LiViNG on the FLipSiDe

2012-01-29T15:37:00.000+09:00

Pyen Chi kissed a girl and she liked it... hahaha;)

And to think I was the only girl she kissed, now I've got Jennifer Aniston to compete with, yikes. That's hard competition.

TV Rambling... Sunday, January 29

2012-01-29T13:59:00.000+09:00

Joe Rogan, the interviewing guy on UFC… urgh! Don’t even get me started. Am I the only one who thinks this scruff-master needs a good shaving?! Either shave it off or grow a beard; the whole in between state mixed with what sounds like a smoker’s voice just comes across as dirty and screams lazy. Mind you, some guys can actually pull this look off and make it look quite hot, but Joe Rogan, nope.

Today I watched the UFC fights but find myself annoyingly and frustratingly distracted by Joe Rogan. So silly, I know, but with every finish to every fight he’d jump in on the action, take over my TV screen, I’d mutter something silly, and then I’d have to either change the channel or leave the room.

Upon changing the channel at one point, I found out that Pyen Chi absolutely loves Jennifer Aniston… hahaha. Seriously, it’s hilarious. I noted this to Snickers the other day and he didn’t believe me, well, when she popped up on the TV today Pyen Chi scooted over to the TV and licked the screen. Yup, Pyen Chi licked Jennifer Aniston’s two dimensional digital head… hahaha.

2012-01-28T23:28:00.000+09:00

The key components needed for tonight's successful "kidnapping" were a sweet destination (beach), a Korean hottie to keep me warm, some Korean food to keep my Korean hottie of a kidnapper happy, and a four-legged friend to keep me company (tonight I had two actually).

I'll Happily Be Kidnapped Again, Thanks... Saturday, January 28

2012-01-28T14:51:00.002+09:00

At exactly 7:50pm I was told I had ten minutes to get ready. “Get ready, I am kidnapping you” Snickers said. “Get ready for what?” was my question. I had no idea what Snickers was planning but I knew it had to do with a comment I had made earlier. Earlier on in the day I had complained about being so consumed with my boxing. I love boxing, don’t get me wrong, but sometimes it’d be nice to be able to escape it, even if for a day. Right now I’m definitely feeling the pressure of my upcoming fight. Meeting up with friends for coffee is a no go on account that I’ve started to restrict my liquid intake, like wise with heading out to a restaurant. I miss the days when I used to get dolled up or even put on heels and make-up for that matter. Now days I eat, sleep and do boxing. I wake up and head out for a morning run or sit with Snickers to go over the video footage of last night’s sparring session. I train like a beast at boxing, especially now that I have sparring every day, so I spend a good part of my day sleeping, storing my energy for my evening of intense training at the club. Then there are emails and random drop-bys I need to do with various sponsors, clients and regarding the 63 Day Fat to Phat Challenge I’m hosting via Flipside Fitness.

These days I seriously envy normal people, and by normal I mean anyone and everyone who isn’t doing what I’m doing, preparing for a fight. I don’t crave junk food and I don’t drink but sometimes, when I’m walking home late from training, all sweaty and exhausted, I see people in the window of local pubs. They’re downing their beers, chewing away at fried chicken and ketchup-drown French fries, or so I envision them doing and I envy them. They seem to not have a care in the world and natural things to them, like eating what they want and doing what they want, continues on without a second thought.

My actual boxing training may only take two hours of my day and thus my “work” schedule doesn’t compare to the average person’s 9-5 work day, but sometimes it feels the very opposite. I can’t just clock in and clock out of work now with a fight scheduled. And that's the thing, it's never a set thing that I'll get a fight. I continually train so hard in hope of getting a fight. I love boxing but sometimes I wonder if it's all worth it. I’ve got sponsors invested in me, a boxing club’s image to uphold, hell I’m the only registered foreign boxer in this country so I’ve got that on my shoulders, and then there’s the fact that I’m totally going against the natural flow of what mainstream Korea thinks it means to be a woman and they always seem so obligated to remind me of this.

Anyways, back to the initial story I was writing about…

So I figured Snickers would be taking me on a long drive somewhere because he threw some of his snacks into my purse and brought Pyen Chi along. Two and a half hours later we showed up at one of my favorite places in Korea – Daecheon Beach. He had taken the scenic route to get here and had made a special music CD for the ride, very sweet.

We walked along the beach, allowing Pyen Chi to go wild and free, which meant she ate the sand and ran in circles around us. It was rather chilly out on the open beach but it was nice. It was nice to just get away.

We love the beachside restaurants with all their fresh seafood but with my fight just around the corner I couldn’t indulge. Snickers felt bad for being hungry but I insisted he eat. Thankfully he ordered something I don’t like – noodles. Unless the noodles are drowned in some kind of spicy sauce or are outnumbered by chicken, I don’t like noodles. At the restaurant there was a little dog, her name translated into English was Pearl, so I distracted myself with playing with her while Snickers ate.

On the way home we leisurely took our time but when we were just a mere 20 minutes from our house we ran into quite the roadside scene. There just feet in front of us on an open massive road was a road barrier shattered into a million pieces. Up ahead was a white car beside the continuing road barriers and a woman kneeling down beside its’ tire. We ended up turning our car around, parking it facing the oncoming traffic and jumping out to help the lady. As it turns out, she had fallen asleep and crashed into the massive barrier. Mind ya, because the barriers are filled with water they’re now frozen because of winter, so it totaled the front of her car. She was all shaken up so I tried to comfort her while she called her mother. Snickers scrambled to drag the large pieces off the road but other cars ended up being tied into the situation as large chunks of the barrier got stuck under their car while others swerved and hit other cars. Within a matter of minutes eight cars had become involved. It was quite the dramatic ending to our sweet beach date – my kidnapping.

2012-01-27T23:05:00.000+09:00

You can tell I was way too exhausted when I couldn't even bring myself to lift the camera and taking any interesting shots at the boxing club... hahaha. My arms were throbbing as was my eye, so I took these shots -- my bruised knuckles and the Korean Hornet training on the heavy bag.

Crunch Countdown Begins!!!... Friday, January 27

2012-01-27T18:47:00.001+09:00

My two week Crunch Countdown to my fight weigh-in day began today and, on account of this fact, I’ve freed up my schedule so that I can basically train, eat, sleep, repeat for the next two weeks. I’ve limited my boxercise classes to only two weekend classes, meetings with personal training clients are still a go but I’m not scheduling running with any of them.

For the next two weeks my days will consist of early morning runs, boxing in the evening and a lot of sleeping in between training. My training at the boxing club will consist of the usual components I do -- skipping, shadow boxing, pad work, weight training and ab work – but it’ll also include daily sparring sessions which definitely jump my training up several notches on the intensity scale. “Train hard, fight easy”.

I’ve got exactly 14 days till I’ll have to step on the scale in front of my opponent and KBC for my fight weigh-in. So, with only 14 days left,, this means I’ll be weighing-in an average of 3-4 times, depending on if I go running that day.

1. immediately when I wake up
2. after my run
3. upon arriving at boxing
4. after boxing training

My weight will be watched like a hawk, not only by me but also by Junior Mint and Snickers. It’s kind of strange waking up, leaning in for a kiss from Snickers but being interrupted by him saying “jump on the scale”. Nothing like a good morning weigh-in… hahaha. Mind you, weighing-in so frequently keeps a constant pressure on me but it’s a needed pressure, a means of keeping me focused. My weight fluctuates so much during the day and as I approach my fight weigh-in day it’ll fluctuate even less though as I start to dehydrate myself next week, then I can practically count the few beads of sweat after training.

Wearing a sauna suit is also a mandatory Junior Mint’s placed on me for when I’m boxing. It’s like a thick plastic suit that ups your body temperature, helps to elevate your heart rate and thus makes you sweat much more than usual. Thankfully I’m not being forced to wear the full suit, only the shirt.

Tonight I got appointed a second sparring partner so I was pretty stoked yet intimidated over that. It’s always a bit nerve-racking, stepping into a sparring session with a new sparring partner but it’s good in that it’s just like on fight day. You don’t know you’re opponent so there’s no getting use to them. Staying with the same sparring partner for too long can prove to be ineffective in that you do get used to them, learn their weaknesses and strengths, and also pick up new moves from them. I’ve never had the opportunity to get comfortable with a sparring partner though on account that I’ve never really had a set partner. Now I’ve got two – Captain Jab and the Korean Hornet – and that’s awesome. The Korean Hornet is a few weight classes above me and is more of an in-fighter, unlike Captain Jab who is almost the same weight as me and is an out-fighter. As for why the Korean Hornet is called the Korean Hornet, it’s because he definitely knows how to sting you with his punches and I got a swollen eye to testify to that, yikes.

We were supposed to go for 4 rounds of sparring tonight, the Korean Hornet and I, but when the kid went to press start on the round bell he accidently turned it off. It wasn’t until Junior Mint noticed that we had sparred through an entire song, about 4-5 minutes, playing in the background that he took notice and stopped us. “Restart!” he yelled out. Turns out by restart he meant restart the whole sparring session so basically we sparred for 6 rounds.

2012-01-26T17:41:00.000+09:00

Snowy day playdate at Pyen Chi's favorite play spot -- Taedu San Park, Cheonan.

One Last Day... Thursday, January 26

2012-01-26T06:29:00.000+09:00

With tomorrow marking the start of my two week crunch countdown to my fight, today I enjoyed my last day of real relaxation. It’s not that I haven’t been training hard or haven’t been focused on my fight, I have, but tomorrow it’ll get all that much more intense.

Today Snickers and I took Pyen Chi out to Taedu San Park to check out a new display that commemorates and pays tribute to the Cheonan warship that North Korea sunk last year with a torpedo. It’s quite a respectable display, showcasing a replica of the boat and a large statue that has all the names of those killed engraved into it. All those young men who lost their lives, of course very sad but I think it’s sadder because they were so young.

I always like exploring the various military machines on display at the park and today it was hilarious to see Pyen Chi explore them too. She literally tried to climb over the barrier robe and climb into one of the flighter jets… oh gosh. I personally love the tanks.

So I spent a good chunk of my afternoon at Taedu San park and then Snickers and I did a couple of errands – dropped by the bank, picked up chicken at the grocers and his coat at the dry cleaners – then we headed off to boxing.

I tell ya, after quite the relaxing and enjoyable day I had, stepping into the boxing club today was quite disappointing. KBC called the club today with bad news and with my fight almost 2 measly weeks away, KBC (The Korean Boxing Commission) playing with my patience isn’t a good thing. Recently they changed presidents but apparently the switch wasn’t one without complications and now both the former and present president are butting heads. Consequently, because things are up in the air with management at KBC, Snickers’ much anticipated, much needed fight at the end of February has been postponed and risks being canceled. I felt so frustrated for him and so angry with KBC. Junior Mint was frantically on the phone, phoning other boxing coaches and managers, scrambling around to find out if my fight has been affected.

Whether it’s their ill matching of opponents, canceling of fights, or silly things like not updating their website and even so much as posting correct fight locations, I’m so sick and tired of being sick and tired of KBC. KBC is suppose to be working for and with us boxers, not against us.

Get it together KBC, seriously!!!

Ahhh… let’s change the subject.

Needless to say, upon getting word that his fight has been postponed and is on the verge of being canceled, Snickers didn’t train tonight. He left in frustration and headed off to Suwon to hang with Wonder Boy, leaving me to train without him. I totally felt his frustration so I let him go, telling him to drive carefully and that I’ll see him tomorrow. I knew he needed to get away, vent his frustration and then come back refreshed and refocused. Wonder Boy will help him get his head cleared.

Junior Mint is going on the notion that my fight is still on so tonight he continued with putting me through grueling training which meant I had to gear up for sparring. My coach Junior Mint was asked today by a visiting guest as to why I spar with guys and I took it upon myself to answer his question. “Because I have no choice, because I’m a girl and that’s my disadvantage in Korea” was my answer and it’s true.

There’s no other female professional boxer in Cheonan and as for the other females at my boxing club, they all do boxing as a means of exercise. None of them are interesting in actually stepping in the ring. My former sparring partner is thinking of retiring from boxing and she’s a two hour ride away. Bella Punch isn’t allowed to spar with me anymore because I fractured her nose and her husband refuses to have her spar with me. Little Miss Sunshine used to spar with me but was a temporary partner and has since stopped boxing, got married and had a baby. So that leaves me with… no other female. That leaves me with Captain Jab, a young guy who is in the same weight class as me, has much more amateur experience than I do, and who, because he’s been working as my coach’s assistant coach, is here every single day the club is open so there’s no guessing as to whether or not he’s at boxing. He’s a very reliable and very skilled sparring partner, perhaps the best sparring partner I’ve ever had. Having said this though, the poor guy is getting dragged through grueling training with me because of me having a scheduled fight so I know he goes home every night sore and exhausted just like me.

2012-01-25T23:33:00.000+09:00

Getting excessively punched in the head and drilled to exhaustion wasn't going to stop this Polack from getting dolled up for her man on their 2nd anniversary. I thought sporting a dangerously short dress with kicking leather boots would score me a for sure smootch but it was Snickers who was quite the show stopper tonight with a little something he had shoved up his sleeve;)

Celebrating Two Years, Snickers, Me... and Bob?!... Wednesday, January 25

2012-01-25T14:28:00.005+09:00

When Snickers and I were on our honeymoon, in Bali, I was approached by a little girl selling postcards in a rice field. She was no older than eight and she spoke to me with such a sweet voice and with such perfect English that, well, I couldn’t resist buying her little stack of postcards. Snickers teased me about being putty in the little girl’s hands so I told him that I bought them for him but because he made fun of me I was going to wait to give them to him.

Today, for our second year wedding anniversary, I finally gave him one of these postcards. On the back of it I had written him a little love letter and then later on in the day I sent Pyen Chi over to Snickers with it in her mouth. It was quite the cute presentation of my letter and he greeted it with a huge smile.

Snickers and I aren’t really into the exchanging of gifts but we’re really big into letters. Occasionally I’ll find a post-it note stashed away in my desk or stuck on the bathroom mirror. Tonight, when we headed out for a late dinner after boxing, he surprised me with a letter. Originally we had made reservations at 5-Star’s restaurant but because I was kept longer at boxing with having to spar and whatnot, we couldn’t make our reservation. We headed to a local little café/bar for a plate of hot chicken and salad and it was there that Snickers surprised me with a letter. He had asked me if he looked stronger and then insisted I feel his arm. I thought it was a rather strange request and totally out of the blue but when I felt his arm I felt paper crumble in his sleeve – it was a letter. He had stuffed it in his jacket and thought he was pretty smart having pulled off this surprise.

I had anticipated a sweet letter written all in Korean but much to my total shock it was written in English!!! English?!... definitely a first for him. Snickers has never written anything in English, not by himself that is. He’s written a letter to my family but it was my English translation of what he initially wrote in Korean that he copied down. Tonight’s English letter was something he wrote solely by himself. I can only imagine how long it took him to write, yikes!

Of course the letter was bombarded with grammatical errors, misused words and scattered sentences but I definitely gave him A+ for effort and thought. I was touched though I must note Ibusted out in laughter at the glance of the first sentence.

“Bob and I’ve been married almost two years...”

“Who is Bob?” I asked him. “I don’t know too. Dictionary told me Bob” he told me. I think what had happened was he had used his online translator for random translations he couldn’t do and things got lost in translation. The end of his letter had a couple of sentences in Korean. I think that’s where his frustration with English and sweating away at trying to express himself in another language got to him and he gave into wanting to just write in Korean.

Apparently now my new nickname is Bob… hahaha, too funny;)

2012-01-24T23:59:00.004+09:00

There's something special about the relationship between a boy and his dog.

My father used to tell me that if I dug deep enough I'd get to China, but now that China is next door, will Pyen Chi's digging get us to Canada?!

Snickers will forever be my man, Mi Nam will forever be my baby but Pyen Chi... she'll forever be my girl friend;)

This marked are last shot of us before we step into two years of marriage tomorrow.

And this is our family shot, a sad revised but happily together family shot for 2012.

Last Day of Year One... Tuesday, January 24

2012-01-24T15:01:00.002+09:00

I once asked my mother “How did you know you wanted to marry dad?” and she answered by saying “I just knew -- when you know, you know.” Snickers and I dated for a very brief time before jumping into marriage but I knew; I had finally understood my mother’s words because that answer was the only answer relevant to what I felt. It’s like I felt it in my bones that Snickers and I were right together.

I remember waking up on our wedding day, full of fear. Fear because I was so afraid that in the night he had developed jitters and realized that he was way too good for me. I’m four years older than Snickers and in addition to these four extra years of life I’ve had so many more experiences and opportunities to explore life – university, travel, living on my own, and so on. I was ready for marriage but I feared he wasn’t. I find Koreans tend to hold on too long to their young and sometimes it disgusts me that they live with their parents until marriage. They go from being an over-aged child to suddenly being expected to fufill and fit the role of husband/wife when really they’re still very much wet behind the ears with lack of independence and life experience.

I was ready to marry Snickers and though I thought he wasn’t when we did, I wanted so eagerly to start a life with him. A friend once told me that no one is perfect but when you find someone who loves you – flaws and all – you hold on to that person and don’t let go. I refused to let go of Snickers so I married him and I’m glad I did… so damn glad I did.

Snickers may not be the typical husband but he tries. He still leaves his underwear randomly in the kitchen, he never washes dishes unless it’s to “make up” for something he did and I always have to remind him to take out the trash and recycling. But he always goes his way to drive me wherever I have to go, surprises me with random Post-It love letters and egg bread, and always holds my hand when he goes to sleep. He always kisses me before eating whatever food I’ve cooked him and he’s not shy to hide being cutesy towards me, even in public. Hearing him yell out “Baby Angel” in the grocery store as he searches the isles for me always makes me smile.

Being married isn’t easy nor is it easy being married when you both come from different cultures, different countries and speak two different languages but I think it’s these differences that have added to our marriage. They’ve made things more “interesting”. Things are definitely never dull, that’s for sure. In so many ways we’re so different but in so many ways we’re exactly the same, it’s strange in that way because we work.

Tomorrow marks Snickers and my two year wedding anniversary so we headed out for a road trip today, visiting the beach side and laughing at the fact that we still can’t believe we’re married. Still sounds funny to call myself a married woman.

2012-01-23T21:13:00.000+09:00

Snickers usually doesn't like my food so we cook our own meals BUT there is ONE meal of mine that he loves. He loves, loves, LOVES my chicken stirfry. Tonight I used a crazy combo of different spices to make a chicken stirfry I called "French Chicken A La Love"... such a cheesy name, I know;) Cooked up some homemade garlic tortilla shells and added a dash of red wine for him to down it with.

Ramble-Bambleness... Monday, January 23

2012-01-23T12:55:00.001+09:00

Not much of a family Lunar New Year celebration on account of some fist-throwing drama that went down a month or so ago. So on that note, Snickers drove Granny-K to Seoul and came back to join me in Cheonan for a romantic candlelit dinner. Well, it was as romantic as it could possibly be with Pyen Chi -- the Pee Master Beast of Fur -- nudging us at the dinner table;) I miss the times when it was little Mi Nam nudging at my toes, asking for handouts at the table. Ahhh Mi Nam, I miss him so much.

Pyen Chi is going through a little bit of a rebelious stage; definitely testing us. Whether it's her jumping on me when we're out walking or her randomly biting me when I'm in bed, she's figured out she's strong and is testing to see who is in control. This has been going on for a good solid week and it's not cool, so I'm not about to let it continue for much longer.

On a different note, this past weekend I've been doing a lot of jogging. Last night I went out for a 15km run and then today I went for a timed 7km run. Am contemplating joining the Adidas MBC Hangang half marathon and am even considering possibly stepping it up a notch and doing the full marathon. It isn't until April 8th so it's plenty of time to train but I think I might just do the half marathon. Set up another "deal" with the Cheonan Trump, like last year but this year I'll beat it. Last year my goal was to do the half marathon under 2 hours -- my time was 2 hours and 7 minutes. Seven extra minutes that killed it for me. Not that I'm making excuses or anything but I did run that half marathon just a week or two after my scooter crash that left me hospitalized and the race route was brutal. Something about running along the Han River -- a totally exposed path with no trees -- in the winter screams silliness to whoever planned it and to me too for that matter for joining it. The Adidas half marathon is basically the same route, well the same area, but doing it in April will mean a world of difference with the weather.

2012-01-22T20:43:00.000+09:00

This was a screen shot of a YouTube video I did. Little did I know that it'd lead me to getting sponsored by Adidas... very cool! And as for this shot, that's Snickers beside the boxer all geared up to go, with his best friend Wonder Boy on the left. Little did he know that girl in the back with her boyfriend [me and Q], who is gearing up for her debut fight, would later be his wife.

Seven Years Recap... Sunday, January 22

2012-01-22T08:54:00.003+09:00

And here I thought I was going into my seventh year in Korea. Turns out I’ll be entering my EIGHT year… wow! Come this February 16th I will have successfully tackled seven years of existence in this country, so I started thinking about it. What do I have to show for these seven years?! I started thinking about this, so I sat down at the computer and gave myself a good solid twenty minutes to think of the main moments that went down in my life here in Korea. Sure, much more has gone down beyond the moments listed below and I'm not entirely sure if my dating of such events are correct but this is what I came up with in the allotted time.

YEAR ONE – Feb. 2005
Started a job as a kindergarten ESL teacher.
Called off my engagement to the retired pro soccer player.
Decided to stay in Korea to avoid engagement call-off.
Went to Thailand.
Dyed my hair black as a situation of pure discrimination.
Visited the DMZ.
Met a North Korean soldier.
Started dating The Ex.
Experienced my first national air bomb raid practice
Surprise visit to my parent’s house on Christmas Eve – BEST Christmas ever!!!

YEAR TWO – Feb. 2006
Called off my relationship with The Ex.
Got into the public education system with a public school teaching position.
Adopted Mi Nam and instantly fell in love with him.
Learned how to snowboard.
Went to Japan.

YEAR THREE – Feb. 2007
Scored a sweet university professor position at Dankook University.
Was adopted into the UP Boxing Club family/team.
Started dating Q.
Got into a brutal motorcycle accident in which I totaled the motorcycle.
Turned professional with my boxing – first foreign female in Korea to do so.
Earned a sponsorship by the Cheonan Trump for my boxing.
Started getting privately tutored in the Korean language.

YEAR FOUR – Feb. 2008
Experienced my first female-induced heartbreak – lost to Park Mi Ran at my debut bout.
Was the focus of two human documentaries.
Was the focus subject an up-and-coming photographer’s photo shoot.
Was discovered on YouTube by Adidas and this lead to them sponsoring my boxing.

YEAR FIVE – Feb. 2009
Started dating Snickers and then, in the same year, we got married.
Moved out of Sambu and into Ggum Guum.
Had a massive picture of me boxing displayed in a gala.
Had another human documentary focus on me as a female boxer.
Went back to blond hair.
Met Jose Sulaiman, President of the World Boxing Council.
Met Judy Kulis, President of the International Female Boxers Association.
Went to Bali, Indonesia.
Did a commercial with the Wonder Girls.
Had another human documentary focus on me and my boxing.
Starred in two human documentaries about Snickers.
Had to a student hint at sucide and then he went through with it.
One of my Korean friends committed suicide.

YEAR SIX – Feb. 2010
Took Snickers to Canada for his first time and to meet my parents.
Got into a scooter accident.
Had a photographer ask and do a focus piece on Snickers and I.
Touched a real life bear for my first time ever – was stoked about that.
Had my apartment Ggum Guum underwent two-time renovations.
The wife of a common friend of Snickers and me committed suicide.
Ran my first half marathon.
Had to deal with a short-time stalker.
Snickers lived in Japan for a little over two months – definitely hard with him MIA.
Represented Korea in Japan for a boxing bout.
Proudest moment ever as Snickers’ wife -- watching 35,000 crowd members watch him fight in the Philippines.

YEAR SEVEN – Feb. 2011
Started working at a Korean daycare.
Attended a surprise wedding ceremony for me and Snickers, hosted by daycare.
Had Ggum Guum renovated for the third time -- yes, very annoying.
Traveled to Canada to say goodbye to my mother.
Started my own personal training/fitness company – Flipside Fitness.
My fitness company was officially sponsored by Adidas.
Adopted Pyen Chi, the Pee Master Beast of Fur, and slowly fell in love with her.
Mi Nam passed away.

As many people know, last year was a hard, hard year -- the Year of Heartships and Loses -- so I'm totally optimistic and stoked about 2012. This year has already been so much better than last year with the anticipation of my friend Nick visiting us from Canada, Satoshi coming from Japan, and both Snickers and I having scheduled fights for February.

2012 is going to be fabulous, it ALREADY is, so stayed tuned for more fabulocity to come!!!

2012-01-21T23:08:00.003+09:00

The harsh reality that so many -- too many -- people are perfectly content ignoring. I've never been a believer that "beauty" is a specific size or number but, with over 60% of Americans being overweight or obese, things associated with being overweight -- high cholesterol, high blood pressure, heart attack, and depression -- are definitely NOT beautiful.

Bold, Beautiful Bundang Women... Saturday, January 21

2012-01-21T22:39:00.006+09:00

Today I held two boxercise classes, one in the morning for those in my Advanced boxercise class and then a free class in the afternoon. The free class was for first-timers and I extended the free invite to returnees if they brought a first-timer.

I live in Cheonan but NO foreign women from Cheonan took me up on the offer. Some tried but it was a no-go. Ended up being contacted by a group of girls living about an hour and some away from Cheonan, in Bundang. Eight women came out and impressed the socks off me and it wasn't because they trained hard but because of what they talked about both before and after the class. Instead of ranting and raving about downing x-number of drinks or hitting the bar later tonight, they talked about how they're swapping clean eating receipes, jogging together on the weekends and how there's more than just these eight in Bundang that are like them. There's a massive group of them.

I'll be honest, I envied them. My Advanced boxercise ladies are a fierce group of gals but they're a small number. Our numbers in Cheonan aren't anything like those in Bundang. Maybe they are but in the seven years that I've been living in this city of Cheonan I've yet to be shown otherwise. The Cheonan crowd is a tough, tough crowd and by 'tough' I don't mean strong tough.

The group of Bundang ladies that showed up today represent only a small percentage of a much bigger crowd of physically-active foreign women. And they're not the only city that's got a good healthy group of health-conscious folks. For example, Seoul, it's loaded with tons of athletic things to jump into. Their running club has a membership of a couple of hundred and they've got a women's rugby team that tours, to name off a couple. But Cheonan... what does it have?!... it's got me with my Flipside Fitness. I've become like the It-girl to go to for health in this city but you'd be surprised at just how many people seriously could give a damn about their health. I'm just sick of feeling like I'm back in university again with the dominant crowd that is here. If you don't drink or shot pool than you're totally out of the social scene. I don't drink, I don't like pool and I sure as hell don't want to be the sober one at a drunk man's party or smell like smoke thanks.

Whether it's been imprompt sleepovers at the boxercise club or having trainer-buddies slip me the key to their fitness gym for my friends to play squash at midnight, there are a ton of things for foreigners to do in this city that don't involve alchol or dishing out mad cash.

Time after time I hear so many foreigners admit that they used to be so fit before Korea but now they're so out of shape. Why does moving to Korea mean ditching your health? I understand where they're coming from -- new country, different food, change of jobs, etc. -- but we all go through this. Moreover, I make it my business to try to help them. I am MORE than happy to help them. I sure as heck don't make a crazy living running Flipside Fitness. Trust me, there's months when bills (as small as they may be) are hardly met, but I continue. I continue to run Flipside Fitness because I believe in what I'm doing is right and I think I can help people but, more importantly, I love seeing people get excited about changing their ways. I take great pride in knowing that I helped them become healthier, stronger... happier.

Having said all this, today I vented my frustration on Facebook, this is what I wrote:

ATTENTION CHEONAN WOMEN, It's with great sadness -- sarcastically speaking -- that I tell you this... Bundang women rock.

Now, don't get me wrong, there are some of you Cheonan ladies who I can so easily list off as being proactive about your health and do put more time into being proactive about your health than simply sitting around and complaining about it over the latest Starbuck latte, but what I saw today with the crew from Bundang who joined my free first-timers boxercise class was incredible. Incredible but also somewhat discouraging. They trained insanely hard but their concern for their health went so much more beyond the boxing club. After class, they pulled out brown-bagged lunches full of clean-eats and good foods.

Health IS life. Health IS my business -- YOU are my business, and somedays I honestly feel like I'm the only one in this damn city that cares two cents about your health. I think I care MORE than you care, how strange is that?!!! Having said this, I'm not saying you have to join my boxercise class or hire me as your trainer. What I am saying is that we're already 21 days into the new year and yet old habits and bad eating from last year continue.

MAKE THIS YEAR BE YOUR YEAR -- YOUR YEAR OF CHANGE!!!

So whether you come out to my boxercise class, go jogging, join a gym or just focus on cleaning up your eating, DO SOMETHING. For the love of yourself do something. Don't feed into the stereotype of what a typical foreign woman in Korea is like. Show them that the foreign woman is healthy strong -- mind, body and soul. I've lived in Korea for almost 7 years now and I'm sick and tired of the brutal foreign woman stereotype being recycled over and over with each new flight of foreigners who arrive.

TOGETHER LET'S BREAK THE STEREOTYPES.
Let's be the strong foreign women most of you claimed you were before you came to
Korea!!!

2012-01-20T23:02:00.005+09:00

Despite not being full charged and still sporting sore legs from last night's timed run, I had boxercise class in the morning, another run but with a client, and then I had boxing in the evening.

And then when I went on my dinner/movie date with Snickers, we sat around for a good chunk of our date disecting my sparring session. I guess that was rather inevitable, seeing as I'm married to a pro boxer;)

A Minor Change in Plans... Friday, January 20

2012-01-20T11:19:00.001+09:00

MY FIGHT HAS BEEN RESCHEDULED TO

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 11th.

I got word of this today when I walked into training. It's great in that I get to train more for this fight but it's bad in that, well, I get to train more for this fight. I've been seriously training like a machine and eating like a beast. Junior Mint has me sparring practically every time I step into the boxing club for training and he quizzes me everyday about what I've eaten, what time I've gone to sleep and how my condition is. I'm rather exhausted -- more so physically than mentally -- but with my fight being postponed I'm getting a bit mentally exhausted. I've totally got my "game head" on but dragging this fight out by postponing it is brutal. My only fear now is that with this extra time I might get somewhat distracted or become a bit relaxed with my thinking.

On a different note, my 63 Day Fat to Phat competition I'm hosting via Flipside Fitness ends on February 12th -- the day after my fight -- so I'm assuming I'll be looking rather "interesting" for that day. I'll be fresh with bruises and stiff with snoreness.

Hell Boy was at training today. I've run into him a couple of times at training this week. Today he stood around watching me train and then approached me about wanting to spar with me. I don't know but a full grown man in his 40's wanting to beat upon a young lady like me just doesn't seem normal. I mean, if he wins our sparring session he just beat a lady less than half his size and about 10 plus some years his junior. But if he loses, talk about a blow to his ego, getting beat by a chic! Anyways, I think it's rather silly and don't really care to have a recap of the last sparring session we had some years ago when he almost broke my nose and yelled at me, telling me I should "just take it". Ya, cause I can really afford to break my nose just weeks before a fight... not so smart!

No one in Snickers' family knows that I have a fight and it's been surprisingly easy to keep it a secret for the fact that none of them ask me about my boxing, or Flipside Fitness for that matter. It's rather ironic too in that Snickers' used to be the "dark horse" of the family, doing a job that none of them gave much respect or attention to (beyond K-Gere that is) and going off to marry me, a foreign gal. Now the tables have turned and it's now me who is the dark horse. For the most part, whenever I see my in-laws, the only thing they really talk to me about is my father and how he's doing with the loss of my mother. I'm curious how they think I make money or what I do with my time everyday. I doubt they even think about it though, to tell you the truth.

Snickers' upcoming fight at the end of February is talked about often these days with his friends and family and I just sit and smile through their chatting, dying to blurt out that I too have a fight. I figure I'll have the fight and then show up the next day with bruises and perhaps a black eye; give them something to talk about.

Even if they knew I had a fight they'd never show up. They've never shown up for any of my previous fights so why would they now?! My friend Satoshi from Japan is flying in to come watch my fight and my friend Nick from Canada will catching Snickers' fight. He's in Thailand right now, doing a tour of Asia so he's timed it perfectly that he'll be in Korea to see Snickers' fight.

2012-01-19T23:30:00.000+09:00

Five of my favorite people in Korea -- my husband, my coach, two of my teammates (Black Skinny and the Cheonan Trump) and my new sparring partner. Five reasons, in addition to the already long list, as to why I love, love, love UP Boxing Club.
Officially named him Captain Jab -- this boy has got a frustratingly fast jab that hit me way too many times tonight for my liking.

Hard Time Now, Easy Time Later... Thursday, January 19

2012-01-19T14:27:00.000+09:00

Snickers returned to boxing this past week. Ever since he broke his hand at sparring he’s been sticking to mountain hiking and road work (running) as his main source of exercise. Just recently he’s returned to weight training too but the best was seeing him step back in the ring for pad work with Junior Mint.

I officially got appointed a sparring partner – my coach’s assistant, Captain Jab – and he’s awesome, though I must admit I had trouble at first punching one of my already favourite Koreans. He’s got a lot of amateur experience and fights purely amateur style in that he’s very fast on his feet and goes for speed as opposed to strength. From here on out I’ll be sparring at least three rounds a day till Fight Day, as if my training wasn’t intense enough. Tuesday was the official day my sparring partner was announced so my coach kicked things off by upping the intensity of my training from intense to insanely intense.

Fight Prep Training
(I should note too that all these exercises were done back-to-back with only enough time given to me to change my gear, like put on my heavy bag gloves or get my head gear laced up for sparring).
15 minutes of skipping
4 rounds of shadow boxing with wrist and ankle weights on
6 rounds of pad work with Junior Mint in the ring
3 rounds of sparring with Captain Jab
5 rounds of heavy bag work
10 minutes of skipping
15-20 minutes of weight training
10 minutes of ab work

Training for my fight continues to go on and continues to intensive. With the school kiddies being on vacation I’ve been training later than usual to avoid the mad flock of boxers at UP. I’m there training for a good, solid hour and a half to two hours and leave with just enough energy to walk home. As lazy as it sounds, there are some days when I wait for Snickers to pick me up, I’m just too exhausted, but no complaints. Hard time now, easy time later.

Still no real action on Operation Beatdown excepted for a heightened sense of anticipation and more people willingly signing up to be on the lookout. We’re seized a leading piece of evidence to the mystery identity of the person involved and are taking it in to be finger printed by the police.

Scored another job, something totally unrelated and incredibly disconnected from running my fitness company and doing my boxing. It’s a means of putting extra money in my bank for the anticipated traveling both Snickers and I want to do in the near future. So, basically for the next year, for every three and a half months of working this job with its 4 day work week with low hours I’ll be getting two and a half months off in addition to juggling Flipside Fitness and my boxing.

2012-01-15T23:01:00.003+09:00

Tonight, with my two partners-in-crime (Snickers and Pyen Chi) we did some baking.

Whole wheat tortillas with a mixture of this, that and whatever thrown into them.

We also made some homemade almond butter, for our banana-smash sandwiches that are oh so delish mid-morning!

Getting Down and Dirty... Sunday, January 15

2012-01-15T11:13:00.000+09:00

Got down and dirty in the kitchen… literally. By the end of our impromptu cooking date, Snickers was sporting almonds in his hair, I had a whole wheat powdered face and even Pyen Chi the Pee Master Beast of Fur hadn’t been left untouched. She had a few splashes of oil in her fur and oregano in her ears… oops. Ya, we had way too much fun baking. Correction, Pyen Chi and I had too much fun. Snickers ended up getting frustrated with trying to make our tortillas super thin.

We made more of a mess than actual things to cook. Whole wheat tortillas loaded to the brim with various splashes and dashes of spices and homemade almond butter were the two things we made. A couple of weeks ago I went on a rampage making numerous kinds of tortillas – my coffee flavored ones being the most “interesting” yet surprisingly edible and enjoyable with a cup of coffee – but lately I haven’t really baked anything. I’m kind of tortilla-sick. This week I want to attack making chili, particularly chicken chili. I read that I need cumin seeds but I have no idea what those are. I suppose I can just Goggle them.

In other news...

Got to send out shout-outs to my teammate, the Heavy Hitter, for winning his fight today. Good job buddy! Way to start the year off on a great high for us at UP Boxing Club!!!

2012-01-14T23:25:00.001+09:00

It's been a long, grueling week of training...
... for everyone.

And it's important to remember to listen to your body.

Rest is just as important to your mind and body as training is and if you try to ignore it, trust me, your body WILL remind you of this fact (like my body did).

Second Catch-Up... Saturday, January 14

2012-01-14T15:17:00.001+09:00

Wednesday – Dinned with the big league

Headed out to Seoul with Snickers for our much anticipated dinner with Adidas France and Adidas Korea. The man in contact from me from Adidas France has actually been relocated to Hong Kong so he’s just a hop, skip and a jump away from me in South Korea, none the less it was awesome to know he flew in to Korea to meet me. I won’t go into all the juicy details of our meeting but will say that it left me totally stoked, incredibly happy and super excited with working alongside Adidas. Adidas has some big plans and I’m so very honored that they asked for me to be included into them, of which my participation in an Adidas home shopping channel commercial definitely was the highlight of my evening.

Words can honestly not even begin to express the pride and excitement I feel with having Adidas supporting not only me and my boxing but also Snickers and his boxing. I don’t think I’ll ever wear any other sports wear but Adidas from here on out, mind ya, with Adidas once again showering us with sweet equipment and exclusive gear, it’s going to be next to impossible. Tonight they asked me to pick my colors and whatnot for an exclusive pro glove that’s made as ordered. They’re going to embroider my name into it --- sweet!!!

Thursday – Literally slept the day away

I wasn’t feeling well when I woke up for boxercise class today but I thought coming home super late from last night’s private Adidas dinner party was to blame for it. We had come home around 2am but I was like a kid on Christmas Eve, so very excited about the evening news and running off pure satisfaction from the meeting. By the time I feel asleep is was close to 5am, so a 7:30am boxercise class was a bit rough. Regardless, I pushed my feeling of blahness aside and headed out for boxercise class. Upon coming home however, the blahness returned and what was anticipated to be a simple sip of some NyQuil and a nap turned into a whole day event with me waking up around 8pm!!!

I’ve always been a believer in the more natural way of things. Taking naps when I feel tired or have a slight headaches, sipping on some warm milk if my tummy hurts and so forth. I remember back when I broke my nose I refused to go to the doctor and refused to take any pain killers. I simply placed a sock in my mouth, let Snickers reset it, and then tried my hardest to not touch it but to continue on through the pain. Having said this though, there are very few times when I have resorted to taking medicine, today being one of those days. One small sip of NyQuil was enough to push me into a comatose-like state. I was out like a light and for hours upon hours on end!!!

Friday – We Trained like Champs and Ate like Animals.

Tonight we had a boxing dinner party for UP Boxing Club, Cheonan, but I didn’t stay long. I wasn’t feeling up to par because of still not having shook off my cold from the other day. Training was rather rough for me today. In between sipping on hot lemon tea and chewing on Halls throat candies, I had boxing, running with client and weight training. Spent the day in a rather strange head buzz; definitely not feeling like myself or up to par with my focus, strength or capability. None the less, Junior Mint is all about “no rest for the wicked” so he practically killed me at training with loading me up on excessive rounds of pad work. Some days I wish I could curse his name but then I’m reminded that I do need his push and that I should be respectful of this and appreciative. I remember back in the day, watching Snickers with his former coach. His coach sat yelling at him, throwing him slander and discouraging comments. It was almost as if he believed the more he put Snickers down the more he’d drive him to succeed. He’s a big, dumb bully if you ask me. He doesn’t even have any kind of weight behind his name either to even back himself up. I’ve come to hate Snickers’ former coach and, to tell you the truth, I think he’s the only person in this whole world I can honestly say I hate. But that’s a whole other story….

Saturday – Cold Front Hits Again

Yesterday was spent in a strange head buzz and then in the evening I was hit like a ton of bricks again by the same cold that had hit me on Thursday. I had boxercise in the morning and was hoping to go out for a late night run to kind of sweat it off but that was a no go. What ended up happening was Snickers’ buddy 3Pak showed up at the house so the two of them chatted while I napped on the floor in the other room. Snickers cooked me up some eggs and I was basking in his sweetness when all of a sudden the unexpected happened… Snickers dropped my only bottle of NyQuil!!!

It crashed on the floor and out spurted NyQuil everywhere… and I do mean EVERYWHERE – onto the wallpaper, over our bedspread, on my clothes, on Pyen Chi’s head, and even on the shelf. It’s thick oozy gel stained the wallpaper and I watched as it crept under the heavy tv shelf. And with only three weeks till my fight and this cold driving me mental, I seriously had to hold myself back from licking it up with my tongue!!!

2012-01-10T22:20:00.000+09:00

Before and After Shots

Decided with all my intense training and, consequently, having to shower twice a day, that the blond hair was too high maintance so I went back to a darker shade with a couple of highlight chunks.

Two for One Deal... Tuesday, January 10

2012-01-10T11:46:00.000+09:00

Monday – Blood, Sweat and almost Tears

With the Cheonan Bulldog’s fight suddenly being canceled, he’s been a no-go lately for sparring with me so today I stepped into the ring to spar with my coach – Junior Mint. It was a weighted sparring session, which meant he couldn’t use his full force when punching me, obviously cause he’s like 80kg. Despite him not hitting me with full force it was a hard sparring session. When he was in his prime, Junior Mint was a Korean champion boxer so he knows his stuff. Moreover, because he’s been my sole trainer while here in Korea, he knows all my weaknesses, strengths… and dirty moves. A lot of dirty moves were pulled, a lot of punches we thrown and, oddly enough, a lot of head-butting occurred. At the end of our four round sparring session Junior Mint’s head was already forming a huge bump and my lip had been split open and was starting to swell.

Tuesday – Went Back to Being the Dark-Haired Villain

I made the mistake of listening to someone and heading off to Seoul blindly for a hair appointment I hadn’t yet made but was told I could simply show up and get. Well, that was a no-go and I wasn’t impressed. It took me over two hours to come to the conclusion that I should have just gone to Sunny’s in Cheonan. Initially I had ventured out to Seoul to check out a hair salon that had been getting rave reviews from various friends – various friends who have all got anything but mainstream hair dye jobs. Whether it was the one friend’s hair that had been dyed in chunks, another who got wickedly multi-tone low lights, or a friend who got a vibrant ash brown dye job that perfectly matched her natural hair color, I was eager to test out their stylist. I wanted a darker shade with darker toned low lights and chunks of highlights at the front.
Ended up heading over to Sunny’s and darker toned low lights and chunks of highlights at the front was exactly what I got, plus I scored some 20% off discount cards for my boxercise girls…. sweet!

2012-01-08T23:13:00.002+09:00

Looking good ladies...

Ya, definitely looking silly here... hahaha.

But regardless of whatever look you ladies sport, I know you definitely bring your fierceness to my boxercise classes, thanks. Men of Cheonan beware, these lovely ladies are packing some hardcore hooks, crazy jabs, and wicked upper cuts that you wouldn't dare want to mess with!!!

Punch-Packing Ladies... Sunday, January 8

2012-01-08T09:35:00.000+09:00

My boxercise classes continue. I’m having a lot of fun with them and I’ve met some really great gals from it. There’s one particular girl whom I’ve bumped up to my advanced class. She reminds me so much of Homegirl – the way she talks, the way she laughs, her mannerisms and even her facial expressions. It’s so wild. She’s like a spinning rendition of Homegirl. The fact that she’s pretty hilarious to talk to and trains hard though is why she’s on my “cool list”, though I must say she’s the one who really has put into effect my name as a new swear word at boxercise… hahaha.

Anyways…

Both my beginners and advanced students are loving throwing punches at the sand bags and yesterday one of my beginners shocked the socks off me with her hardcore, heavy punches she threw at the one sand bag. Yikes… that sand bag took a beating and the bar holding the bag up rang and it shock like nothing I’ve ever seen a women do before. It was intense; it was awesome!!!

2012-01-07T22:39:00.000+09:00

I took this picture yesterday but thought I'd add it in here. It's me caught in the act, playing a kid's boxing video game at the front of a restaurant. A restaurant that, like many Korean restaurants, make you take your shoes off and sit on the floor... ahhh, the warm heated floors of Korea, I love, love, love them!

These are my pictures from today -- shopping at the outdoor traditional market. Even Pyen Chi the Pee Master Beast of Fur came along for the shopping trip. People absolutely freaked out at the sight of her though. It was as if I had brought a fierce lion -- children cried, women screamed and some men bravely tried to touch her. Gosh... I'm curious how they'll react when Pyen Chi reaches full size. She's only 10 months and still has about 20-30kg to go. So on that note, she had to wait in the car while we quickly bought eggs and veggies.

There IS a Point... Saturday, January 7

2012-01-07T10:53:00.000+09:00

Today’s schedule:
7am – check in to Operation Beatdown
8am – personal training meeting with a client
10am – Advanced boxercise class
12:30 – Fat to Phat Seminar
2pm – Beginner boxercise class
4pm – Operation Beatdown lookout duty
7pm – grocery shopping: LotteMart and traditional market
8pm – Operation Beatdown lookout duty
11pm - go home and relax

Operation Beatdown is becoming quite the little adventure in my life. I feel almost like I’m some kind of undercover detective or cop; showing up with coffee and sitting in an illegally tinted car with flyers taped onto the license plates. Even Snickers’ buddies have jumped into the action, taking shifts with lookout, showing up with snacks and offering to drive me around for errands so that Snickers can resume lookout duty. I’ve let some of my boxercise ladies in on the situation and one of them suggested I go viral with this – make a YouTube of the actual scene we’re all anticipating. I was thinking about doing it too, after all it’d make for a wickedly interesting tale but I’m not too sure on how exactly it’ll all go down let alone if it will have a good, action-packed ending as anticipated or if it’ll go sour and get violent.

To be truthfully honest, I’m suspecting it’ll get a bit violent and this has left me on an adrenaline high today. When I mentioned this to a friend, I added, “But I’m not a violent person” to which she laughed and said, “Ya, sure. You only make a living punching people!” Very true but there’s a difference between street fighting and boxing. There are rules, regulations and skill in boxing. And not that street fighting doesn’t require skills but it’s very much an anything-goes kind of fight. I’m not looking to get into a street fight, thanks, but I sense it may very well get to this point. I may be required to fight, I don’t know. I really don’t know.

Part of the whole not knowing what the outcome of this all is kind of what has been making this whole Operation Beatdown exciting and interesting to me. And, strangely enough, what we’re fighting for isn’t actually what you’d think we’d be fighting for, instead it’s a principle we’re fighting for. We’re fighting to stick up for something that really has nothing yet everything to do with the one thing we’re stalking.

2012-01-06T17:08:00.000+09:00

Shhhhh... I have a secret and it's juicy.

On the Look Out... Friday, January 6

2012-01-06T15:09:00.001+09:00

Operation Beatdown started today.

I'd love to tell you what Operation Beatdown is but then I'd have to kill you... actually no, but I'll tell you the juicy details about it when it's over and done. For now, I'll fill you in with some basic details, to let you in the loop somewhat.

Today Snickers called me, totally overly excited and talking super fast, and insisted I get dressed and meet him downtown, so I did. I raced over to where he told me to meet him and when he approached me he told me "When we turn the corner, don't scream". I had no idea what he was talking about but sure enough, when I turned the corner, I wanted to scream. I stepped back at the sight before me and Snickers instantly wrapped his hand around my mouth.

I can't tell you what I saw but I will say this, Snickers discovered was a long-awaited discovery that both he and I thought he'd never stumble upon but low and behold, on a chilly Friday afternoon, he stumbled upon it, just minutes from our house.

For the rest of the day Snickers sat stalking his discovery... yes, stalking. It can neither talk or walk but Snickers is stalking it, waiting for a certain someone to come along and claim it. All of Snickers boys are in on it too, taking shifts stalking it. Honestly, it's rather hilarious to me and quite exciting. Trust me, I want to tell you what Operation Beatdown it but I can't and it's killing me.

I used to ask my husband "What's wrong with you?" but now I think the more appropriate question is "What's right with you?" and after what went down today and my total participation and egging-on of Operation Beatdown, I am begining to seriously think the same question could be asked of me. What went down today and what's continuing to go down with regard to this situation is anything but the opposite I would do if I were in Canada. As they say in the TV show People's Court, "Don't take things into your own hands, you take them to court" but this is Korea and well, we're definitely taking things in our own hands.

2012-01-05T23:52:00.000+09:00

Getting an email from Adidas Korea today made me think of all those who support me, like my buddy Satoshi in Japan. I met him in Korea and he's returned several times but him showing up at my fight in Japan meant the world to me.On his last visit to Korea, I sent him home to Japan with some boxing goodies -- new Adidas gloves and a t-shirt from my boxing club, where we met.

Adidas France and Adidas Korea at One Table... Thursday, January 5

2012-01-05T11:50:00.001+09:00

The Cheonan Bulldog's fight has been canceled, leaving him with the equivalency of "blue balls" for a boxer. All that hardcore training and then, with only a couple of weeks till fight day, the fight is canceled -- ya, very frustrating. Consequently, he needs some time to deal with this frustration so he didn't show up tonight at training, tonight as in the day we were supposed to spar. Junior Mint made up for me not having sparring tonight by making me do extra rounds on pad work and then watching me like a hawk during my rounds on the sand bag.

I'm sporting an injury so that's not cool but the injury is anything but new. It's my left wrist; it's been acting up again... again as in it first started when that taxi driver jack knifed into my scooter and decided to send me pavement flying well over a year ago. Oddly enough I don't feel any pain when I'm going round for round on the pad work with Junior Mint but I think it's a matter of mind over matter there. I love pad work and am way too focused to think of anything but the shots he's calling out to me and really pushing myself to keep him from yelling at me. I definitely feel the pain during my rounds on the sand bag though, so I'm trying to go easy with my left hooks and body shots.

In other news, I've been invited to a meeting and dinner by the General Manager of Adidas Korea for this upcoming Wednesday. He emailed me today to invite both Snickers and I and to tell me that Adidas France -- the man who initially discovered me on YouTube and sponsored me -- will be coming to Korea too for this meeting and dinner. I'm absolutely stoked about it! I've been in contact with Adidas France for quite a few years now so it's great to be finally getting the opportunity to meet face-to-face. I've been waiting about three years to meet him. Adidas has always been super supportive of me and my boxing (and now Flipside Fitness) and I really hope that my continual input really does aid them though my support can't even begin to compare to the awesomeness of their support!!! So next week, Wednesday, I'll be heading to Seoul to meet with some people I've labeled very important in my life and am really excited about it.

2012-01-04T23:08:00.002+09:00

For awhile there we had 4 members in our family of machines -- the No Name van, Goldie (our car), Gotti (my scooter) and Maximus (Snickers' scooter).

But then we sold Maximus for a newer, updated version, and thus Kato was added.
Occassionally the Blue Devil joins us here in Cheonan -- a slick sports bike that Snickers and his boys rent to go on random day trips around Korea on. I refuse to ride on the Blue Devil for the fact that I don't think maxing him out and letting him soar around 300 clicks is very fun.This past summer Gotti was kidnapped right from our doorstep and has yet to be found.

And recently this little bad boy has caught my eye... am seriously thinking about adding him to our family of machines. He's a motorcyle not a scooter... am upgrading to bigger and faster machines, cool. Am already working on trying to fit an appropriate name that fits for this little spark plug.

A Revival of Freedom... Wednesday, January 4

2012-01-04T12:26:00.000+09:00

Living in Korea is great but there's way too many times where I feel so restricted, like my life consists of a 4 block radius. I miss the days when I could just jump on Gotti and drive where ever and when ever. I felt such complete freedom. But then Gotti was stolen and my sense of absolute freedom was crushed and stamped out.

A little over a month ago I took some of the girls from my boxercise class on an Adidas run -- checking out various Adidas factory outlet stores in neighboring cities. We made a whole evening of it and Snickers was such a gracious driver. He didn't think much of it but to us foreigners along for the ride, it was a big thing. Sure we could have taken a bus or figured out some kind of other public transit route but it wouldn't have been the same, not to mention we surely wouldn't have been able to possibly venture to as many outlets as we had that night and trek back with all the goods we bought. The car was our golden ticket to the whole night; it gave us all a sense of freedom to some degree.

I want this freedom again.

I live right smack dab in the downtown of Cheonan. My boxing club is a 10 minute walk from my house as is the coffee shop I like and stores where I shop. I think the only thing I really need my car for is grocery shopping at Emart and that's only because we buy a lot of food.

Every once and awhile I head out to Seoul for this and that but I try not to go there too often. Usually when I go there I take the bus because it's overly crowded streets like ants on an ant hill drive Snickers mental when trying to drive through them. So we really have no need for a car let alone the scooters we keep on bringing home. At one point we had four vehicles -- a car, a van and two scooters. We sold all but Goldie, our car.

But my desire for this freedom I'm referring to isn't a matter of necessity beyond just wanting to be able to get up and go... go anywhere. Snickers' buddies wanted to buy me a new scooter this past summer when Gotti was stolen but I insisted that they not do so. Now I want a set of wheels.

I need a set of wheels... and I think I've found the perfect set;)

2012-01-03T20:16:00.002+09:00

This was posted on my door awhile back and today I found it's publisher.

{note, that's my Korean and English scribbling on it, written in the brutal late hours when I first found this plastered on my door... I was annoyed]

Picking a Bone With Someone... Tuesday, January 3

2012-01-03T09:01:00.000+09:00

A couple of months ago the above notice was plastered on the front door of my apartment and I was livid. I was livid because I do pick up after my dog and let me tell you doing so when I walked BOTH dogs was damn hard. Between trying to scoop the poop and keep both Mi Nam and Pyen Chi from getting their leashes tangled up or running off (if not on leash), was quite the juggling job. I hate bad dog owners too but I'm not one of them. Owning a dog means taking on various responsibilities, responsibilities that I am fully well aware of and do fufill.

Today some Korean ajjuma (older woman) who works at the restaurant just steps away from my apartment building passed me in the street and mumbled something as I passed her with Pyen Chi. She said it clearly not expecting me to understand Korean but it didn’t take me to know Korean to know that what she said was about me and my dog and it wasn’t good. The whole rolling of the eyes and sticking your nose up in the air is pretty much universally understood as a rude gesture.

So I mumbled something back. Ok, so I didn’t mumble something back, I flat out spoke up and corrected her. She had claimed that it was because of my dog that the park outside my house is littered with dog poop.

“My dog has NEVER stepped foot in that park” I told her, and it’s true. It wasn’t rude of me to say so, at least I didn’t think it was. She snapped back by shaking her head and walking away. “I think the same thing. I want to shake my head at rude people too” and with that I shook my head at her.

My apartment is right beside a local river, a local river where so many dog-walkers take their dogs and where so many of such dog-walkers don’t scoop their poop. I can point to three people in particular – all Koreans – who own large dogs and have never picked up after their dogs. But because people always see me out there with my dog, Pyen Chi, they assume it must be from my dog. Proof being in the fact that whoever posted that notice on my apartment door went out of their way to add English translations. Why did they add English?!... because of me, of course.

But what got me today was the restaurant lady who shook her head at me and accused me of trashing the park with dog poop. No sooner did I come into the house but then I overheard her outside my window. She was dragging a large bag on the ground and I watched as she dragged it down to the riverside and emptied it. It was full of bones from her restaurant.

I noticed two weeks ago a similar pile of bones – a pile of bones that Pyen Chi dipped into and ended up puking up in my house!

So... and you’ll have a hoot at this… I went down and bagged her bones. Yup, I bagged her bones and took them back to her restaurant. Hey, I figure if she can bag some dog’s poop, snap shots of it and plaster my door with notices about it than me bagging her bones and bringing them back to her isn’t so bag.

Her jaw just about dropped when I walked into her restaurant – calm, cool and collective – with a bag of bones. Customers stopped to stare at me but I didn’t care. I wasn’t angry or mad, just wanted to stop this ongoing silliness. “I think you dropped these” I noted. I didn’t wait for her to say something before I added “and can you please stop posting pictures of dog poop on my door. I pick up my dog’s crap so please pick up yours!”

Quite juvenile, I know, but you know what, I felt rather proud for sticking up for myself and not accepting someone’s crap. I totally understood her frustration with bad dog owners but neither I nor my friends fit that label. I’m so not cool with anyone littering anything anywhere – dog poop or food trash. Dumping bones where kids and dogs play, come on, that’s so not cool. Talk about a recipe for germs and disease!!!

2012-01-02T22:18:00.002+09:00

Dressed like a tundra bunny but Korea hardly gets a winter compared to Canada. We got snow on Christmas Eve and New Year's day... a week of probably 2-3 inches of snow. So with very little snow, it's no wonder no one here really owns a snow shovel and you never see salt trucks on the road. Store owners lay out what looks like carpet underlay outside their shops and only on the country roadsides will you spot bags of salt.

No complaints here!!!

Korea, Home of Kimchi and Cheap Livin'... Monday, January 2

2012-01-02T08:41:00.002+09:00

I’ve been getting a lot of homepage readers asking me how much it costs to live here so I thought I’d post about that today.

$480 rent
$60 housing bills (electricity, water…)
$280 groceries
$200 transportation
$400 “secret” money, aka spending cash
$1400 the grand total for the two of us to live, eat, and play in Korea;)

Further details…

Rent
I live in a one bedroom apartment that has a very spacious family room, bathroom and a huge kitchen. It’s located right around the corner from the downtown shopping mall, beside a local river, so it’s location is definitely very sweet. Moreover, my apartment isn’t in an apartment building, well not a large one. It’s a four floor building with a tax office occupying the main floor.

Housing bills
Usually our monthly bills total about $40 but with it being winter we have the heat on for a good part of the day. We don’t have air conditioner, no need for it actually because of the large windows in our house and the one wall in the kitchen that is all window.

Groceries
We usually spend on average $70 a week on groceries for the two of us. We try to stick to buying many of our veggies and fruits at the local traditional market where we can bargain for discounts and where we already get great discounts from the sellers we continually buy from.

Transportation
We’ve got a car that we drive a lot now with it being winter but in the other seasons we stick to driving our scooters, knocking about $100 off that estimated cost. I should note that our insurance of $70 a month is also included in this estimated cost.

Secret money
We started this a year ago in an attempt to avoid overspending and as a way of keeping better track of our money. Every week Snickers and I give ourselves $50 each and how we spend that money is our own free choice. I usually spend mine at the coffee shop or on things like treating Snickers out to dinner or a night out at the movies. Eating out together ranges from $12 to about $20 and leaves us stuffed. Snickers usually uses his “secret money” to pay his phone bill.

2012-01-01T21:41:00.000+09:00

First date of the year. It was intiated by my husband getting down on all four, kissing my hand and asking me out for coffee.

So off to a cozy little coffee house tucked away on a country we went to have our annual New Year's Resolution-writing date.

A New Year of Opportunities, Hope and Coffee... Sunday, January 1

2012-01-01T10:15:00.001+09:00

I won’t lie, we failed miserably on conquering last year’s new year’s resolutions, more so Snickers than I though. I don’t want to continually say it was a hard year and lean on that as my crutch but 2011 was definitely a brutally hard year for me so I’m super stoked it’s 2012. It’s a fresh new start with fresh new resolutions and a new outlook. This IS going to be THE year and if not well, I’m certainly going to bust my butt to make it THE year for me… for us.

Like this time last year, Snickers and I headed out to a coffee shop to gather our thoughts and write up some new year’s resolutions. Last year Snickers really wanted to buckle down on his studying of the English language but proof of his failure was evident as soon as I asked him to take his best attempt at writing out his new year’s resolutions in English. First of all, he didn’t capitalize the first letters of his name and then when he sounded out “resolution” and wrote it down, he wrote what appeared to be “lesbo lotion”… hahaha. Too funny but with that he called it quits on trying to continue in English.

Snicker’s 2012 New Year’s Resolutions:
1. Finalize my Canadian visa.
2. By September make x-amount of cash (sorry… secret;) )
3. Once every 2 months, take Amy and Pyen Chi on a 2-day, 1-night trip.
4. Once a month write a letter to Amy.
5. Only fight once a month with Amy.

I questioned Snickers on his fifth resolution. We honestly don’t fight much and when we do it’s over rather silly things, like his friends calling super late at night, like 2am, or some family connected thing like his mother wanting us to move in with her of which my response is “If she doesn’t mind me walking around buck naked and drinking straight from the milk carton than I’m in”. I like my freedom thanks – freedom from the pressure of others, freedom from the presence of others and freedom from my clothes… hahaha.

My 2012 New Year’s Resolutions:
1. Everyday write one page in my Korean diary.
2. Once a month write a letter to my three little nieces in Canada.
3. Once a month prepare a special date for Snickers.
4. Learn how to drive stick shift.
5. Acquire my personal training license.
6. Get down to 15% body fat.

I was going to add “Get my driver’s license” to my list of resolutions but I don’t know how exactly to do that in Korea or if I can for that matter. I don’t even have a Canadian license so it’s not as if I could switch my license to an international license. Snickers wants me to learn how to drive our stick shift car so I’ll do that but that’s only for emergency-only situations. I rather just stick to driving a scooter and though I’m legally not allowed to do so without a scooter let’s get real here people. This is Korea – a country where scooter drivers freely drive on the sidewalks, where high school students load two additional their friends on one single scooter, a country where I’ve already gotten into a scooter accident – two actually – and got paid out by the insurance company.

2011-12-31T23:57:00.000+09:00

My first and last real drink of 2011, a glass of wine over dinner with Snickers.

Tonight wasn't so much about ringing in the new year as it was saying goodbye to the old. I'm so done with 2011.

Ringing in Late... Saturday, December 31

2011-12-31T17:54:00.000+09:00

They say insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results, so this year I'm doing things differently. Tonight Snickers and I talked about this over dinner, New Year's Eve dinner out. We had headed out to one of our favorite restaurants here in Cheonan for a quiet romantic dinner but romance wasn't on the menu of discussion, change was.

Tomorrow, like last year, we're planning on doing our usual New Year's day coffee date -- coffee sipping and resolution writing at a cozy coffee shop. Tonight I started to think seriously about all that went down this year and all that I hope for in 2012. 2011 was a hard year, possibly my hardest yet, so it was with a huge sigh of relief that New Year's Eve was finally here.

I've been waiting for today this whole year -- the day I get to close the door on 2011.

2012 entered tonight without the anticipated bang, minus the New Year's Eve strike at midnight kiss and without me yelling out the window "Happy New Years" for all the neighbors to hear. Nope. New Year's came quietly and Snickers and I slept through it. Actually, I woke up at exactly 12:02am to greet it. Snickers, on the other hand, didn't wake up till about 1am to give it any kind of recognition and by then I had poured myself a glass of red wine. We had purchased the bottle earlier on today, anticipating a romantic nightcap with mocha bread and a good midnight smootch, but Pyen Chi grabbed our mocha bread off the counter when we were out at dinner and then we had fallen asleep before midnight.

I had had a single glass of red wine during dinner -- my first and last real drink of 2011 -- but I had slept off any of the buzz it had given me during dinner. When I realized it was 12:02am and consequently already 2012, I thought I'd crack open the bottle, pour a little and then wake Snickers up to toast him. He was out like a light so I sat beside him and took a sip.

I took more than just a sip actually... I took two glasses, and two glasses were enough to send me into super giddy-mode. When Snickers woke up I was sitting in the kitchen trying to tie Pyen Chi's blanket around her waist. I was quite buzzed and when I realized it I started to laugh so hard, knowing full well that it's been over a year and a half since I last had a drink. I think I'm good to go for another year now.

2011-12-30T23:59:00.000+09:00

My grade six elementary class photo. I'm in the first row, last one on the right, and my friend Pardeep is in the middle row, second last one on the left.

The Boy With the First Flower... Friday, December 30

2011-12-30T23:58:00.000+09:00

I was standing waiting for the camp's closing ceremony to start when I got a text message from a friend back in Canada, asking me if I had remained in touch with a common elementary friend, Pardeep. I have so I texted her back and asked her why.

Pardeep was a guy I meet back in the day, back in elementary school when I lived in a very white suburban city. He stood out at my school because of his ethnic background and was sometimes teased because of it. I remember once seeing a boy rip off Pardeep's turban and watching as Pardeep's long, long, jet black hair flew out into the open air. When I told my mother the story that day, she told me to be extra nice to him because he was like me, "beautifully different" as she put it. Whether it was kids calling me "Church Girl" or them teasing me about my small eyes which they insisted meant I was part Asian, I had tasted what it meant to be different. It never really was the extent to which Pardeep had endured, none the less, I agreed with my mother and tried to be extra nice to him.

Me being nice to him was one day "rewarded" with flowers. Yup, I was either 12 or 13 at the time when it happened. I was upstairs when my mom called me down, telling me that a boy had brought me flowers. I thought it was a joke at first but low and behold there at my front door stood Pardeep with a massive bouquet of mixed-coloured flowers. It was the first time any boy had ever bought flowers. Instantly my body went several shades of red with embarrassment as my two brothers raced up the stairs to come laugh at me. "If you don't like these I can buy you roses" was Pardeep's response to all the commotion.

Today I got word that the first boy to ever buy me flowers died. He fell from his 21st apartment. I don't know the details of the story but I was told by other friends in Canada that it's been all over the news so I looked it up on the Internet. Apparently he was wanted by the police. When they arrived at his apartment this past week, he tried to flee by jumping onto a neighbor's balcony but he slipped and fell. The police found him dead on the 9th floor balcony.

I was shocked when I read the news of the event -- my friend, a boy I went to elementary school with, someone who I grew up with. News of his shocking death flooded the pages of my friends on Facebook but it didn't make it feel anymore real. It still very much feels like a fictional story. Things like this just don't happen where I come from. This is so crazy.

2011-12-30T23:47:00.000+09:00

This past week I was a paid 'professional kid', which meant I got to go swimming, sledding, and all that fun stuff kids do but got paid to do it... cool.

Mind ya, it also meant I was bombarded and up to my ears in kids non-stop at a resort I wasn't allowed to leave.

But my partner in crime (Ashley) helped me out and together she and I and our B-Red team had four and a half action-packed long days.

Non-Stop, Action-Packed Camp... Friday, December 30

2011-12-30T17:07:00.001+09:00

This past week I stayed up in Icheon working at an English camp. The camp was being hosted at the SK Telecom resort that also houses the SK professional basketball camp so I anticipated running into some tall men... hahaha.

The SK Telecom resort was a sports fanatic's heaven... indoor and outdoor soccer fields, an indoor driving range, two swimming pools, a sauna room, weight training gym, yoga meditation room, WII room, ping-pong room, a bowling ally, ballet room, and an indoor jogging track that outlined the basketball court. It was awesome and we basically used every single one of these rooms for the English activities we planned for the English camp kids. I was a huge fan of the large swimming pool and the indoor jogging track.

On a different note, not only did I run into these freakishly tall basketball players but I also got to train with them so that was super cool! One of them showed me a new weight training exercise and I went jogging with two others. With me being away from boxing for the week I had promised Junior Mint that I'd keep up with my own personal training -- jogging, shadow boxing and weight training -- so that's exactly what I did but I did it with the basketball team. My work day from the English camp was basically 9am to 9:30pm everyday but because they turn the main lights off at 10pm I had to depend on waking up early for training. I woke up everyday at 7am and headed down to the basketball gym to run the indoor jogging track, do some HIIT skipping, shadow boxing, ab training and weight training. Then I'd return to my room around 8am, shower and then have breakfast.

I anticipanted not being keen on the food so I had come loaded with tons of food -- tuna, granola bars, nuts, dried fruit, broccoli, and beef jerky. For the most part my breakfasts consisted of mixing some mustard into my tuna and nibbling on broccoli. I was picky with what I ate in the cafeteria for my lunch and dinner but because I had to eat these two meals with the kids I couldn't exactly head up to my room for tuna and broccoli. Powdered donuts and extra sugary juices were the going trend for snack time so I kept things like my beef jerky and granola bars stashed in my pockets for snack time.

The English camp was jam packed with kids and jam packed with lots of activities, ranging from Golden Bell quizzes to swimming and sledding. There was very little time in between activities to breath or catch a moment of silence so when the work day was done I'd retreat up to my room, lay on my bed in silence and then crash around 10pm or so. I had three roommates assigned to my room, all of us foreign ladies and all of us very much craving some peace and quiet after the craziness of our work day.

At the end of the full jam-packed week the sight of Snickers picking me up at the camp was a much anticipated joyous event. It had been a fun week and I had met some awesome people but I was so ready for home. Pyen Chi had joined Snickers for the long ride out to Icheon to pick me up so that was fun parading her around for the kids and my co-teachers to meet.

2011-12-25T21:04:00.007+09:00

This year's Christmas was hard to celebrate considering the loss of Mi Nam and my mother so we put all our focus into making it a good first Christmas for Pyen Chi.

A Not-Very Christmasy Christmas... Sunday, December 25

2011-12-25T15:17:00.000+09:00

Today marked my second Christmas as 'wife', first Christmas for Pyen Chi, and the first Christmas without both my mother and Mi Nam in my life.

Last night's Christmas Eve was a total bust so I wanted nothing more than to sleep away this year's Christmas. We had anticipated doing our usual Christmas day festivities -- morning Children's performance-watching, romantic dinner out, and then opening presents in between.

I love Snickers, I love him and all his two thousand and one parts, but I'll be the first to admit that he's brutal when it comes to the holidays. He's never bought me a Christmas present, a birthday present, or any kind of anniversary present. He bought me chocolates once for Valentine's Day but it's because I kind of gave him a hard time about it. In his defence though, I will say he's boughten me random little gifts before for no other reason than to be sweet. I remember when we were first dating, he showed up with a blue rose for me -- that was pretty cool. Then there was the time when the hair dresser in Seoul killed my hair and I headed back to Cheonan in tears on the bus. Snickers surprised me at the bus terminal with a ton of flowers.

I just wished he'd buy me an actual holiday present though.

I anticipated him not buying me a present for Christmas so I bought myself my own present -- boots and a winter coat. I'll be the first to say I can't stand Ugg boots, I think they're fugly to the core, but considering how much time I spend outside playing with Pyen Chi I need something to keep my little feet warm. These boots leave my feet sweating... dang!!!

As for Snickers' gift, he's all about 'couple wear' so I bought him couple winter fur hats and couple sweaters. I also bought him a pair of pretty sweet looking CK undies. For Pyen Chi, I bought her a stuffed tiger paw (to go along with a silly game I play with her) and a silver name tag.

For the most part, this year's Christmas was spent 90% in bed. I wanted to sleep the day away but I did manage to get myself dolled up for a dinner out with Snickers... only to return home and crawl back in bed.

I'll be honest with you, it was a hard Christmas but Snickers promised me this would be our last Christmas in Korea. The plan is to move back to Canada this year but whether or not that actually goes through we're planning to spend next Christmas in Canada, either as residents or visitors. I've always struggled with searching out the Christmas spirit here in Korea and I think, for me at least, it just doesn't live in Korea. We woke up to snow yesterday, that was nice, but it just doesn't cut it. I want snow up to my knees. I want to struggle with untangling the Christmas lights and freeze my toes off while I hustle around doing my Christmas shopping. More importantly though, I want to be surrounded by friends and family for Christmas -- I need that for Christmas to happen. And though I have my in-laws and friends in Korea, my in-laws don't even celebrate the holiday, neither do most of my friends (Korean friends).

I'm so over Christmas in Korea. I need a REAL Christmas and next year that's exactly the gift Snickers promised me for next Christmas.

2011-12-24T20:41:00.000+09:00

It's Christmas Eve, so I was excited about a night goshie Christmas romance with Snickers.
So I got all dolled up and waiting.... I waited four hours.

And all the "action" I got were kisses from Pyen Chi. Not the night I anticipated.

Bah Humbug... Saturday, December 24

2011-12-24T11:49:00.000+09:00

Original plan for tonight -- Christmas Eve -- involved the following:

1. Rent an old skool Christmas movie.
2. Bake Christmas cookies with Snickers.
3. Make 2 cups of my home made secret recipe white hot chocolate.
4. Watch the movie while nipping on homemade cookies and sipping on hot chocolate.

That WAS the plan but this was what really went down:

1. Waited 4 hours for Snickers to remember we had a Christmas Eve date. Recently he started playing Starcraft -- a computer game that apparently is highly addicting -- and lost track of the time while out playing with friends.
2. He arrived home, totally forgot it was Christmas Eve and asked if we'd go grocery shopping so I threw the Emart bag at him.
3. Walked out, sat in the park and got teary-eyed. I had hyped up the evening so much in my head so I was incredibly disappointed.
4. Instead of trying to make anything out of the evening, I insisted I wanted to be left alone, then fell asleep at 9pm.

On a plus note, I'm anticipating that this will be my last Christmas Eve in Korea. The Christmas spirit doesn't live here in Korea and consequently I'm guessing Santa won't be visiting here tomorrow.

Bah Humbug.

2011-12-22T23:37:00.000+09:00

Despite the chilliness of the evening weather that scared off many from training, tonight I trained with two of my teammates and my favorite Highschool Kiddie.

I didn't need Junior Mint (coach) to push me tonight though, I was definitely running on quite the high from getting scheduled a fight. In fact, I trained so hard that Junior Mint told me maybe I should tame it down a bit... and I've got the bloody knuckles to prove it.

Like The First Time... Thursday, December 22

2011-12-22T15:10:00.003+09:00

If a guy getting all worked up for nothing means he gets "blue balls" than getting a boxer all worked up for a fight that's yet to be scheduled or even promised leads to a similar frustration. You can tell when Snickers is reaching his frustration breaking point when he starts egging on various fights, fights outside of the ring and totally not connected or held in the boxing club. My frustration shows it's head via randomly taking days off boxing and upping my running.It's totally frustrating training so bloody hard and not being scheduled a fight. Personally, for me I need a fight to keep me focused. I love boxing but the idea of a fight possibility is what drives me to continually train so hard and push it with eating clean. If there's no fight for a certain period of time than why continue to be so strict with myself?!

I'm very much a goal oriented person. The persuit of a fight being a much needed goal -- a focal point. So it came with much relief today when Junior Mint called me and said he just scheduled me a fight. Usually he calls me to ask me first but I've been busting my fight at boxing, pulling in extra hours helping train others in addition to doing all my boxercise classes, so he knew I needed a fight.

The UP Boxing Club fight line up:
January 15 -- The Heavy Hitter
January 29 -- Cheonan Bulldog
February 5 -- The Grizzly Bear [me]
February 26 -- The Korean Hulk [Snickers]

All we need now is a fight for Black Skinny and then we'd have a fight for everyone on our pro team. Tonight there were three of us on the fight line up list training. We trained together and we trained hard.

I love the anticipation of a fight -- the hard training, crazy dieting, doing extra road work (long distance runs and HIIT runs), and all the hype that comes with it. Most importantly though, it gives my hard training purpose.

I'm so done with 2011. It wasn't a good year for me or for UP Boxing Club with regards to staying in the boxing community spotlight. I'm convinced 2012 is going to be our year -- our year to put Cheonan strongly on the map and to really show Korea what UP Boxing Club is all about.

I'm pumped.

... "Like the first time" is our club's motto and tonight we definitely portrayed this to a T. With the windows cranked open and our breath visable in the cold, chilly air, we trained hard and we trained long. Packing the new year with several fights for UP was exactly what we needed to remind us to keep the love of boxing fresh, alive and strong... "Like the first time".

2011-12-21T23:02:00.000+09:00

At first there was just one, Jo Mi Nam.
And then there were two -- Pyen Chi and Mi Nam. Two little friends that weren't quite friends.

But then they became the closest of friends.

... And then there were just one again.

Mi Nam, Are You Here?!... Wednesday, December 21

2011-12-21T14:47:00.000+09:00

Today both Pyen Chi and I had a heart-moving morning when I decided it was about time I throw out Mi Nam’s old blanket. It was actually our bed under-padding but when we got a new one we decided to give our old one to Mi Nam. He loved it. He loved it so much that he refused to let Pyen Chi come close to it so then we had to get Pyen Chi her own blanket. I’ve been holding off on what to do with this padding. It’s been laying on the floor, under the desk and under Mi Nam little red bed, and I haven’t been able to bring myself to move it since Mi Nam died.

I thought about donating it to the animal shelter out in Asan but it got splattered with blood, Mi Nam’s blood, in his last remaining moments so I just want to get it out of the house. I need to get it out of the house.

Today it left the house.

I scooped it up and got quite teary eyed when I accidently lost grip of part of it. It unfolded a bit and there before me was Mi Nam’s blood out in the open, exposed. I was quite to pick up the end that unfolded but then a wave of Mi Nam’s smell hit me. Pyen Chi started to bark… bark so loudly and continually.

When I returned from taking it outside, Pyen Chi was huddled near the desk, backing at Mi Nam’s little red bed that remained. I think I’ll keep it there. My mom had sent Mi Nam a little stuffed dog which Snickers and I called June Bug, as a kind of joke because my father is petrified of them. June Bug remains in Mi Nam’s red bed and the little red bed is still under the desk.

For the rest of the day, Pyen Chi stayed beside the desk and randomly she’d moan and whimper. Occasionally she’d bark, too. I caught a bit of it on my cell phone video but haven’t figured out how to upload it onto my computer.

It was quite freaky.

Pyen Chi is a huge fan of naps but today her naps were suddenly and continually interrupted with her popping her head up and glaring at Mi Nam’s bed. It was almost as if he – or something – was in the little red bed. I definitely believe in spirits and in angels, and I believe that some people linger around before “moving on”, but I don’t know if I believe if animals do the same thing. I’ve never really thought of it before.

All I know though is that I’ve been really struggling with Mi Nam’s death, much more than ever expected and I can say honestly that there isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t get choked up over him. Whether it’s walking by where he’s now buried, seeing his collar at the door, or even saying his name, I find myself shocked by just how much I miss my four-legged little friend, Mi Nam. I don’t know if I’ll ever love Pyen Chi like how I love Mi Nam. I don’t know if I’ll ever let myself to do so or if I even want to do so. All I know is that I miss him so damn much and today it definitely felt like he was here once again.

2011-12-20T23:51:00.000+09:00

Only a face a mother could love?! I think not. Ironically enough, though he's making a funny face in the second picture, this is a more true depiction of Snickers -- always silly and always fun.

After almost two years of marriage we're still very much attacted at the hips and very much in love. We still have our "date night", and even "day dates" too for that matter, and we continue to be that couple that used to make me sick... hahaha.

God Bless the Korean Men... Tuesday, December 20

2011-12-20T14:04:00.000+09:00

Next week I’ll be MIA from Cheonan and from the Internet on account that I’ve taken a position at a four and a half day English camp. It’s being hosted at the SK Telecom training resort which is quite a beautiful resort but, because of security reasons, there’s absolutely no Internet access. I question if I’m even able to bring my phone. I remember back when I tutored at Samsung, they’d put a security picture on my cell camera and check to see if it’s been tampered with whenever I left.

So ya, next week I’ll be preoccupied. It’s a toss-up on who will miss me more, Pyen Chi or Snickers… hahaha. My coach said he’ll miss me the most.

Today I had a training session as a means of prep for the camp. Yesterday I had training too although yesterday seemed more like a test of my patience if anything. The directions they gave me were rather sketchy in that the hospital they said their building was beside, well, turns out on the other side of Seoul there’s another hospital with the same name and it being quite big meant the taxi driver who picked me up after I arrived in Seoul took me there. It took me three hours to get to where I was supposed to be, not cool.

I thought I’d simply slip into the meeting via the back door, no such luck. The room was packed with foreigners and Korean helpers but all the foreigners were guys. I was the only female foreigner with a F2 visa which just goes to show you the ratio of foreign men marrying Korean women vs. foreign women marrying Korean men!

I’m so pro-Korean men. They tend to be more sensitive, attentive to detail, and their definition of what it means to be a man is so different than that of Western men. They’re not afraid to show a softer side, hell they even wear pink and do so with not a second thought. They’re pretty… pretty gorgeous and their skin, wow, soft and smooth. I can’t believe they’re not butter;)

God, thank you, thank you, thank you for the beautiful men we call Korean men. It’s days like today when I absolutely love Korea. There’s just so much eye-candy (Korean men) everywhere I turn. I feel the cavities filling up my eyeballs… hahaha. All jokes aside, I do think Korean men are much more attractive than Western and European men -- beyond just physically. I’ve always had a flair for Asian men in general, a certain attraction and curiosity towards them, and I have absolutely no interest towards Western men. I have gone to the dark side -- black hair side that is... hahaha. I guess in a way, you know how most Westerns think Asians all look the same, well, most Western men look the same to me now… hahaha.

Silly, I know, but I love waking up every single day, opening my eyes and seeing my beautiful Korean man with his jet black hair all tossed about and his tiny eyes looking at me. I think Snickers is a stunning man and his child-like personality that accompanies his charming looks makes quite the amazing package. Sometimes I joke with him, telling him, “Open your eyes!”. My friends and family back in Canada always used to tease me about my small eyes so I guess I’ve met my match. We have small eyes together and I love the fact that when we both smile they seem to disappear into our rosey cheeks.

2011-12-19T21:58:00.000+09:00

I couldn't have hit the nail more accurately on the head when I called Korea "The Flipside". Pyen Chi drinks her water in the morning with her butt sticking up and my husband refers to eat my food but my teammates and buddies at boxing love my treats. The stranger my treats get the more they like them.

Self-Punch... Monday, December 19

2011-12-19T17:05:00.000+09:00

Pulled a “Jae Sub” at boxing tonight, meaning I accidently punched myself in the mouth today when doing pad work. Yup, you read right. Sported a swollen lip for the rest of the evening, nice. Such mishaps – silly, self inflicted and accidental – like this happen a lot at the boxing club. They’re inevitable, so we’ve name them according to either the first person that pulled the silly mishap or the person who does it the most.

Despite giving myself the mother of all swollen lips, I definitely earned my “stripes” tonight at training – tiger stripes, as in the sweat lines that appear on the creases of your sweater.

The Dentist trained tonight at the same time I did and he brought a friend, another dentist… great. As if having one dentist at the boxing club wasn’t stressful enough for me. (Did I mention I hate the dentist, not this dentist in particular, all of them). The Dentist tried to get me talk to his friend who had apparently lived in Canada for a month or something like that. I didn’t get the full story but I definitely tried not too because I have somewhat of a borderline phobia of dentists. Stuck to training hard, taking very little breaks and ignored all eye contact in hopes of not having to talk to the two dentists. Talk about kicking up the intensity of training several notches!

The other day I made several of my teammates whole wheat flax seed tortillas and made them several of what I call “Cinna-fun Torts”. Today they made a special request for healthy cookies. My mission, now that I’ve accepted it, is to make just that… healthy cookies. Stay tuned for that;)

2011-12-18T21:35:00.001+09:00

Korean weddings -- their version of a more "modernized" wedding -- is definitely an experience you'd have to experience if you come or live in Korea. I just don't recommend throwing on a traditional Korean hambok and doing it.

My sister-in-law made for a beautiful bride but I think all women regardless of whatever always look like the most beautiful female at their wedding.

I think it's the fact that they're glowing that makes them so beautiful. Today my sister-in-law was definitely glowing as was K-Gere. K-Gere was quite the proud father and he shed some tears during the ceremony.

On My Best Behaviour... Sunday, December 18

2011-12-18T16:15:00.000+09:00

Not really wanting to write about the wedding.

It went down today, as expected, and I was uncomfortable in a hambok, as expected. My sister-in-law was a beautiful, blushing bride, as expected, and Snickers looked handsome in his suit, as expected.

It was a typical rendition of what Koreans think a modernized wedding should be -- overly-glamorized, overly-priced, very much for the cameras only, and within the hour not only was the ceremony over but so was the meal.

I’m not a fan of such weddings.

My sister-in-law runs a study-room in her apartment so many of the students performed during the ceremony. One of the performances consisted of several girls singing a pop song and randomly popping up signs that wrote “kiss”, “hug” and “clap” in Korean. Snickers frowned at them, insisting it was tacky. I turned to him and told him, “if this ever went down at our wedding, I’d seriously walk down the isle and leave you!”

Harsh, I know… hence why I never had such a wedding, or a wedding at all for that matter.

2011-12-17T16:07:00.000+09:00

Caught Snickers trying to study English online when he forgot to close the browser. Often he randomly tries to memorize sentences and this was the sentence he tried to memorize today.

... and this was my response to his sentence... hahaha.

Pre-Wedding Jitters... Saturday, December 17

2011-12-17T14:24:00.000+09:00

Tomorrow's the much anticipated sister-in-law's wedding and ever since I've been warned that I'll be wearing a hot pink hambok I've been dreading it.

I hate that I'm dreading her wedding. I want to attend her wedding as me -- Amy -- not as a far-fetched image of myself that's so very Korean and so far from who I really am.

I know this is Korea; I'm more than well aware of this fact.

I speak Korean...
I eat Korean...
I wear Korean...
I listen to Korean...
I sing Korean...
I watch Korean...
I play Korean...
I even married Korean.

I probably speak, eat, wear, listen to, sing, watch, and play Korean more than I do English. And in doing sometimes I question just how much Korea let's me be me -- a Polish/Canadian. So often I feel like my own culture, my identity as a Polish/Canadian is pushed aside and given less than second priority. I felt more freedom with expressing my own culture and whatnot when I taught English. Students loved hearing about the cultural differences, learning the slang and mannerisms, but now I have no students. I don't teach English so now my medium for practicing my culture seems to be rather obsolete and limited to either my own home or venting about it over coffee.

My Korean professor at university was right. "When you go to Korea you'll meet one person -- Korean" was what he told me when I told him I was going. Korea is infested with Koreans and though I think they really do want to become more in tune with Western culture and more modernized, they're still very much Korean-focused. Oddly enough, this is what initally really sparked my interest. I come from Canada, a huge multicultural country where depending on where I go I am the minority. Canada is a beautiful collague of cultures, unlike Korea that is very Korean-Korean.

Sometimes I feel rather choked in Korea, wanting to break free and just explore, experience and live my own culture. Korea has it's own way of thinking, a way of thinking and a way of life that can be frustrating to me. Whether it's the heirarchy of age or dominance given to the men, some things in this culture just don't fly by me but I try my best to either ignore it or bite my lip. It's goes beyond this though. It seems to interrupt and interfer with things that I do value. Things that are special to me like holidays and things related to the holidays that I no longer participate in or are very limited in doing so.

Take Christmas for example, a holiday that is pretty much given a solid month (if not more) of recognition in Canada. Korea gives it one day. Advent calendars, cabbage rolls, decorating the Christmas tree and house, the manger story on Christmas morning, going door-to-door singing Christmas carols, Christmas Eve candlelight services, listening to the Salvation Army Band, making ginger bread houses, sending Christmas cards, a birthday cake in the shape of a cross for Jesus on Christmas... I can't even cook a cake here. Regular ovens are pretty much a luxury.

So many of the things that make Christmas Christmas to me seem so far away. Instead, I have a cheap two dollar Advent calender I bought from Emart, I can't bring myself to unpack the Christmas decorations my mom sent me last year, and the extent of celebrating Christmas here consists of going out for dinner and watching a children's performance in Korean and at a church that really has no meaning to me besides it being beside my old apartment.

Christmas in Korea always feels like a Charlie Brown Christmas.

Sometimes I feel like I either have to conform to Korea on my own accord, risk being pushed into it or risk not really fit in if I don't conform. My in-laws will never introduce me as a professional boxer who runs her own fitness company, nor will they tell anyone I'm Polish/Canadian. I'm "Amy, a former Dankook University professior who is Canadian". Canada seems to have some kind of luxery appeal to it. My family is very proud of our Polish heritage, so I was raised to respect this fact. I never called myself Canadian or even considered myself Canadian until I came to Korea. Moreover, I haven't worked at Dankook for almost two years.

I love Korea but I love being a Polish/Canadian from Canada. I just wish Korea wasn't so Korean at times because being in this mono-culture country is sometimes very hard for me to be me when I'm so not Korean. I feel like I'm juggling the two cultures -- Korea's and mine.

I wish Korea was more accepting of difference.

Tomorrow I'll be attending my sister-in-law's wedding in a Korean-created version of what my in-laws want me to be -- Korean -- and I feel rather sad about it. I'm always trying to cater to their Korean culture but when will they cater to mine?

"Make me a Polish cabbage roll and I'll gladly wear a hambok" I told Snickers.

2011-12-15T23:31:00.004+09:00

Introducing the fabulous Sunny -- probably Cheonan's one and only Korean hair designer who speaks English and understands us foreign girls don't have Korean hair.

No colour is unavailable at her salon, unlike others who only offer black, blacker, blackest, and brown.

In anticipation of my sister-in-law's wedding, today I got my hair done.

Pyen Chi reacted as if nothing had changed but Snickers... yikes, he absolutely loved it, especially the fact that Sunny had curled it (with a curling iron... no perm for me).

Feeling Like A Trophie... Thursday, December 15

2011-12-15T19:19:00.001+09:00

Only a couple more days till I turn into a "foreign doll"... a toy to parade around, or so I surely am anticipating as hinted by the strange wedding prep plans that have been going down.

I'm being forced to wear a Korean hambok at my sister-in-law's wedding and though I realize that yes this is Korea and yes my in-laws are Korean, I am not Korean. I've never heard of in-laws having to wear the traditional dress at a wedding. I've only really seen the mothers and older ladies wear them. I thought it was a matter of preference on behalf of those wearing it. However, I've been told I have to wear one. No ifs, ands, or buts. I'm not impressed.

Being forced to wear one has turned me into a sour puss, I know, but I really don't feel comfortable being turned into what feels like a trophie. I'm so over being the pointed-out foreigner in a crowd and I rather just be able to enjoy the event like the rest of the crowd. Anyways, at the dress fitting I couldn't even look at myself in the mirror. I had told them specifically "NO bright colours" and what colour did they make my dress... pink.

Correction, it's not pink.... it's in-your-face, hotter-than-hot pink.

I don't like big crowds, I try to avoid them actually, and I don't like loads of added attention, hence why a while back I dyed my hair black and continually darken my hair. So throwing me, a foreigner, in a pink hambok, a dress that's got more material in it than my bedspread and makes me feeling nothing less than a walking-talking bulls eye among a flood of Korean-only, screams "look at me!".

And they're arranging to get my hair done in Korean style to go with the dress, same goes for my make-up that they'll be doing too. I was even told to get my hair colour touched up.

This Sunday I'll be Foreign Barbie.

2011-12-14T18:57:00.000+09:00

The evolution of Pyen Chi, the Pee Master Beast of Fur.

She went from being this overly-annoying ball of fur that bit everything and everyone and freely peed, to this massive, beautiful gal that I simply can't kiss enough.

Snickers thinks I'm silly cause I talk to Pyen Chi but sometimes I seriously think she's trying to digest and make sense of what I'm saying. She told me today that she too misses Mi Nam every single damn day!

Almost Smuthered by Love... Wednesday, December 14

2011-12-14T11:03:00.000+09:00

Had a near-death experience today when I woke up to what felt like someone trying to snuff me out with a pillow. My instant reaction was to try to grab whatever was pushing down so incredibly hard on my head, only to realize that it was Pyen Chi. Pyen Chi had flopped herself down on my head. It was actually quite scary because my arms were crossed behind my head so both my arms were pinned by the weight of her massive body. I was home alone too, to make matters even worse, so screaming for help was pointless and there was no Snickers to help me. I had no choice but to bite her. Yup, I bit her. At first she didn’t react. I had a mouthful of fur and skin but not of air and freedom, so I bit harder. Finally she reacted. She got up, swung her head into my face and bit my nose. Served me right I guess but my options were definitely limited.

This isn’t the first time Pyen Chi’s flopped down on me but this was definitely the first time she’s flopped down on my head. Every morning, usually around 5 or 6am, she does this. She tries to lay her whole body down on mine. It was fine when she was a pup, quite adorable actually, but now’s she is 37kgs and it’s just down-right scary at times. I have to do the whole tap-out like in UFC, banging on the floor to get Snickers attention and to get him to help get her off me.

Snickers shows Pyen Chi tough love whereas I bombard her with kisses, hugs and always cuddle with her. She’s become this massive walking-talking teddy bear and yes, I said talking. Trust me, if you don’t feed her in the morning when she’s hungry or if she needs to go outside for a bathroom break, she’s gets very verbal – no barking, just a lot of moaning and groaning. We try to initiate it a lot but we end up looking like fools and laughing at each other. I’m sure she thinks we’re a bit nuts but that’s ok by me.

2011-12-13T23:37:00.000+09:00

Big brother is watching. Little sister is watching back.

And the Internet is tracking your every move.

... so what do the 88 visitors today think about that?

You're Not Invisible... Tuesday, December 13

2011-12-13T16:44:00.000+09:00

You think I don’t know but I know and now that you know that I know, I hope you know better… calling yourself “Anonymous” is the understatement of the year.

What does it mean to be anonymous anyways? I mean random people sign comments on my homepage using this name, most of them I must note use it when they have a mean comment to spit on my page. So does calling yourself Anonymous mean you’re identity is secret. You do realize we live in a techno-world where everyone everywhere and everything is linked via the World Wide Web?! It’s called IP addresses. I think the label “Ignorant” would be a more appropriate for such anonymous commenters that think they’re protected by such a misused label. Maybe I should respond to such “Anonymous” commenters by calling them out by their home address – “Dear Mr. ## Hopkins Street” -- which is so easy to get considering my homepage keeps record of commenters’ IP addresses and Goggle maps them.

The other day an “Anonymous” commenter claimed I “am not a professional boxer”, to which I question, what then defines someone as being a professional boxer vs. an amateur boxer or even someone who does it simply for leisure? I suppose me being a registered license boxer who puts more time in the gym and training than anything else, who constantly has to report to sponsors – both domestic and international organizations and companies who annually support me financially and with products. Would this same “Anonymous” commenter be more up for calling me a professional boxer if I was fighting more often and sporting punch-drunkness?!

Moreover, I’m always curious as to why such negative “Anonymous” commenters continually read and critic my homepage if they supposedly don’t care for me. Sounds rather silly if you ask me. I don’t care for peas and carrots so I don’t eat peas and carrots. Ok, so I’m not exactly peas and carrots but if you don’t like something or someone than why would you continually come back to visit that person even if it is a simple click onto their homepage?! Do too people simply have nothing better to do? I say, get a hobby.

Since when was it ok for people to pee on other’s parade? If someone’s happy, why try to pull them down to your level. With so much crap already consuming the news and our reality why would you want to help foster such negativity? Why can’t people just be happy for someone who is happy?

2011-12-12T23:14:00.000+09:00

These pictures were actually taken yesterday after a very grueling advanced boxercise class. I'm surprised we could even scrounge up enough energy to pose for these pics considering our hard training.

2011-12-12T14:14:00.000+09:00

My anticipated schedule...

A Battle for the Buck... Monday, December 12

2011-12-12T13:45:00.003+09:00

Boxing, boxing... and more boxing. This is exactly what's been consuming me lately and I am definitely not complaining but it's leaving me quite exhausted. After a long day of boxercise classes, meeting personal training clients and then doing my own boxing training, I then come home to watch past fight highlights or UFC on the TV before I call it a night.

Not too sure if you clicked on the above pic of my schedule to enlarge it (or if you can for that matter), but this week I'm throwing in two 6am boxercise classes... ya, ouch. It'd be one thing if it were early morning tutoring like when I tutored at the crack of dawn at Samsung. The scooter ride over woke me up but the job wasn't physically demanding on me. I could simply sit back and chat the hour away. Not so with boxercise though.

I have my sister-in-law's wedding to go to this Sunday so boo to that in that I won't be able to host my regular boxercise classes. Sunday tends to be my busiest day with yesterday being a prime example -- Fat to Phat Challenge kick-off, advanced boxercise class and then a beginner boxercise evening class.

I've been spending my afternoons lately working on my fitness book that I've been writing, revising and constantly adding to for the past couple of years. I still manage one of my friend's fan page but with her not having a bodybuilding competition till February, she's got extra time on her hands so she's been trying to handle it herself.

Flipside Fitness -- both my personal training and boxercise -- has been paying the bills somewhat but I'm seriously thinking about taking it to a much different level. I love hosting it at my boxing club here in Cheonan but I've been offered a guaranteed set monthly salary if I take it to Seoul where my cliental would most likely be married Korean housewives. It'd be very similar to the class I did about a month ago but I remember that class like it was yesterday. I was more or less on show and those in my class were more interested in watching me and socializing than actually putting forth the effort and focus. It was rather frustrating to me actually.

None the less, networking here in Cheonan is brutally hard and though I've been getting a good turn-out it's definitely not as good of a turn-out as I had anticipated or hoped for. The foreign crowd is a tough crowd here. I'm definitely putting in the time and effort, heck even if only one person shows up for a boxercise session I'll do the session, meaning I'll train someone for an hour and a half for only 15,000won. That's a huge bonus for them considering I charge my personal training clients more than double that price for only a hour. But I'm not complaining. I'm super thankful for those who have been showing up and I consider myself extremely blessed to be doing something I love so. Having said this though, picking up random jobs to cover the bills isn't what I want to be doing in addition to running my own company. Afterall, one (of many reasons) why I created my own company so that I wouldn't have to lean on someone else to give me work and hand me a paycheck. I wanted to earn an honest dollar my way.

I know for a fact my life would be so much easier if I just gave in and signed up for the next available English teacher position but I also know for a fact I wouldn't be happy. I had the great teaching job; I worked at Dankook. Four day weeks, 20 hour work weeks, many months off for summer and winter, and a paycheck that easily kept Snickers and I fed, clothed, plus so much more.

Do I regret quiting Dankook? No, but I can't help but wonder if I've bitten off more than I can chew or if there's even enough here to chew on and maintain.

2011-12-11T23:41:00.000+09:00

After a long action-packed day I was pleasantly surprised to be treated to a dinner date by non other than my beautiful Snickers. Tonight's dish -- beef sashimi, raw beef marinated in a garlic sauce and oh so delish I was almost tempted to lick the dish;)

Action-Packed to the Brim... Sunday, December 11

2011-12-11T14:08:00.000+09:00

Very exciting… kicked off the 63 Day Fat to Phat Challenge today with an amazingly positive and super sweet group of girls. At first I was somewhat discouraged in the numbers (specifically those who signed up by were a no-show) but then I asked myself, “Why should numbers matter?” I mean, would I really care more about the event if I packed the boxing club? And my answer is that although numbers can help to pump up the event and add to it’s energy, those who really want to participate came out. I much rather work with people who really want to be involved than a bunch that are only half into it.

My advanced boxercise girls really helped out a lot today – taking the before pictures of every participant, chatting up boxercise and giving a one round boxercise demo class. Much props to them. They really are a solid group of awesome girls.

I was pretty pumped about the event as it was but it only escaladed with who showed up. Cheonan has some really sweet girls and I was really happy to have a group of them join me for the event.

After the event one of my advanced boxercise gals came back to my apartment to watch the big Ji Hyun vs Jodie 10 rounder fight on TV. It was a pretty action-packed fight but I didn’t know who to cheer for. I fought at a tournament a while back and Jodie was on the fight card with me, so together we represented the foreign females here in Korea; that was awesome. However, I’ve also fought on the same fight card as Park Ji Hyun – an amazingly talented female Korean boxer who was sweet enough to introduce me to her mother and ask me to help her out at a previous fight with gearing up for her fight. Today’s fight marked her ninth time defending her IFBA title so it was quite the anticipated fight. Both girls were head-to-head with the points and it was definitely a fight that made us female boxers proud. Judges who scored the fight named Ji Hyun the winner so it was a sweet win for Korea.

Later on in the day I watched the UFC fights on TV. I’m not a fan of Mir but I like his opponent – Nogueira, the brother of a favored fighter of mine. The fight ended with Nogueira breaking his arm so that was rather disturbing to watch. Actually, I’m not too sure if it was an actual break or if it just popped out of the joint (dislocated), none the less, it was pretty rough watching it happen.

So today I kicked off the Fat to Phat Challenge, watched the highly anticipated Ji Hyun fight, watched a rough UFC fight and then I also had a packed boxercise beginner class and a wickedly-intense advanced boxercise class.

It certainly was a bloody, action-packed, sweet-induced Sunday... good stuff.

2011-12-10T20:44:00.000+09:00

My little butterball of a cutie, Snickers nephew who is one of the two super cute twin boys. Ever since I first met this little mini Korean, whose not as little or mini as when I first met him, he's been all eyes on me.

I Am Steel... Saturday, December 10

2011-12-10T17:57:00.000+09:00

I titled today's entry "I Am Steel" because that's exactly what I felt like today; that's what I had to be today to endure the dinner party with the in-laws today.

It was a toss up between making myself feel like steel and feel like Snickers' burden.

So here's the scene.

Snickers and I headed over to his mother's house today for a family dinner party celebrating the upcoming and very quickly approaching marriage of Snickers' sister. Everyone in Snickers' immediate family were there -- mother, father, two sisters -- and his oldest sister came with her twins and husband while the other sister, the one getting married, came with her soon-to-be husband. There were 10 of us in total.

For the most part, the women (minus me that is) kept busy in the kitchen and really didn't get to enjoy the meal with us -- a part of Korean culture I don't agree with. My mother would NEVER let us start a meal until she sat down... but anyways, this isn't Canada and Snickers' mother isn't Polish/Austrian. The meal was great; Korean sushi with lots of side dishes and then a fish stew. Everything was going smooth, real smooth, that is until Snickers' parents presented the upcoming newly weds a massive present. It was beautifully wrapped in old style Korean clothe with a white clothe tied in knots around it. It looked stunning. Inside the gift was a beautiful wooden box, similar to that of a small treasure chest, with wedding day hamboks, various other things, and a beautifully written letter on scroll paper. I wanted to be happy for the couple and share in this special family wedding ritual but I couldn't.

I felt hurt, I felt embarrassed and I felt like I had robbed something special from Snickers that he would have, could have and should have also recieved but didn't. He didn't because I am not Korean but I think it's more than that. When we got married we didn't even so much have any kind of similar special family dinner nor did we recieve anything more than a envelop of cash dropped off by one of his sisters. I'm not a fan of cash. My parents never allowed me to accept cash unless I had done something to earn it, like working for it or doing chores. Also, I've always viewed cash as a cheap way of getting out of having to put any thought and effort into a gift, and they know this.

At that very moment I hated Korea. I hated Korea from the bottom of my heart and wanted to seriously scream at the top of my lungs. I don't know what I would have screamed had I but I'm sure it would have been a blur of not-so-pretty words with tears and fists of pure anger, bitterness and resentment.

So on that note, I got up and walked out of the room.

I didn't say anything; I just got up and walked away. I joined the twins in the other room where they were drawing. I couldn't be in the main room anymore. I'm sure they thought nothing of it and I know they never meant to hurt me but that's the thing. They never thought anything of it and they had hurt me.

Randomly I sometimes ask Snickers if he wished I was a Korean girl and he always replies with the same answer, "Hell no". I know he's being honest with me but I also know his life would be so, so, soooooooooo different if I was a Korean girl.

On the drive home I turned to Snickers and asked him, "Didn't we get married?" It was a rhetorical question but sometimes I seriously wonder if some people here take our marriage serious and I want to ask it. Still to this day several people refer to Snickers as being my "boyfriend", after a year and a half of marriage though it's not funny. It never was funny to begin with.

I didn't go into depth with Snickers as to why the rhetorical question but instead told him that the more he tells me to understand his family the more and more I don't. I adore his father, K-Gere, his mother tries but sometimes it's an unnatural try, and I think his two sisters are quite super sweet to me, but their innocence is often insulting to me because it means they often totally miss what's really going down, like tonight.

2011-12-09T23:23:00.000+09:00

Lots and lots of deliveries today... eight to be exact.

Knock, Knock, Knocking at My Door... Friday, December 9

2011-12-09T17:35:00.000+09:00

More Adidas stuff came today... awesome!!!

Actually more than just Adidas came knocking on my door today.

Today was quite the busy day for delivery men here in Cheonan – a shipment from Bodybuilding.com in the States for my Fat to Phat Challenge, Western goodies from Mrs. R. in Canada, Adidas stuff from Korea, Second Skin clothing from Korea... to name a few.
EIGHT deliveries in total today... cool.

I think the coolest of the delivers, despite Adidas always bringing me such pride, were the Western goodies from Mrs. R, a long time friend of my family. She had sent me tons of Splenda, Crest toothpaste, a couple of lip balms, two cute Santa frames, apple cider… and the ever so loved but dangerously delicious Reese Pieces Peanut Butter Cups. Her sweet gift was a totally unanticipated, randomly sent box of pure sweetness and it tickled a sweet bone in my body.

2011-12-07T14:02:00.000+09:00

It used to be Mi Nam who snuggled up to Pyen Chi, the Pee Master Beast of Fur, but now she snuggles right up to us and interrupts us in middle of the night so she can score a sweet spot and an extra hug.

The Secret is Out The Door... Wednesday, December 7

2011-12-07T12:21:00.002+09:00

So the secret is out... out-the-door out that is.

A couple of weeks ago Snickers headed out to Osan for sparring, in preparation for his Welter weight title match that had been moved from Christmas Eve to Janaury 2012. He never returned, well he did but he returned the next morning. It had been a bad sparring session and, though his sparring opponent was no match for him, he did the mistake of bringing his feelings into the ring. He's been frustrated lately with KBC continually making him wait for a fight and this frustration mixed with his own frustrations with not being at par with where he'd like to be got the best of him.

Consequently, he broke his hand during sparring.

Now a broken bone has become somewhat of a common occurance and well, with this being Snickers' eight break on the same hand, it wasn't such a big deal. Snickers has broken his right hand eight times, got a metal plate surgically placed in it, has broken his nose three times and scored much needed stitches on his underbrow from his Philippines fight. So the problem wasn't the break, he could heal and be ready for a fight in late January, his problem was with his passion. It's struggling to stay alive; fading.

When he arrived home from sparring the next day, I opened up the door and there stood before me a very humble looking Snickers -- face somewhat swollen, lip sporting some harsh blood blisters, cheek a bit cut, and his right hand swollen like a softball.

"I want to quit boxing" he blurted out.

Honestly, him telling me this was quite heartbreaking and I thought I'd cry. I didn't know what to say, after all what could I really say? I felt heartbroken because I knew that this all came about by things outside of his control -- family pressures, social pressures, frustrations with KBC, and so on. Unless you're a professional soccer player in Korea being a professional athlete is a hard, hard thing to do and it requires more than just skill and determination. It requires super thick skin and strong broad shoulders to wear the burden that so many around you will push upon you and throw at you. Snickers doesn't want to deal with all that crap anymore and I can't say I don't understand. I totally understand and to that I'd love it if I could stand on the top of the highest mountain and shout at the top of my lungs "Shut up and screw off" to everyone and anyone who has ever discredited or stood in the way of anyone trying to do what it is they love, regardless of what it may be.

I felt somewhat overwhelmed with various emotions actually -- saddness, disappointment... bitterness. I felt bitter, bitter towards KBC for not scheduling him fights but bitterness towards Snickers.

"You have what I go everyday and bust my butt for and what every other boxer at UP wants -- talent, REAL talent. You're just going to throw it away... why? Because you're not 'successful' according to Korea, a country that disguises modern day slavery by dressing it up in a suit?!"

Having said all this, it came to much surprise tonight when Snickers came home and told me he agreed to a fight at the end of February. I'm way too happy he agreed to this fight. "If this be your last fight then so be it but go out with a bang, go out on top!... show KBC that you're going out because YOU want to" I told him.

2011-12-05T23:00:00.000+09:00

I'm all about women exercising strength and doing what they love, regardless of obstacles those around them prop up, so mad props to this awesome lady -- Cheng Jing.

I've Made My Decision... Monday, December 5

2011-12-05T13:03:00.000+09:00

I’m been tossing and turning in my sleep for the past two nights, debating whether or not I’ll take this fight in China for January 1st. And in trying to decide, today I did some searching on the web. Goggled my proposed opponent, Cheng Jing, and found out some interesting facts not only about her but about boxing in China.

Did you know that it wasn’t until 2006 that the Chinese Government approved women’s boxing? Yes, it’s true. Team Cheng told WBAN, “Professional [boxing] just starting in China. There is not a lot of pro boxing in China. They don’t have a chance to fight overseas too. Thus, the Chinese fighters always fight in amateur bout and professional bout in the same time. The Government has no rules to stop them to fight in the professional card.”

Cheng initially got into boxing when he father say her fighting in the street one day but because the Chinese Government hadn’t approved women’s boxing, she joined the Tae Kwon Do Team and in 2002 she won the Champion in Tae Kwon Do at the Province Game.

I’d be interesting to meet Cheng Jing, she seems very much like a girl in the same shoes of me – breaking the social norms, doing what she loves and not taking no for an answer. Much respect to her.

But back to why I initially Goggled her… deciding to take the fight or not take it.

I’ve been bouncing back and forth but in my heart I know it’s not my fight to take. It’s not about weighing the pros and cons, it’s about being realistic.

Is it realistic for me to take on a 10 round fight when I’m only up to 6 round fights? No.
Is it realistic or possible for me to drop everything and just train for this fight? No.
Is it realistic to think this is even a fair fight? No.
Is it realistic for me to take on such an opponent? No.
Is it realistic for me go into this fight with possibly no sparring practice? No.
Is it realistic for me to be ready – mentally, emotionally, physically -- in only 3 weeks? No.

Sure I’ve been keeping up with my training and I’m very active – I teach anywhere from 4 to 7 boxercise classes a week in addition to my own boxing, weight training and running – but staying active and training for a fight are totally two different things. I’m not at where I should with my training intensity if I were to have a fight in three weeks. For starters, I’d have to drop my boxercise classes and clients so that I could solely focus on my fight training and right now my boxercise classes and personal training clients are my bread and butter. This could really cripple Flipside Fitness.

Realistically speaking, it’s not a fight I should accept and though I have many others telling me else what, I know in my heart it’s not my fight. And though the thought of me possibly being able to walk down the street this time in a month with a championship title is awesome, I haven’t deserved a title shot yet and I don’t want to ride luck on this. I don’t believe in luck; luck is for the ill-prepared and undeserving. I believe in determination and preparation, both of which are needed for success.

2011-12-04T23:08:00.002+09:00

Adidas is all in... and so is Flipside Fitness!

Here's one of my fiercly fabulous Flipside Fitness gals from my boxercise advanced class. She's looking all cute in her newly acquired Adidas Flipside Fitness track jacket but don't be fooled; this pretty lady packs a mean punch!

Challenges at Boxercise... Sunday, December 4

2011-12-04T21:59:00.001+09:00

Hosted two boxercise classes today, one at 10am (advanced boxercise) and another at 5pm.

My advanced class is running very smoothly. All the girls in this particular class bring such great positive energy to the class, they push themselves and let me push them, often ask to do an extra round on the heavy bags, and they’re willing and wanting to learn and improve.

My beginner classes, on the other hand, don’t always run quite as smoothly as my advanced class because it’s still all new to those participating. I’m enjoying it as are those coming out to the classes but sometimes the fitness levels in the beginner classes varies so much. Today, for example, I had a marathon runner training alongside an inexperienced gal with health issues and joint problems. I like the challenge of trying to adapt things for them all, so that they all get worked out, but sometimes the challenge is well… very challenging. My biggest challenge is trying to keep in mind that this is all still very new to the girls in my beginner classes, so I constantly have to remind myself of this when I’m throwing them to handle various boxing combos or handing out various weights for the weight training component of our class. I want the classes to be challenging from them but not impossible or discouraging. It’s a hard balancing act.

None the less, boxercise classes are going great and I’m meeting a lot of great gals, definitely a huge perk for me and everyone that has come to my class has been nothing short of super sweet to me and energetic about training together… very cool.

Next Sunday Flipside Fitness will be kicking off a 63 day Fat to Phat Challenge, so I’m busy trying to organize not only the starting day events but things to do during the duration of it. Not as many women as I had anticipated have been signing up but I’m not discouraged because, like my boxercise classes, I rather work with those who really want to do it full force than those who I have to pull into it.

Should I Stay or Should I Go?!

2011-12-03T23:18:00.001+09:00

I've been offered a fight. At exactly 8:06pm my promotor asked me.

A flyweight 10 round WBC ABCO title match, China, January 1st.

After trying to contemplate and weigh both sides of whether or not I should take it, the notion that this is quite the amazing and rare opportunity weighs heavily on my mind despite me not really knowing how to make up my mind.

I take it for the next couple of nights I'll have sleepless nights, trying to pick my answer.

2011-12-03T14:12:00.000+09:00

What better models to model the new Flipside Fitness track jackets than a couple of the jab throwing, upper cut giving, fabulously-fierce women in my advanced boxercise class.

They're All In Too... Saturday, December 3

2011-12-03T02:15:00.000+09:00

Handed out some Flipside Fitness track jackets to a couple of my fabulously fierce boxercise ladies that are in my advanced boxercise class. Last Sunday they scored their first pair of beautiful Adidas boxing gloves and Adidas handwraps, today we added to their collection of Adidas boxing gear with the new Adidas Flipside Fitness track jackets.

They looked sharp in them... wow!

I think it's safe to say I've "converted" many of my boxercise gals into Adidas-wearing, Adidas-loving ladies. I say this because the plan for tomorrow is to take a couple of them out on a road trip with the destination being a couple of the Adidas factory outlets, so they can stock up on Adidas training clothes.

Adidas is all in and so are my boxercise girls!!!

2011-12-02T23:35:00.002+09:00

Introducing the newest addition to Flipside Fitness, our company track suit jacket!!!

Sorry Pyen Chi, as pretty as you are girl, this jacket is for two-legged girls. This jacket was made to fit the fun, fierce women in my boxercise class.

Flipside Fitness to Go All-Girl with Boxercise... Friday, December 2

2011-12-02T19:40:00.001+09:00

Busy, busy, busy... that's exactly sums up my day today.

Today's schedule:
7:30am -- meeting with personal training client #1
10:30am -- timed run with personal training client #2
12noon -- meeting with potential personal training client #3
2pm -- posting Flipside Fitness flyers
3:30pm -- meeting with boxing sponsor
4pm -- typing up routines and tips and tidbits for clients
5pm -- boxing
8pm -- Cheonan group run
11pm -- responding to Flipside Fitness emails and website inquires

I tell you, the workload to salary ratio of running Flipside Fitness definitely doesn't compare to the ratio of when I worked at Dankook or had a "normal" job. I basically work seven days a week with the weekends being the two busiest days in my workweek. I'm constantly answering to clients calls, emails and meetings. On weekends I run four boxercise classes in addition to meeting up with clients and trying to juggle spending time with Snickers. Having said this though, I may not be raking in the cash like I was before I decided to make my own company but I am certainly happier than I've ever been in a long, long time.

Networking has been my biggest difficulty right now with getting Flipside Fitness more out in the public. Today the printers called me to tell me the Flipside Fitness Adidas track jackets were finished and ready for pick-up. I was totally stoked about that.

Heading out to the local bars and feeling like I'm on the hunt for foreign females here in Korea doesn't sit well with me. I don't want to feel like a Jehovah witness and I don't want the ladies to get the impression me approaching them means I think they need to lose weight.

The direction Flipside Fitness is leaning towards is an all-girls directed company. I'll still continue to offer personal training for both males and females but I think making my boxercise class a girls-only thing is best. I don't want the boxercise classes to turn into a social thing or a pick-up joint. I don't want to the added distraction and the potential drama and ackwardness that seems too often to tag along with such situations. More importantly though, I think by making it an all-girls class those that come out to train will feel a lot more comfortable and willing to train hard and really push themselves. I really want to focus on making the boxercise classes a safe, comfortable and open place for women. As a foreign female here in Cheonan, I know from personal experience just how hard it is to find such safe and open places where I can feel totally and completely comfortable in my own skin while surrounded by others. I want my boxercise class to be exactly that.

2011-12-01T23:29:00.003+09:00

A.D.I.D.A.S

All Day I Dream About Sparring

The young amateur boxers always get plentiful chances to spar.
... my teammates (male pro boxers) spar on a weekly occurance ... and even the young feuding sisters get to spar.

Props to the Korean Female Boxers... Thursday, December 1

2011-12-01T13:21:00.000+09:00

In the wonderful world of the of boxing where beginners I help train proclaim that trying to master the coordination of footwork and throwing punches say it’s like being asked to rub your tummy and pat your head, sparring is an essential key to your success as a boxer.

It’s one thing to master the skipping – jumping from fancy footwork to double skipping, triple skipping too if you can do it – then to do round after round of shadow boxing, pad work and then pound away at the heavy bags. All these various exercises help with much needed key skills – coordination, endurance, strength, self drive and self motivation. I love the boxing club and I love training there but it’s hard to go in day after day to the boxing club and keep it fresh “like the first time”, which appropriately enough is UP Boxing Club’s motto. But in addition to all these grueling exercises and much needed skills that need constantly work on, fine-tuning and continual practice, is the importance of sparring.

I don’t spar nearly as much as I should, could, would, want and need to.

Finding an fitting sparring partner here in Cheonan, South Korea is like looking for that needle in the haystack and I’m green with envy over just how many sparring partners and opportunities to spar my teammates have.

Tonight I had sparring. It came as a result of one of the high school kiddies shooting his mouth off at me so I posed the challenge to him, asking him if he wanted to take me on in the ring. He said yes so we geared up and took our corners in the ring. I did the mistake of letting feeling drive me in the ring; I was furious. The sparring session had been initiated by the fact that he had repetively called me “man-like” but in an inappropriate manner than even Junior Mint caught him on and tried to make him apologize.

In the second round, right at the heat of the fight, I got him with a good left body shot. He instantly dropped his guard so I stepped into him and did a round hook on him, sending him down to his knees. I stepped back to let him get up but when he did, he leaned into me, drabbed his arms around my shoulders and he exchanged a couple of words with me. So I threw him a nice combo and sent him back down to the ground… but this time I didn’t want to step back. I didn’t step back. I went in for a cheap shot, I knew it would be a cheap shot. He was down but I wasn’t done.

Junior Mint reached into the ring and pulled me away by the hood of my sweater. The sparring had concluded.

“If I am man then you’ll never be half the man I am. I am WOMAN… WOOOO-MAN!” I yelled at him and with that I threw off my gloves, grabbed my jacket and bag, and left. I walked home dripping with sweat with my jacket dragging, mouth guard still in my mouth and boxing boots still on my feet.

It’s one thing to be a female in a male-dominated sport but I’m a foreign female living in a country still very dominated by men. A country where it’s oh so evident and told straight to my face that I don’t fit the mold of what it means to be woman. So I conclude this homepage entry for today by saying my respect for female Korean boxers living here in Korea is all that higher than before. I may come from a country that respects and admires the strength and individuality of it’s strong women but they don’t. And if I have a hard time here as a foreign female boxer, I can only imagine just how much harder and more stressful it is for them to constantly go against the very stereotypical mold their own country tries to push them into

2011-11-30T23:22:00.000+09:00

A little Christmas present in the making... a token of thanks.

Going Strong... Wednesday, November 30

2011-11-30T21:24:00.000+09:00

My boxercise classes are still going strong and are gaining more hype as the weeks go by.

My initial beginner's boxercise class have since upgraded to the advance level, meaning that their high intensity part of the class is now done on the heavy bags. And let me tell you, they love working the heavy bags... probably just as much as I love watching them do so. There's a great sense of pride I get, seeing them train hard, work up a sweat, and continually come back to my boxing club for another class. I'm very proud of them.

Today I started thinking about extra things I can do for my boxercise gals and my personal training clients. The other day I cooked them all whole wheat tortillas and today I cooked up another batch. But with Christmas just around the corner I was thinking about what I could do for a little Christmas gift -- a small token to say thank you and Merry Christmas. I don't think I'll give all my clients gifts but I do really want to give a Christmas gift to a select small group of girls that have really helped me with my company, not only with getting it up and running but with their continual support and continual hard training.

I think I've found a great gift for them. It's small, it's handmade and it's handmade out of something very much used and abused but it's somewhat of a traditional thing that both my Canadian boxing coach and my Korean boxing coach have made for me in the past. My boxercise girls may not get the full symbolic meaning behind it but it's something that has great significance to me. Now I'm in the position to be able to do it for someone else and I'm honored to be in such a place.

2011-11-29T21:32:00.002+09:00

With Pyen Chi the Pee Master Beast of Fur helping me out (her posing as my back rest), I got adventerous in the kitchen tonight.

My mission was make homemade tortillas... and they were delish!!!

Playing with My Taste Buds... Tuesday, November 29

2011-11-29T17:52:00.002+09:00

Look out Martha Stewart, I’m turning myself into quite the kitchen-adventurous gal… cooking up a storm, experimenting with foods I like and trying to come up with strangely delish but often questionable dishes, and now I’ve added baking to my list of things I do in the kitchen, sweet.

Tonight I experimented with making homemade tortillas. Ok, so apparently tortillas are easy to make but I noted that I “experimented” with making them and by experimenting I meant I added random ingredients I like but didn’t know if they’d taste good.

That seems to be my trademark in the kitchen, or so Snickers claims. Often I try to make random dishes out by combining foods I like, like chicken and oatmeal; I call it “Chickmeal” – oatmeal combined with boiled chicken and either a dash of cinnamon or blueberries added for extra flavoring.

Today’s tortillas were relatively tame ones, meaning that they didn’t have anything really unusual in them but I tried to make them super healthy and super delish, with flaxseed and whole wheat flour being the much leaned on ingredients as well as various spices like garlic and oregano. So tonight’s tortillas were delish and rather on the tame side but I do plan on venturing into more creative tortillas, like tortillas with crushed bananas in them or things like shredded spinach or perhaps some protein shake mix to really mix them up!

2011-11-28T23:54:00.004+09:00

He hits below the knees and head butts... quite the dirty fighter for a mini-Korean ;)

The Next Generation... Monday, November 28

2011-11-28T21:16:00.002+09:00

It’s always training with my teammates, now more than ever. Boxing is an individual sport, fair enough, but here at UP Boxing Club we’ve got a tight little group going on and almost everyone in this elite group are professional boxers or at least aspiring professional boxers.

Our team numbers are dwindling though. With teammates getting older and taking on additional roles in their personal lives – husband, father, sole breadwinner, and so on – our once very active team that dominated UP Boxing Club and was always present at training is now not so. Boxing in Korea is a young man’s sport and already in my four years here at UP Boxing Club I’ve had a couple of my teammates retire, like Panty Boy Jr., Handsome Boy and Milk Dud. The Heavy Hitter and Snickers have been added to the team in the past couple of years, but Black Skinny remains the strong captain of us all. He is the heart of the team but with the shocking unexpected loss in his last fight, questions about whether or not that was his last fight still are brought up at UP.

Tonight I walked into UP and there before me was Black Skinny. Black Skinny had brought his son, Little Skinny Mini, to training so I joked around with him, asking him if Little Skinny Mini would be carrying on his name in the ring.

“Yes, I want” was his response.

Little Skinny Mini was very curious with his father’s training, insisting that I give him a skipping rope so that he can try to skip. Of course the club doesn’t have a skipping rope short enough for knee high mini-Koreans but he tried hard with the rope I gave him. When he continually stumbled with the skipping and once too many times accidently stepped into someone else’s skipping rope, Black Skinny stepped in and insisted he watch ringside. So for the rest of his father’s training Little Skinny Mini sat ringside and watched his father train.

When I was done my training I joined Little Skinny Mini, slipped on my boxing gloves onto his itsy-bitsy hands. The gloves swallowed up his hands and went well past his elbows. And just when I was about to blurt out “You’re so cute” he jumped forward and gave me a good hook. His hook didn’t hit me in the head like a hook should but then again he barely comes to my waist, so I took a good hook to the hip bone… and it didn’t stop there. He bounced back with a 1-2-hook combo and then a head butting that pretty much took me out considering where it landed, need I say more.

“Minus point!” I yelled out.

Little Skinny Mini may be but only knee high and weigh in well under the weight of one of my legs but this mini Korean can pack a punch and he knows how to do a 1-2-hook combo… pretty impressive. And as for the shots he gave below the belt… yup, he may be a dirty fighter but he’s definitely got fighter in him. Must be those genes Black Skinny gave him!!!