Another Boxing Tale

Our second day in Chang Mai, Glyn and I were walking around when a local guy in his early 20s stopped in front of us on his moped. He handed us a boxing event flyer and said he would be fighting tonight and would we come watch him. He had a killer smile full of pride. The next night, we showed up at the boxing ring and sat on a plastic chair with a hundred other spectators; equal number of locals and travelers. It was a special holiday--I can't remember which one now as this was in March, so there was no alcohol being served.

The first fight was between two boys that looked no older than eight. In Thai years that might have placed them at about twelve. The boys kept pounding away at each other with their little boxing gloves. Finally their coaches called the fight.

The next fight was between two fourteen year-olds. Before the fight began, they ceremoniously prayed at each corner of the ring while shrill and whiney prayer music played. Then they bowed their oiled bodies to each other and began boxing and kicking. I was crowd watching because I couldn't stand seeing such young teens punching and kicking each other, although I'll give them credit for their sportsmanship and athleticism. I looked up just in time to see one boy punch the other so hard in the chin that he spun around and dropped like a bag of rice thrown out of the back of a truck. The entire audience gasped and jumped up. The guilty boxer paced, worryingly holding back tears, as the coach soothed back into conciousness. The winner helped the dazed boy out of the ring.

The guy who invited us fought in the last, climactic fight of the night. He won to a guy a foot taller than him and much heavier. But the best part of the night was the show in between the concussion and the last fight: a topless transvestite show. Three beautiful ladie-boys pranced on stage in lingerie-style dress. The diva of the group wore a corset around her stomach with her perfectly round, unbouncy boobs out for everyone to admire. The girls were absolutely gorgeous, and I felt for the first time a bit jealous of a transvestite for having perfected the female form.

Chang Mai gave boxing a whole new picture.

Strength and Honour

My parents, old friend Julia and I saw Strength and Honour last night at Cinema Paradiso in Fort Lauderdale. I love that theater! It's an old church built in an old Spanish style architecture indicative of old Miami. Inside are blue velvet chairs and a giant Oscar award with a penis. I've never noticed if the statues given out at the Academy Awards have schlongs or not.

Strenght and Honour is an Irish boxing movie. Watching me punch each other around, killing each other doesn't usually get me off, but Strength and Honour was enjoyable regardless of the blood hurling and a couple dramatic killings and knock-outs that made Julia and I cringe.

The story is set in an Irish traveller community, which I'll be apart of tomorrow when I move into our family friends' pop-up camper to gain some privacy while still in the comfort of my parents' home. Moving back in with my family with no job after a break-up is the lowest point I would have imagined I'd ever get to. IT's here, however.

On the bright side, I'll save up money to go back to school, make new friends, catch up with family and old friends, and have my own place that I can laugh at in a year or two.

Just keep on punching!

Eternal Love

Last night my grandparents (Papa and Carolyn) and I visited Carolyn's cousins in a suburb of Tel Aviv. Simon, from Poland, was liberated by Allied forces from a concentration camp; I saw the camp tattoo on his forearm. His entire family died under the Nazi Final Solution, so Simon made his journey to Israel to start a new life. On his way, he was stopped and held in Cyprus along with thousands of other Holocaust survivors, where he met Rosa. Rosa was 19 and Simon 22.

Simon, now 84, greeted us at the bus stop with all smiles and energy to match a 60 year old. We sat around the table talking, eating fresh dates from their daughter's farm, roasted cashews, dried figs and croissants. Simon was attentive to Rosa, who has just had surgery, with a diligence of obvious enjoyment. When she talked, he listened, looking straight into her eyes, his face of pure adoration, respect and affection. They have been married for 61 years and have never let their passion die.

Seeing these two people so dedicated to each other put me nearly to tears last night. Every person deserves to be loved unconditionally and passionately by their partner. I hope that I am loved by my future husband until the day I die.

Diaspora

I'm visiting my grandparents in Haifa, Israel at the moment. They emmigrated here nearly two years ago, the first time they have ever lived abroad and for my grandmother, the first time she had ever traveled abroad with the exception of visiting Israel for two weeks before deciding to move here.

They have the same fascination and dismay that I first experienced when I moved to Japan. Simple things, like the toilets are in a tiny room separate from the shower and sink. The lever to flush the toilet is different (theirs is the same as Italian toilets). I think my germiphobe grandmother would flip if she had a Japanese toilet in which the sink to wash her hands was the same water circulating in the toilet tank to conserve water.

They took me to the Shuk, the local market where they buy their meat and produce. Touring me around the market they pointed out watermelon, oranges, dates, walnuts, cheese and fish as if this were the first time I had ever seen such treasures. Explaining the bus and train system as though I have never used public transport before: On the train, a station employee will come around and check your ticket.

I just smile and nod, act surprised or amazed, and try to suppress my comments of Yes, I know, most of the world outside of America has the same thing, or does the same thing, or operates in the same manner. It's cute, and I'm proud of them for emmigrating.

Goodbye Northern Ireland

I'm leaving from Belfast the day after tomorrow for Israel!

Although I'm obviously excited about seeing some of the oldest sites in the world, I will miss Ireland.

The day before yesterday Glyn and I went on a five hour trek across the Antrim Plateau. On either side of us were heather fields and hundreds of sheep grazing on farm plots. About two kilometers in the distance, the ocean, dark blue indicating its depth and frigidity, spread as if we stood in a landscape painting hanging on a hotel bedroom wall. It was gorgeous! I felt so clean and fresh from the exercise and being in a nonpolluted environment amongst the epitome of peacefulness: lamb and sheep Baaahhhing.

We sat at the edge overlooking the Irish Sea where Scotland spanned beyond that, to eat ham and cheese croissants with tomatoes and lettuce. Walking home, I ate wild blackberries growing on the bushes.

English Breakfast

The first time an English breakfast was laid before me in an Irish Pub in Tokyo, I was terrified. How could I possibly eat so much protein? What will happen to my large intestine after indulging in Heinz baked beans (a commodity in Japan), chips (aka french fries), fried eggs, toast, sausage, bacon and roasted tomatoes (for the prostate)?

It was amazing! Especially after too much beer the night before, it's what the stomach needs to make the devourer feel truly human in every sense of the hethonic word.

This morning I got some really bad news concerning my UK work permit. What did I do? I whipped out the baked beans, toast, bacon, and ran to the store for free-range eggs and cherry tomatoes and cooked an English breakfast in Northern Ireland--my first ever non-cheese comfort food.

Vietnamese Shoes Killed My Feet

A few months ago I visited Hoi An, a city in central Vietnam famous for custom-made clothing and shoes. The city is gorgeous--two to four centuries-old wooden Chinese architecture, paper lanterns lit at night, Chinese temples, art galleries and antique stores; a quaint town straight out of a Pearl S. Buck novel.

I had four pairs of shoes made: a cute silver pair with orange and yellow polk-a-dots (trust me--they were fabulous) to wear with jeans, black and brown pumps for work, and a hot pair of black knee-high boots. The silver dotted shoes I threw away in Italy after the second time wearing them.

Yesterday, I walked downhill to the train station in Larne, NI for fifteen minutes in excruciating pain. Even though these shoes had been measured and designed for my feet, they felt like torture devices from the Inquisition or, dare I say it, devices used on POWs during the Vietnam War. Never mind, that was uncalled for.

When I reached the station, I had missed the train by three minutes since my stride slowed down as I awkwardly walked in the least painful way possible. SInce I had an hour to kill, I went to a cheap clothing store called New Look and bought a pair of flat, black eyelet shoes for only 12 pounds. Although they were much more comfortable, my feet had blisters and bubbles like the time I spilled boiling water on my foot. Today, I have to walk on the sides of my feet around the house, since blisters are covering the entire bottom of my soles and the tops of my toes.

Moral of this complaining: The suits in Hoi An are great. Get some. But skip the custom made shoes.