With my crew all cozy in the heated seats of Foxy Brown, we headed off to Chuncheon for some live boxing matches. There were three things on my agenda -- say hi to Junior Mint, speak to my promoter and cheer on Yamada.
Junior Mint is my former coach and I haven't officially talked to him in over a year.
My promoter is currently trying to arrange fights in Japan for Snickers and I.
Yamada was the Japanese female boxer fighting in one of three title matches today.
My anticipation of having a conversation with Junior Mint definitely distracted me throughout today's fights and I got so nervous about leaving the stands in the arena to say hi to him that I had to stop for a quick pee break. With Snickers hand clasped in mine and my friends behind me, we approached him to say hi. He was sitting down watching the fights but turned around to say hi to Snickers. Upon noticing me, he did a double take and said hi in English. I'll take it. It surely wasn't much and I stood there hoping he'd at least stand up so that we could have somewhat of a conversation but he didn't. I'll take his English hi though; it's a small step but it's definitely more than the cold shoulder and the hard-hitting shoulder I got at our other two run-ins this year (one being a literal run-in).
I briefly saw my promoter. He was all smiles but, like usual, he was super busy managing his boxers and running around for the bouts. I never did get a chance to really talk to him but we'll talk soon so no worries.
As for Yamada's fight, this was awesome. Several months ago I saw Hong Su Yun (today's Korean opponent) fight another Japanese fighter in which she didn't appear to have control of the fight or be winning but did in fact win. Snickers and I both vouched that it was only because the fight was in Korea that Su Yun won. Home advantage is pretty brutal. Surely it's bad in other countries too -- Japan is really bad for it -- but throw in the fact that both countries, Korea and Japan, don't exactly like each other and home advantage takes on a whole new meaning and pressure. Korea doesn't like visiting fighters to win and often sets up matches so that the visiting fighter can't win because of unfair matching, but throw in a Japanese fighter into the ring with a Korean fighter and woozers. Sometimes the crowd is not nice. I'm thankful that Korea's crowd isn't nasty like the crowds I've seen at Canadian and American sports events where hecklers flood the scenes and booing is expected. Korea is pretty tame with it's heckling, considering, but it's lack of hecklers is made up by it's increase in country pride and excessively loud cheering -- cheering at everything and anything! Yamada slipped in one of the rounds, slipped as in stepped in a wet spot in the ring that her opponent had also slipped on, and the crowd went crazy.
Having travelled to Japan to fight, I can definitely vouch for the pressures and added stress that come with not fighting in your home country. You usually go a day or two early so that you can get used to the environment but it means you either have to pack your own food and figure out where to cook it or try to search out food your nerve-racked stomach can stomach. You stay in a hotel that's obviously not your own bed or comfort zone and you're either left alone to drown in your own thoughts or told where to go and when. I loved it when I went to Japan to fight, they treated me extremely good, but it was definitely different fighting there as a visiting fighter as opposed to fighting in Korea. Even when I do fight here in Korea, I always insist on sleeping in my own bed and travelling on the day of the fight. Junior Mint used to hate this fact because it meant we had a super early ride to the fight location, ranging from 2 to 4 hours. I didn't want to break my routine though and I knew sleeping somewhere else meant I wouldn't be able to sleep nor would waking up somewhere else for whatever Korean food they'd be serving me sit well in my tummy.
It's quite the reality, walking into a stadium and knowing that everyone there is wanting, wishing and waiting for you to lose. When they announced my fight in Japan, my Korean name and the fact that I was fighting out of Korea got out. Consequently, a healthy crowd of Koreans showed up at my fight to cheer me on. The look on their faces when a platinum blond girl, me, sporting a Korean name on my uniform and Korean writing tattooed on my neck emerged from the dressing room was awesome.
Today's fight wasn't about me but it definitely brought back all the memories of the added stress of having to fight away from home so I cheered on Yamada. Su Yun had won her previous fight but it wasn't a real win and I didn't want to see another visiting boxer get robbed of what was theirs. I have a lot of respect for both fighters, I imagine they both trained very hard and both eagerly wanted the win, but what I don't respect are the judges letting home pride rule over what is fair. This is where I have the problem.
When the fight was over, both Snickers and I agreed that it was Yamada's win but we thought for sure they'd give it to Su Yun. "This is Korea" Snickers said and that pretty much said it all. But then they lifted up Yamada's hand, signalling that she was in fact the winner. We cheered and I was so proud of her. She had come to Korea and had done something that so many boxers before her had tried so eagerly to beat -- Korea's home advantage. She had been given a fair judging and had won. It surely made for quite a memorable day.
I got a chance to talk to Yamada and her coach in the change room after ward. We exchanged business cards and talked for a bit. I told them about my status as a pro boxer and Snickers' too and then they introduced me to Yamada's sister who is also a pro boxer, very cool. I have my husband as my boxing backup and she has her sister, what a great source of inspiration and motivation. We ended our encounter with lots of smiles and words of encouragement, and I left feeling so happy for her win.
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