I was told back in highschool by my cross country coach that I "only need one person" -- one person to push you, one person to believe in you, one person be proud of you -- and that "this one person has to be YOU". Sounds rather silly, perhaps, but it's not always easy to put this idea into motion especially when I'm too tired to go train or am stuck thinking about a past loss but she was right.
Making myself this one person my coach talked about has done wonders. In Canada it was much easier to be that tough girl who was always seen racing around town on her BMX bike, heading off to boxing with her gloves flung over her shoulders or off to weight training at the gym. But this is Korea. Things are definitely different here and often I find myself seriously struggling with who I am, what I want to become and the mold I'm too often forced into fitting into. The other day someone commented about me, saying I looked a lot thinner and was "eating like a lady". I could have dropped kicked this person in the head if it weren't for the fact that I'm now related to her. Yes, I'm thinner and yes I'm eating less but that's because I'm about a week away from my fight -- a fight I have kept very hush-hush from all my in-laws.
Sometimes I think I have it so hard here but then I am reminded that I have quite the sound support system at my boxing club -- a boxing club that has become my safe haven, where I feel totally comfortable, supported, admired and respected. I consider my teammates like a second family and I love them all.
And then there's the ladies in my boxercise classes. Today I trained with one of my Advanced Boxercise ladies and I was sad to remember that she'll be leaving at the end of this month. This particular gal reminds me so much of Homegirl -- a foreign female I met in my first year in Korea but who has since returned to Canada. I have a great group of girls that I train at boxercise. They've always been super supportive of me and I find them to be very motivational to me.
So it got me thinking, if I think I have it so hard yet have so much then how do the other foreigner ladies here in Cheonan feel? Perhaps I'm just spoiled and have it better than I know it.... I think so. So if I have all this and still have a hard time than what do they have?
I've been pondering starting an all-girls club here in Cheonan, I'd call it either S.I.C. (Sisters In Cheonan) or S.O.C. (Sisters Of Cheonan) but am thinking about branching out with Flipside Fitness. I love the idea of an girls only club but am not interested in it becoming like the Seoul club I tried to lead before. I don't want it to be a drinking-centered club that's all about bar-hopping and big meet-ups. I'd like something more low key. Moreover, I'd love for it to be diversion, an alternative, from the usual foreigner social things like drinking and playing pool. I don't drink and I hate pool but I can't be the only one that feels this way. Likewise, I think many of the girls that follow the rest of the crowd do so because there aren't really much other options open to them, that they know of that is. It'd be nice be the one to make other options because I know Cheonan has a healthy number of foreign ladies here.
On my Facebook page for Flipside Fitness I've got 35 members -- 35 reasons why I should be more pro-active with my idea of making Cheonan a more foreign female friendly city. Cheonan already has a dinning-out club, a pool-playing club, and I think the language exchange club is still going but what about an all girls club -- non existant. But this wouldn't just be an all-girls club, I'd make this one for fitness-minded females. Sure, we could get together for happy hour but it wouldn't be all about that, drinking that is. I don't want a club that's all alchol with a bit of activity. We could hit the mountain trails, go for weekly jogs, meet up at a coffee shop on a Saturday or whatnot.
I think what's really missing here in Cheonan is a support system for us females, a second option available to us instead of going with the stereotypical foreign crowd. I feel it.
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.
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I wish I had that kind of connection. I'm in the midst of moving to Seoul for a job and living with my boyfriend Bongsoo. Before hand I visited him for a month twice a year on school break after he had moved back. I love his parents and his friends are nice, but I do (especially from the ladies of the house) about being chubby or eating too much. Always something like that. I'm thankful Bongsoo because he doesn't care what I look like as long as I'm healthy, but I feel judged and living in Seoul... well, many girls are will be all too glad to give comments. I'm trying to adjust, but its proving difficult...
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