Nobody puts Meow in a corner!

"Muay Thai is referred to as the "Art of Eight Limbs" or the "Science Of Eight Limbs" because it makes use of punches, kicks, elbows and knee strikes, thus using eight "points of contact", as opposed to "two points" (fists) in Western boxing and "four points" (hands and feet) used in sport-oriented martial arts." Wikipedia


We made it! We actually made it through our first full week of Muay Thai Kickboxing and we survived...a bit wrecked on all of our 8 limbs and all points of contact as well, but made it nonetheless. We were rewarded with free tickets to an actual real life Muay Thai kickboxing fight on Friday night. I stupidly thought this meant we only have 1 workout on a Friday, but alas I was wrong and we worked out twice and then quickly got cleaned up, ate dinner and headed to the ring that is actually located adjacent to our room for the fight! It began at about 8:30pm with the under 10 year olds...yes, you read correctly, under 10s. Believe me, they could kick my ass in a heartbeat. They go 5 five minute rounds (4 of fighting and 1 with a rest) and there are 9 fights on fight night. After about 3 fights with kids (all getting progressively older with each fight) a set of girls came out to fight and they were kind of scary. There was an incident in the 1970s in which a woman reporter stepped into a Muay Thai ring and dozens of fighters were injured after this with cuts and bruises and it was believed that this incident angered the spirits that protected and guarded the ring (not the fact that when you punch, kick, elbow and knee people they will sustain injuries) and therefore women were banned from the sport for many years. Luckily, this ban was only temporary, but even after the ban was lifted, some gyms would not allow women to come a train and this left the door wide open for Western women to train in Muay Thai and subsequently dominate in the sport. There are still some interesting misogynistic undertones regarding how seriously female Muay Thai fighters and female matches are taken. For example, when men/boys enter the ring, they have to jump over the top or fourth rope in the ring...they are NOT allowed to climb underneath the ropes to enter the ring where as girls have to actually lay down on the dirty floor and roll underneath the bottom most rope to enter the ring. They also only fight for 3 minutes per round and rest for 2 minutes...kind of doesn't really sit well with us, but this is their fighting culture and those are the rules. Once the fighters (boy, girl, man, woman) have entered the ring, they pray at each corner on the mats and their coach makes a prayer over them before their ceremonial dance called the Wai Khru Ram Muay begins. It is all very traditional with headbands and a live band playing Thai instruments during the dance and each round. Some of the fighters were knocked out within the first few rounds and that was really hard to watch in person...it seems so different on the television, but in real life it is just so brutal and intense. I gasped a few times at the intensity and horror of seeing little boys beating each other. I do not think that I could actually fight in the ring...I can barely spare with my trainer, Maw...he is a bit of a dick and likes to smack me in the head, face and stomach as a way of "teaching" me how to block and/or avoid, yet none of the other trainees get this type of training technique. There are two other trainers who also help me in between my ring sessions with Maw and one of them looks like Patrick Swazye (circa Road House/Point Break/Dirty Dancing) and Bruce Lee (circa The Way of the Dragon/Enter the Dragon) made a baby together and the baby is this trainer, Seb. He is lovely and so enthusiastic about Muay Thai. Perhaps he wants me to give Maw a taste of his own medicine, as he teaches me some sneaky elbow moves that I use on Maw in my afternoon sessions, though he quickly catches on and beats me down accordingly. But I will never give up and I have made it my mission to fly out of the corner with some secret move and show Maw just how vicious I can be, though the few times I have gotten a move or two over on him, I apologize, as I feel very bad. I am just not fighter material. It does really motivate me though to work harder and build up a tough skin (not just literally, but figuratively too) and that is always a good thing in the Muay Thai ring and the ring of life. Alex's trainer is a sweet man named Bant. His mother is Indian and his father is Thai, but he was born in a town that is literally on the Malaysian/Thailand border so he speaks, Thai, Malaysian, English and French...very impressive. He is a very short man, but built and stocky and teaches Alex how to fight in a very methodical manner...showing her one move at a time and practicing it step by step over and over again until she masters it and then he adds to that move in the end building a combination of punches, kicks, elbows, knees and blocks that can be used in an actual fight. Yesterday, during training, some random fighter from another gym came up to her and asked her if she was training to be a fighter or for exercise...we think that there may be some talk in the Muay Thai world about a tattoo girl fighter who can kick ass and they are worried that the Suwit Gym we are working out at might want to put her into an actual fight, as she is that good and so tough! Al just wants to do it for the exercise and perhaps the other gyms have sent a mole to investigate just how good tattoo warrior really is or if it is all just hype. So the days continue and we work out harder and harder and medicate our injuries each day. In between our workouts, we visit the various beaches around Phuket, go to the giant Buddha, do some shopping and volunteer at the Paws Phuket Animal Welfare Society. You know it wouldn't take long for us to find some sort of animal rescue so we could pet some dogs and cats! Now comes decision time. We have asked Mr. Kitty Sac Meow Meow Kitty Kitty (who reminds us the character in Dirty Dancing called Neil...the mean little bosses son who made all the dancers lives hell) if we could come back for the last 3 weeks of October and there is space for us so now we have to choose whether to come back after our race up 1,083 stairs to practice Muay Thai or travel on to Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam. Mr. Kitty Sac is the boss's son and he just walks around in his silk pyjamas all day long watching over the trainers making it difficult for them with his commentary and input, while kissing ass with all the tourits and white fighters. It is strange how there are so many Dirty Dancing undertones and characters right here at the Suwit Gym. Someone should make a documentary film about this place...Wendy...