School of Hard Knocks

Fairtex Muay Thai Camp, Bangplee, Bangkok, Thailand

 

(Bangplee is a suburb of Bangkok, I think it's in Bangkok district, hence the long ass subject line)

 

On my previous post I don't think I accurately explained why I am doing this.  I did give an explanation, which was because I did it before, but that's pretty half-ass and tautological and I don't settle for that kind of shit.   So the reason why I'm doing this is the same reason JFK said we'd go to the moon and hustled Marilyn in  the back door of the White House - and the same reason why I've climbed mountains and crossed deserts and hacked through jungles for the last five months.  I didn't do them because they're easy, but because they're hard. 

 

Thai Boxing is hard, real hard.  Particularly if you're out of shape and not very good at it.  But I keep at it.  There's nothing as absurdly satisfying as in the one kick out of ten when I hit the pads hard and perfectly and make  a loud slap/bang shotgun blast type noise, nothing at all.  It's a challenge, a big challenge - but I like it.

 

What makes it more fun is that like I said before, what could be an intimidationg atmospeher here is anything but.  The fellow campers, (western guys who are pro fighters in their home countries) are a bit socially dysfunctional (meals pass in punctuated silence) but for the most part are not a bunch of jackasses as one would expect.  There's hulking dutch and hungarian dudes here who are nothing but unfailingly polite, and a couple of Spanish guys from somewhere in the South of Espana where I've never heard of  who don't shut up but don't speak much english either so it keeps a lid on things.  All in all though it's a decent crew, all very helpful.

 

Even better, and I can't express this more, are the Thai instructors.  These guys are all former Lumphini and Radamancheon Stadium Champions (think MSG and Boston Garden in basketball), which in the world of Thai Boxing  is equivalent to the world champs.  Many of them are legends in the sport.  But here I am, an out of  shape, out of work attorney moonlighting as a wannabe fighter, and they couldn't be more happy to see me.  I suppose it's the fact that big money (the top of the line fighters, in top fights, make no more than $2,500 per fight) is nonexistent in Muay Thai and hence egos remain in check.  But still, it's remarkable - the guys training alongside me are world champs, who fight in the main events at Lumpini -- and then there's me.  My own personal trainer, a former world champ named Ruck who's about 3 years and 30 pounds beneath me, thinks I'm the greatest thing since sliced bread, desptie the fact that I'm utterly inept at the sport. (I also informed him that I'm the undisputed beer drinking champ of Lumpini Stadium, which I am)  It's sort of like going to a fantasy basketball camp with Michael Jordan and Magic Johnson as coaches, and training alongside Tim Duncan and Kevin Garnett.   Crazy stuff. 

 

As for the particulars, life here is a bit of routine. I get up at 6:30, down a bottle of Caribou Daeng (Thailand is the ancestral home of energy drinks), go a few rounds from 7-8.  9 Am is breakfast/lunch - then sleep  in till about 1:30, then do training again from 2-4.  It's a bit monotonous, and allegedly if you're a serious fighter you'll run 6 miles before each training session (fat chance, I'm sore as shit), but it's good, still.