1. Kicked my own butt at weight training today with training back and chest. Eating that delish protein-packed banana pancake after though made it all worth my wild.
2. My morning schedule six days a week follows the same routine: 5:50am wake-up, 6am meet Kitty Cat for weight training, 7:30am return home to eat my protein-packed banana pancake and shower, and then go back to bed. Hitting the sack after training usually consists of an hour nap but today I slept for two hours.
3. Waking up to my director calling me was definitely not the way I wanted to wake up. Nor was ending our phone conversation in tears how I anticipated that conversation to end. I had texted her earlier on this week to tell her that I wanted to talk to her. It was regarding my work contract, immigration and my boxing. Immigration and I have sorted things out but all that’s needed now is a letter of permission from Dankook saying that they’re allowing me to continue competing with my boxing.
4. I won’t get into the details of the conversation but it ended with me getting all frustrated at the fact that the very person who is suppose to represent me and be fighting for me is fighting against me. Basically, Dankook is trying to push me into stopping my boxing. “Why don’t you just do amateur boxing?” she asked. “That’s like telling a marathon runner to do a 100 meter dash; it’s not the same thing.” Boxing is my passion but so is my teaching, and if anything, my boxing has added so much to my teaching. It has greatly changed who and what I am when I walk into those classrooms and what I bring to my students so mark my words, I refuse to give up my boxing because someone tells me so. When and if I do stop, it'll be because I decided to.
5. I had anticipated my sour morning to seep into my afternoon with the arrival of my difficult class of the week, my Friday 1:20pm speaking class. However, and much to my surprise, they were awesome for me today. I felt like a mother watching her child take it’s first steps in the fact that I bombarded them with so much praise today and continually told them that they were being so great today.
6. I got spotted at the school’s bus stop by one of my former students and his friends. His friends had read all about me in the paper and so we jumped on the bus together and they started up with the million and one questions. Snickers called me when I was on route home and so the three male students I was with asked if they could meet Snickers. They were all overly eager to meet a professional boxer, a “real celebrity in Cheonan” as one put it, and so when Snickers surprised me by showing up at the bus stop they all jumped off the bus with me to meet him.
7. Friday was looking really good despite it’s sour mid-morning break. Snickers took me by the hand and treated me out to dinner at the Sushi Den. It was there, however, that Friday got bad again.
8. My director had called me during dinner and I got all choked up. No sooner did I hang up the phone but then the tears started to fall. I cried right in front of the Sushi Master. He turned and shewed the waitress away to give Snickers and me privacy.
9. Today my request for a permission letter to continue my boxing here in Korea was rejected and I was crushed. Snickers tried to cheer me up by asking me if I wanted him to go march right over to Dankook and talk to the dean himself. I knew he would if I had let him but instead I told him I just wanted to not think about it tonight. To tell you the truth, Snickers isn't all that keen on me having actual bouts but he knows how much I love it and even he has agreed that me traveling to Japan for this next upcoming fight is a huge honor and quite the once-in-a-lifetime experience. He agrees with me, I need this Japan fight.
10. And so on that note, tonight I put all thoughts and ideas regarding my boxing on the shelf temporarily. Junior Mint flooded my phone with text messages, teammates called to see where I was, and even the promoter working with arranging my fight in Japan was texting me. I just wanted to escape it all and so Snickers took me out for movie and ice cream. I was crushed though. “I know you’re really sad when you won’t even eat ice cream!” Snickers told me… and that is true.
QUESTION OF THE DAY...
How far would you go for something you love?
QUOTE OF THE DAY...
Chase down your passion like it's the last bus of the night.
-- Glade Byron Addams
As the story has it, one day I headed to the opposite side of the globe – the Flipside. I arrived in Korea February 16th, 2005 and thought I’d do a year, then leave. I was wrong. I stayed, launched my first company, Flipside Fitness, and then opened Korea's largest boxing club, Hulk's Boxing (now called Hulk's Club).
After 11.5yrs in Korea, I then picked up one day and returned to Toronto, Canada. But then I left again.
Now I live in the Philippines where I am the CEO and head coach of Empowered Clubhouse, the Philippines' first and only boxing clubhouse exclusively just for women. I also am the founder of the Lil' Sistas Project, CEO and designer of Slay Gear and Baa Baa Black Sheep .Ph.
4 comments:
Dear Amy,
You are part Korean, get an F4 Visa. Then you cannot be held accountable for what you do outside of your job.
-Aaron
She's not part korean.
She's polish.
Forgive me but I thought she was part Korean.
Ever thought about an F5?
"Permanent residency visa. It is a permanent visa that never expires. Whereas on the F2 the Korean spouse is the sponsor, on the F5 the holder of the visa is his/her own sponsor. After a divorce, an F-5 visa would not be revoked, while the marriage visa (F-2) would. The F-5 grants full freedom of employment, just like the F-2 visa, with some special little perks. For example, one is able to go through the Korean lines at Incheon immigration. These lines tend to move really quickly and it amounts to a very short waiting time to re-enter the country. Finally, no re-entry stamps are needed, unlike on the F-2. "
-Aaron
Post a Comment