Sunday, October 28, 2007

Dear oh dear.

Not a good week at all. It started out well - my new training schedule firmly in place, I was duly up at 5am for my run on Monday morning, did a pretty good job with the diet, sprints in the evening before training... pat on the back for me, I thought to myself.

It was all downhill from there, however. Tuesday I did not do my hillrun as planned, although I did do my two Thai classes - I apparently decided to swap running for Olympic biscuit-eating. Goddamned staffroom.

And the rest of the week continued in that vein, really. I missed 3 Thai classes, only went running twice and ate myself stupid.

I don't know what it is - the change in the weather? First week of term exhaustion/self-pity? Just the fact that I've not had more than 3 days off training for fights since April? Anyway, it must stop.

After the last fight I was so disappointed in myself that I determined to train like a machine for the next two, win them both, achieve international fame and fortune (well, maybe not that one) and reward myself with a couple of months of well-earned debauchery over Christmas.

So, we begin again this week. Up tomorrow at 5am for a run and this time there will be NO BISCUITS.

D'ya hear me? NO BISCUITS, God damn you!

Thursday, October 18, 2007

Fame. No fortune.

Before I get started, I have an apology to make.

Mum, I'm really, truly sorry. I swear. Alot... I thought you knew! Just try to block it out - speak to Kal's mum, she knows all about blocking out blog-swears ;)



So, basically, I used to be fat. Really quite fat. Look.


See? 14 stone, aged twenty, or thereabouts. As we know, I am now quite a bit less fat for a few reasons.

Firstly, I lost 2.5 stone with Slimming World (comes highly recommended if you like your food and you need a bit of support), and then I lost the last stone and a half or so with Muay Thai training and help from www.weighlossresources.co.uk (comes highly recommended if you want to feel like you are solely in control of your weightloss and calorie intake)

When I uploaded some before and after shots onto my profile at www.weightlossresources.co.uk it came to the attention of the owner of the site who asked if she could use me as a success story for the website. I said "Why, yes - absomalutely", and a few weeks later she emailled to say that she had passed my story on to the editor of Zest magazine who was interested in featuring me as well.

I tell you this because that's where I was yesterday: in London having a photo shoot for Zest. Rather funky, eh?

It was a pretty hectic day, preceded by a bit of fuckwittery on my account ("It's 23.30, I have to get up in 4 and a half hours, but I've left my passport at my flat and I'm staying with a friend. Shiiiiiiiiit...") and involved flying out to London at 06.30, flying back again at 14.05 and six tube rides inbetween. I arrived in North London at Veryposhhouse, on Richpeople Terrace in North London at about 09.45 and the people from the maazine were really welcoming, very friendly and professional, even though it did seem like most of their jobs consisted of having a lovely chat and a nice croissant (I'm sure there's much more to it than that, but I'm still strongly considering a move into the media industry).

The shoot itself took all of about five minutes - what really took the time was making me look like.... (prepare yourselves)... a GIRL!

Seriously, I was in makeup for about an hour and a half, and yes - I looked hot, but it really takes some of the joy out of it when you know that you *do* scrub up nice, but only with 90 solid minutes of professional help.

Once I looked female we went out into the garden for some lovely smiley shots of me in "leisure wear" (tracky B's and a nice vest top) and they took some pictures of me kicking as well, in which I pray I don't look too much of a gimp, otherwise I'll never live it down!

By 11.30 I was on my way with a bag containing a Pret a Manger sandwich and chocolate cake portion and by 16.00 I was back in sunny Edinburgh for a 2 hour stint of furniture-moving (we're having our floors sanded, hence the staying with a friend) and then off to training.

It was a busy day, but something thoroughly out of the ordinary for me. It's always nice to receive a compliment, and it makes a change to have people (from London, who work with proper girls) saying nice things about how you look, so I was feeling pretty good yesterday.

Muay Thai is great, and I'll never swap it for anything, but I find it plays havoc with my own sense of femininity. Girliness is generally *not* an advantage in contact sports, and spending most of your free time red-faced and slick with sweat is not going to make you look or feel attractive, so it was lovely to spend a morning reassuring myself that, with an effort, I can pass for pretty and it was a nice bit of recognition for the effort that's gone into losing this 4 stone.

The interview will be done over the phone apparently, and I'll mostly be mentioning Muay Thai, and the SMTC every second sentence to make sure I get some promotion of the sport in there, since god knows we need all the help we can get!

Anyway, my "Real Success" story will be in the April edition, I'm told, and I'll be sure to keep you updated with any news as it breaks (see, media-speak ;p)


In an aside, I'm deeply curious about who, if anyone, reads my blog - do me a favour and leave me a wee message so I know who's lurking there, and I will prepare myself to be extremely embarassed by the lack of responses....

Tuesday, October 16, 2007

Running

Holy mother of God. Where once I had regular, non-flamey thigh muscles, now I have two large, frayed elastic bands which appear to be ON FIRE.

On Sunday the 14th October I went down to Manchester with some people from the gym (Ally, Marty, Graham and Wee Mark) to watch Master Sken's Supershow. Always a big event in the Muay Thai calender, I wasn't really too bothered about the specifics of who was fighting because I don't *really* care, I just love to watch fights. However, one of ours, Chris Polley was fighting full rules against Alix James and since some folk on the net were convinced this would be a walk in the park for Alix, we were all keen to go along and watch them realise the error of their ways.

Chris is a fantastic fighter - aggressive but composed, really unique style and incredibly fit, and since he'd just come back from Thailand we knew it would be a stormer and we weren't disappointed. He easily dominated rounds one and two, but since it was a 5 rounder and Thai judging scores rounds 1 and 2 of a 5 round fight equally, the first 2 rounds wouldn't normally make a massive difference to the outcome of the fight. However, he opened up quite a nice cut on his opponent's eyebrow in round 2, so that may have had an impact on the scores in Chris's favour.

Round 3, as Ally put it, was like something out of Rocky - Chris took two standing eights which could quite easily have cost him the fight, but his performance in rounds 4 and 5 was epic and he won the fight convincingly and against the odds.

His face looked a wee bit mashed afterwards, but he said he felt he could easily have fought another 2 or 3 rounds if he'd had to, and in light of this and my disappointing performance last week, I've thoroughly inspired to take up running. Alot.

For some reason I'm convinced I hate running, but in actual fact, if the last couple of days are anything to go by, I actually rather enjoy it. It reminds me of being a kid again in the Highlands when it's windy and rainy, and when it's sunny I get this sense of elation from being outside and listening to my favourite music.

Anyway, I asked Chris what he does to prepare for a fight, and apparently he goes running 8 or 9 times a week in addition to his Muay Thai training.

This is just a teeeeeny bit more than I do.

It's about 8 or 9 more runs a week than I've been doing, actually. So yesterday a new era dawned, and I went running round Arthur's Seat in the wind a rain and felt high as a kite afterwards, in addition to the 10 miles I cycled and the hour of training.

Today, my thighs feel as previously described: ouchy. But that's beside the point - I feel more positive, I feel like if I can keep this up for the next 6 weeks I'll mostly be keeeeking some bott at my next fight.

All I need to do is re-read this post every single morning at 5.30 when I need to get up for a run, because I can absolutely guarantee that this is not how I will be feeling when I have to run around Edinburgh in the, cold, wet nasty winter mornings which lurk just around the corner...

In light of this I am making a public pledge and I invite anyone who reads my blog to call me on it regularly and question/hassle/mock me about my running.

I, Aarayan, hereby solomnly swear that I will get up and go for a run at 5.30am every monday, wednesday and friday morning, and that I will also go for a really good run on a Thursday night because there's no training. Furthermore, I swear that at least 2 of those runs will include nasty shit like hill spints and steps. I promise this on pain of mockery and poor performance in the ring.

Watch this space...

Saturday, October 13, 2007

Made it.

It's finally the october break, and I'm so tired that there isn't even a descriptive term for it. Every new teacher (and every experienced one, for that matter) will tell you that it's that first term which really stings. The sheer work involved in that first round of forward planning, where you have not a clue what you're supposed to do. The unfamiliarity with the resources in the school - where the fuck is everything? What are you supposed to do? The daily battle with behaviour: a problem in any new class, let alone a class like mine. New children, new staff, new surroundings - it's a big challenge and one which takes its toll on any teacher.

There have been many occasions over the past 8 weeks where I have really, truly doubted my ability to make it even this far as a teacher, let alone to the end of the year, so I do have a certain degree of pride in the fact I've made it to half-term, and further that I've done so without a nervous breakdown. It hasn't, however, been easy. I've cried myself stupid many times at school, in the toilets at lunch and break, in my room at the end of the day, thinking "What the fuck am I playing at - it's not worth it". And I'm not the only one, by a long stretch, it's been hard for others who I know, harder even.

But, it's not been a wasted term: I've made progress personally and professionally. My disaterous first unofficially observed lesson has been improved upon with two good, if not outstanding lessons, of which I'm fairly proud. The constant stream of bad, shocking behaviour has been, if not replaced, broken up by lessons in which the behaviour could be desribed as very good. It's been a good few weeks since I've cried from stress or despair about teaching, and it's also a few weeks since I've considered quitting, although the last week was a time in which I regularly had to force myself into school against my own wishes.

Of course, I've made life a bit more difficult for myself with the training - I've spent a term getting into school for 7.15, working 11 hours a day to leave at 6.15 (when the school closed), and training for an hour or sometimes two every night. My poor, uncomplaining husband has literally not seen me for more than 2 waking hours a day for over 2 months, but he never makes a fuss - he may well be too good for me.

So, praise be, I've got a week of no school. A week of sleeping late, doing what I want, or not doing anything at all. I've got no fights scheduled at the moment, so I don't need to diet as such, but I intend to eat healthily, exercise lots and try to get a bit more healthy: I am at the moment a bit on the grey, spotty, cold-ridden side, as my immune system has taken quite a wallop recently.

The highlights?

It's made me very happy to see the way that some wee boys, who would have me believe they're the hardest thing since Ghengis Khan, will light up with joy and self-satisfaction at the mention of a pleased note home to their mothers in a special, silver bound jotter with stars on which says "Colin* is a Star!" inside the front cover. (*names changed to protect identity)

Small victories, like having taken two girls who hadn't understood in maths, out of class in my own time to try again to explain how fractions convert to decimals and vice versa, and having them say "oooohhhh, right....I get it now - I understand", can really make your day.

Hearing, second or third hand, that management consider you "well organised" is nice in an anally retentive, superficial kind of way.

Camp was a great experience - some of these children are just not designed for formalised education, and they thrived in the environment of activity, self-relience, and challenge which camp provided. Also, being surrounded by young men and women who were all, without exception, cool and who were not afraid to tell the little hard-nuts just how unimpressed they were by their antics certainly did them no harm.

So, it's not been all bad by any means, and I'll stick it out I think and make it to the end of the year.

But in the meantime?

Fuck teaching. I'm on holiday :)

Wednesday, October 10, 2007

Results....

Well, it's not quite the unblemished record I was hoping for, but it is, as they say in East Lothian "No Bad". I got a draw this time, against an embarrassingly young (15) female fighter called Hayley Thomson from Fighting Fit Gym, but who I can safely say is tough as old boots.

Another C -class 3 rounder, I was much more tired during this fight than for the two previous ones, for various reasons. Initially I was supposed to be fighting a different girl at 64kg, who pulled out at the last minute because of weight issues, and was rematched with my opponent, Hayley Thomas, at 62 kgs. This did mean a 2 kg weight cut in the 5 days before the fight, which was no fun at all, especially since I also had to go away on school camp the weekend of the fight. Have you ever tried sidling up to a chef at an activity camp and telling him his pizza and chips looks fab, but would he mind heating up this bowl of Weight Watchers soup? No? It's embarrassing.

Anyway, camp was great fun, but did unfortunately involve forfeiting the usually standard rest period before a fight and swapping it for 17 hour days of abseiling, archery, trapeze, raft-building, and child entertaining. Not a plan of action I intend to ever repeat again. Turns out that looking after 10 children on an outdoor activity weekend, in the cold on 800 calories a day is actually not much fun at all, but I am glad I went even still.

So, in addition to all that, obviously I had no access to a sauna or a salt bath, so the day before the fight ran thusly:

06.00-07.00 - 3 mile run in a sweat suit.
08.00 - fruit for breakfast
09.00 - 10.30 - abseiling
10.30 -12.00 - archery
12.00 - 14.00 - Lunch (soup) and general child coralling
14.00-15.30 - trapeze
15.30-17.00 - Raft building (sat on the side for this one - didn't fancy dunking myself in a freezing cold muddy pond!)
17.00-18.00 - child minding and dinner (soup)
18.00-19.00 - 3 mile run in a sweat suit
19.00-20.30- Child activities
20.30-11.00 - getting children to sleep
11.00-06.00 - lying awake worrying about weight

Come fight morning I was mostly grey, spotty and knackered and in a final fart in the face from fate, spending a weekend with 50 hormonal girls brought my period on with no warning, on the morning of the fight. Nice.

So, a very kind colleague gave me a lift back to Edinburgh at 06.30 from the camp just north of Perth, getting me back to my house at about 08.30 on the Sunday morning, and Ally picked me up about an hour later and we and Kim drove through to Baillieston for the weigh in at 11.00. Come 12.15 my opponent hadn't arrived yet and rather than risk me going out and hunting down a ned for sustenance the referee officiated my weigh-in so I could get down the serious business of eating..... EVERYTHING.

Or, at least, everything that was left after Ally got his grubby paws on it... ;)

The fight itself is a bit of a blur - I remember various points with particular clarity, such a the moment when John shouted "push her off and high kick", so I pushed, stepped in and threw my hip, only to watch my "high-kick" hit her just above the knee.

"Hmmmmm...", I thought. "Shit."

I remember thinking "Holy fuck, I'm tired. I wish she'd just go away!", but she didn't, so we fought it out to the end. I beat her on the outside because I'm stronger and more technical, but she beat me in the clinch because she's fitter and had a much higher rate of activity. In the end it was announced in the ring as a win to me, but it was a mistake and was in fact a draw to us both.

To be honest, I'm happy with that - I felt at the time I didn't deserve to win, and I'm more comfortable with that decision. However, I am disappointed not to have another win, obviously, and I'm also a bit disappointed in myself because I know I can do better, and that I didn't prepare well enough for the fight.

However, I learned alot from it - I know exactly what I did wrong and why I didn't win, and I know how to fix it, and next time I definitely wont be making the same mistakes again.

So watch out ;)

Check out the photos of the show here, I'm about halfway down, looking, erm, photogenic as ever:

http://www.marktimmphotography.co.uk/gallery_99026.html