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.

Saturday, July 23, 2016

Shades of Gray Will Get You Every Time... Saturday, July 23

Today changed everything.

It started at the curbside of Yonge and Bloor, at 9:40am, with me standing there waving someone off, and it ended at the curbside of Ossington and Bloor, at 5am, with me waving someone else off.  

I had woken up at 9am but it wasn't until close to 6am that I finally called it a day.  

In between a hug from one and a hug from another today, my day had been filled with more hugs from more people I care about, both familiar friends and new friends.  I had added a whole new crew of 30+ people to my list of friends, people from the Korean-English language exchange group I just joined.  It was interesting to note how and who I fitted in with there.  I felt more comfortable talking to the Koreans and really wanted to speak to them in only Korean but thought maybe they might take me as a show-off.  I mingled with everyone but then there was one particular Korean girl who totally fed all Korean stereotypes to a T and I caught myself rolling my eyes at her and shaking my head.  If my energy levels in the car two Mondays ago exhausted that guy than this girl definitely exhausted me and my tolerance of Korean princesses.  She was just a normal girl, fair enough, but her manners served to spark some uncomfortable feelings of how much I really didn't fit into Korea until I tried to change myself to be cuter but even then it was so incredibly temporary.

It had been a long day of new friends, lots of hugs and an overdose of giggles and good times but it was also an exhausting day.  I had anticipated hanging out with a particular favourite person of mine tonight but first I had a business meeting to attend to, an interview for a job that I wasn't quite sure if I was naive in believing I'd want or just flat out desperate because I am very much a starving athlete/entrepreneur.  

I went for the interview, regardless.  It was a free meal out at the restaurant of my choice and I was super low on groceries and hungry.  I needed to eat after pumping out 50 laps in the pool and then kicking butt at kick ball up in the blazing sun.  I'm a starving athlete, I can't afford to eat out.

I needed a night out.  I needed to disconnect from some news I got from Korea yesterday, needed to dissect something new in my life, and just basically wanted to get out of the house and do something with my weekend other than training and work.  

Tonight everything changed and not just because of that morning goodbye, the game in the park or the interview, but also because of a particular conversation that sparked between me and this other person at 2:30am as we walked up to Bloor to part ways and each go home.  We had stopped to dig deeper into the issue of discussion, right outside of my church actually of all places, and that's exactly where we stood for the next couple of hours.  Me with my shoes off and he standing there leaning against the fence.  

At 6am I turned my night light off, rolled over and scooped Balboa up in my arms.  It had been a long day and everything I thought I wanted and thought I was comfortable with had been turned upside down, challenged, questioned, and had left my head full of pondering thoughts and left me questioning what's really the difference between right and wrong.  When you're a little kid things seem so defined, so clear, but as you get older the once solid line becomes fuzzing and now shades of gray come into play.  

I might have agreed to something really wrong today and I might have done something really bad, but I don't know. 

Those damn shades of gray will get you every time.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

So obscure, what are you talking about? How come you never share the details of things that might not be good for you. You are good at sharing everything else, but not things you know are not good. Why the ambivalence? Please don't tell me that Snickers is coming to visit you in Canada.....

Long Time Reader