performances by a taekwondo troupe. its always interesting to watch them perform. following them was a magic act. yes, i said magic act. for a minute i thought i was actually in high school watching talent night. when the magic act ended, there was a brief introduction of the judges and then it began. the testing was arranged by groups. i was in the first adult group which meant we wouldn't take the stage until after all of the children were finished. talk about a long wait. jordan, one of my students, was actually there with his tkd school to take his test. it was pretty funny to see him. i learned from anna that i needed to score a total of 60 points to pass. she tried to explain to me how it was broken down but it didn't make any sense. the test was set up in three parts. in groups of 15 you enter the stage and face the judges. this meant your back was facing the audience. the first part was practicing kicks, punches, blocks, etc. you really didn't know what you were going to have to do until the announcer called it out. this had me a bit worried since i only understand a little bit of korean. my kwanjangnim told me when it was my turn to just look at the people around me and copy. the second part was the poomsaes. we had to do 2 different poomsaes. one of them was definitely paljang [8] and the other one was a random poomsae [1-7]. after the poomsaes were finished you bowed then headed to the back portion of the stage for fighting. there were three fighting sections going on at one time. after an hour of watching this over and over my nerves started to subside and i was actually getting bored. my group finally took the stage at 5 pm. i walked around to the side entrance where they had sheet of thin foam on the ground for us to sit on. we sat in numeric order. i was number 7. at first i was sitting in the wrong spot so they had to point to where i was suppose to sit. no one there spoke any english. i'm not sure if i mentioned this yet but i was the ONLY foreigner there. the man started speaking. i just stared. there was nothing else i could do. i did realize that he was taking roll. i wasn't sure how i was suppose to answer. when he got to me he looked muttered something and then moved on. my group of 15 included 6 ajummas, 8 college students, and me. let me just say that all of the college students were BIG. where were all the skinny, lanky ones. then i thought that perhaps i'd have to fight an ajumma. how funny would that be. before i realized what was happening we were motioned onto the stage. it was time to begin. the butterflies in my stomach picked up speed. we bow and then the test began. i feel pretty confident with the punching and kicking segment of the test. during my first poomsae sam jang [3] i messed up a little bit at the very end. i knew it at the time too because it felt wrong. there's a slight possiblity they didn't notice since my back was toward them. i'll have to wait and see. the next poomsae was pal jang [8]. once i finished the first poomsae i felt much more relaxed. i think i actually did fairly well on this one. no mistakes that i realized. when we had finished we bowed again to the judges and headed off stage and toward the last part of the test:fighting. unfortunately i didn't get to fight an ajumma. i got paired up with a college student. he was big, too. once we were suited up we headed over to our designated fighting spot. i'm not really sure how long the fighting actually lasted. it felt like forever. especially since i was getting the shit kick out of me. i did manage to get a few kicks in here and there but nothing major. this guy was fast. he nailed me once in the groin but i kept going. i was actually pretty proud of myself. after our fight i was completely exhausted and very thirsty. my opponent shook my hand and said something in korean. most likely it was "thanks for letting me kick your ass". i walked back up to the front where my kwanjangnim was and he gave me a thumbs up. i won't know for sure if i pass for two weeks.

the first part of my very long saturday was over. i felt relieved. i felt tired. however my night was just beginning. tonight was horace's farwell dinner in seoul with his friends. from the tkd test center we jumped on the subway and made our way to namaste for dinner. namaste is the very yummy nepali/indian food. once again i had the chicken butter curry and garlic nan. i could literally feel the fat growing on me. after dinner we hopped into cabs and headed for the comfort zone. the comfort zone was this really cool bar. its an area i had yet been too. but from the look of the shops its one i definitely need to check out. there's a university nearby so its kind of a young crowd. i love finding new areas. young went with me to the pharmacy so i could get some cream for my hand. it had been throbbing ever since i blocked a kick while fighting. we had one cocktail at the cz then headed off for "the hill" in itaewon. we hit two bars in "the hill" soho and queens. from queens we went to a dance club called del. it was in the basement of the hamilton hotel. the place was packed. we stayed there until 4 am. thats when young and i headed back to soho for one final drink and await the openning of the subway. at 5:20 am we head for the trains. i finally got home around 6:50 am. my day was finally over. it was time to get some much needed sleep. and thats what i did.

be well…

14 days and counting