Sylvie von Duuglas-Ittu

This is such an amazing project. I've read about some small communities on the outskirts of villages where people with HIV/AIDS are sent, usually cared for by monks but with incredibly limited funds and often no medication. There's a huge dearth of education about HIV/AIDS in many parts of the world and a lot of the rural communities in Thailand don't know how to, or are afraid to, care for their family members who are infected. Giving these kids a safe environment, healthcare and a community is absolutely invaluable. I hope we can help!

In America people get very impatient or laugh at the Wai Kru when they don't know what it is. But I think that's a big part of it. If there was some kind of introduction or explanation provided by the announcer or the show, people might know what the hell they're looking at. There's a stadium in Chiang Mai that has a westerner (German) guy on the microphone to talk about the fights and explain some things to the western audience while the fights are going. How the fight is being scored or whatever. But he explains the Ram Muay while it's happening in the first few fights. Even the Thai announcers will make comments about my Ram Muay when I fight - it's unusual, which they always comment about. I think this is good for the audience to have a chance to appreciate it, rather than just getting rid of it.

I've been very impressed by how many women I've come in contact with who are in their late-30's and mid-40's, who are very devoted and dedicated to Muay Thai. I'm certainly made to feel older than I actually feel by living in the Thai world of Muay Thai, which skews toward adolescents. But, while I don't consider 31 to be "old," it's not exactly categorized by "young" either. But even at my age, perhaps by the circumstances of living here, I see a lot of truth in that saying, "youth is wasted on the young." I'm much more focused and work much more deliberately than the young'ins at my gym. But I don't think I would have been ready for this kind of experience earlier in my life. I was an idiot in my late-teens; I needed to be the age I was when I started and I've needed the years I've spent in the sport/art already to get to the point I'm at now. There are so many times I have a realization about a technique or ethic that I was instructed a LONG time ago but it only makes sense to me now. I'm only ready for it now.

TOTALLY agree with the note about it being a fear issue.

My gym is Petchrungruang in Pattaya, it's medium sized. We have about 14 regular fighters, maybe 4-6 of those at the big Bangkok stadia on a monthly basis. Mostly kids and teens, but no such thing as "kids classes" or separation by time schedule in Thailand. We all train together but we get grouped mostly by size and experience, so the kids play together and I'm with the teenagers because I'm small. It's really good for me. We have westerners, too, but they tend to be bigger than I am so they train together and I only sometimes spar or clinch with them. The kids train in the early morning before school, so they're running at 5 AM and finished with their conditioning and morning workout by about 6:30-7:00 AM. They don't do pads in the mornings. I come at about 8:30 or 9:00 for my training and I do a full workout, including pads in the AM. Then we all start again in the afternoon between 3:30-7:00 PM. People come in waves, as there are folks who only train in the afternoon and show up early, kids get out from school and get there a bit later, then we leave in waves as well. Usually the gym is quiet by 7:00. There are two rings (one is quite small, it's mostly used by the kids), six heavy bags (three long, three standard), an uppercut bag on a wall mount, a matted area for warmup or skipping or padwork spillover, and a full weight room. Plus a ping pong table :) This schedule is 6 days per week; Sundays have no AM training, so it's a half-day. There is apparel (shorts and shirts), Mongkol, Praejit, anklets, tape, gauze, vaseline, oil, etc. sold at the gym. Any equipment is ordered through the gym and arrives from Bangkok within a week or so, but you can pick a very wide variety for order. I've never seen any gloves, shinguards or anything like that actually in the shop already, but you can order all of that plus headgear, belly pads... anything. Training is very inexpensive compared to other gyms I've seen and trained at. Only 4,000 Baht per month. There are very few trainers but they have different assets. Generally it's just Pi Nu, who is the best padholder I've ever had; his father owns the gym and he grew up there - it's his house. But there are also some men who can be called in to help when it's busy or who work with particular fighters. I've only ever worked with one or two of them when Pi Nu is unavailable, like if he's at a fight in Bangkok or something. I love my gym a lot.

Thanks for the link to the pictures; very cool.

At my gym(s) way more time is spent in clinch than in sparring. Sparring is generally three rounds, so about 15 minutes, but clinching is rarely less than 30 minutes and often an hour.

I like that there's a "if you show interest, I will teach you" thing going on with your head trainer. In some cases in the west, I think people learn it without actually learning anything about it - same goes for in Thailand. But Thai people recognize elements that we as outsiders don't - we just don't have context for it - so it requires less explanation. Even if there's no "time" or allowance for a Ram Muay in the west, I think there should be some (even if it's very short) ceremonial homage to one's teacher upon entering the ring. That's a part of the tradition I feel is non-negotiable.

The tones are crazy until they aren't; you just hit a stride eventually and start hearing/imitating them. It's funny because when I lived in Berlin my German was SO BAD for the longest time. For whatever reason these older men all wanted to ask me for directions on the train and I was so embarrassed every time I opened my mouth and they'd just say, "oh, you're American" because of my horrible, horrible accent. (Damn you, Friedrichstrasse!) However, the more I spoke it, the more I sounded like a Berliner because the lilts and cadence of the language itself rubbed off on me. I actually have a Berlin accent in German now, which is kind of what it's like for me in Thai at this point, where I speak very differently in Thai language than I do in English - the tones aren't considered, but more my actual sentence structure naturally goes up and down and I emphasize very differently than I do in English. Same if I imitate my dad's way of speaking. My dad says "fuck" the exact same way regardless of context. It's like he has his very own tone for it, hahaha.

Mod is awesome for this kind of thing, and there's lots on Youtube if you spend some time searching around. http://learnthaiwithmod.com/

Well put, Lawrence. For me, it comes down to knowing what you're looking at and then acknowledging the limitations in what you can take from that. If you can discern good teaching from bad teaching, useful technique from stunts, etc, then by all means learn from the best. But also understand that watching 10 hours of Buakaw highlights is not how Buakaw became those highlights.

Thanks for joining up, Nick. I hope we can help to spread the word about your efforts and get as much help as possible for the kids at your orphanage. The lack of education around HIV and AIDS in all parts of the world make it very difficult for those affected and really anything we can do to make it easier is hugely meaningful.

Wow, clinching so much in AM and PM, no wonder they are so good!

Totally agree with Micc that women just get paired together regardless of compatibility because, derrrrr, girls! Working together is good and you can both benefit a lot from each other's differences, but you shouldn't always be partners - same goes for the huge guys in the gym or when kids come in. But, if you don't mention it to your trainer, he may not ever realize it's reasonable for you to switch up partners. And by going with some of the guys sometimes, some of the things that she's doing that are so annoying to you may get worked out by other people with different levels, tolerances, comfort with confrontation, etc. So, I'd say asking your teacher to switch it up (after or before training would be a good time to address this) is a definite step. As for when you are working with her, you mentioned that she might not know how hard she's going. I see this with my own partners all the time and, honestly, I don't know whether they know or not. I've even considered that maybe I'm going harder than I think I am and that's causing them to go harder, get pissed off or heated, etc. There are studies on this - we honestly might just mis-gauge how hard or soft we're going, as well as how hard we're receiving. Since you've told her straight out that she's going too hard, it might require you to actually have her throw the same strike three times at varying degrees of power to find the right spot. Like that "warmer, colder" game. That way you both know where that level is, and you can do the same to kind of calibrate for her. With the timing on pads, that sounds so annoying. But my immediate thought was about how everyone in a class has different motivations. If she's gassing out and going 100% on all her strikes, not working on timing, etc., she might just be interested in getting a "workout," not learning techniques or skills. So, you have to figure out a way to balance that out with the actual drill, which involves balance, timing, countering, etc. I'm not entirely sure what that approach is, but maybe verbally calling out the strikes so she can tell that she's "off beat" would help. Like, if she's already kicking when you're calling out the right cross (for example), she might steady herself the way you would try to get on the beat of music. Or, if she's cool, just say "we're off sync here, how do you think we can better work together?" I don't know. These are all my suggestions from a million miles away. I do hope you can work with her and work some of this stuff out AND that you get more opportunities to work with other people. I have great training partners who I sometimes just need a switch from, just to mix up the experiences. Let us know how this goes!

Yay!! This makes me so happy. And that you're well sized together is fantastic as well, since you can not only offer so much as training partners but can also share fighting opponents (or fight).

I think this is a common question among people who come to Thailand for a mid-length stint (longer than a month, shorter than 6 months) and have spent enough time at one place to have gotten over the humps of initiation. There are pros and cons in both directions of your situation. The cons of moving to a new gym now is that you have to "start over" in terms of re-introductory to new trainers, new environment, relationships and even just being accustomed to your padholders. Every time you go with someone new there's this "wait, what are you asking for?" period of getting used to each other. There is also, of course, the risk of not liking the new place as much as your first experience and wishing you'd stayed or feeling you've wasted your time. Of course, the opposite can happen as well, where the second gym is better for you. The pros of moving to the new gym are that you get a wider experience of different training styles, techniques, trainers and training partners, etc. You will be "treated like a beginner" no matter where you go, simply for the fact of being new. But it's just for as long as the trainers are checking you out, seeing how you work, etc. It's not permanent. But, you may be a bit short on time to establish strong relationships in that second gym. But here's the thing about your particular situation. Your gym in Chiang Mai is technique-oriented, which lots of people really love, but you have to keep in mind (and may simply just not know this, as there's no reason why you should) that that gym hires all its trainers from one gym in Bangkok - they're all from the same "school," so to speak. And while it's not typical for all the fighters of one gym to have the same style, it's something that your gym strives for. They've made a choice to keep uniformity in their technical training rather than the far more common every-trainer-wants-you-to-do-it-differently experience of most Thai gyms. So the correction (and perhaps over-correction) of your pre-existing technique is to mold you into their style, not because you're necessarily doing it wrong. Imagine trying to make all your students in school have the same handwriting: you're not spelling or using words incorrectly, but at this school you can't put a tail on your 't' even if that's more natural to you. They just want uniformity. Which is another reason why you may not be learning anything new. In the west we learn Muay Thai combinations and "tricks" kind of like the Japanese form of kata, like accumulating tools. But that's not how it's done so much here in Thailand. It's massive repetition of the basics until they become automatic and you're comfortable enough to start throwing in a little twist of the technique - faking or doubling up or those ridiculous spinning elbows at terrible range that all the western guys who fight at Max tend to do. It's possible you could split the difference and try a different gym not too far from your current gym and see how that feels. That way you get to experience something different and if you discover you're actually pining for your first place you haven't already moved. It's a bit of a delicate option because of the social/business issues that might arise from popping into a neighboring gym, but since you're not fighting yet it shouldn't be a huge deal to try a different gym for a few days or a week or something. As for the fighting question: you don't have to wait for your gym to ask you to fight. In fact, showing and expressing interest might be the spark that pushes you into a different level of training. You know who the fighters are at your gym so you probably can see whether or not the training is much different - if there's more sparring/clinching, different focus in technique, etc. But all Thai trainers make discerning choices in training fighters vs. non-fighters. You don't need to train elbows in sparring at your current level, and indeed, given how you've described your partners I wouldn't recommend it. I do feint elbows in both clinching and sparring, but they never make contact and actually yelling "sok!" is how they're mostly incorporated. I got elbowed for real by a kid I train with the other day; he's a dick and lacks control. Don't throw elbows for real in sparring until you are super, super experienced. That said, you're not going to be used to elbows from training before you experience them in fights. It's just not how it works. Elbows aren't thrown in every fight, most that are thrown don't land. Focus on keeping your guard tight when you're in range and you're good to go; way easier to practice than actually having people throw elbows at you. My trainer elbows me in padwork, but he has total control and has only started doing this in the last 6 months or so. Your likelihood of getting a fight in Chiang Mai is very, very high. There are fights at numerous stadia all the time and lots of female fighters up there, of varying skill and discipline, which makes finding a good match reasonable. I don't know what it's like at this other gym you're looking at, but from what I know about them they don't have female fighters, so I have no idea how readily or willingly they'd get you a fight in a short period of time training with them. So the breakdown is like this: if you want a different training experience, do try somewhere else. If you want more from your current gym, don't be afraid to ask. It's always a good idea to let your gym know that you're interested in fighting. Your technique that you came to Thailand with isn't necessarily wrong - your current gym is looking for uniformity and if you go to a new gym they'll adjust everything also, possibly even more so and between trainers at the same gym. Consider it an expansion of options, rather than a limitation of what's right and what's wrong. Don't elbow in sparring, but do think about elbowing while you're sparring and either call out those openings to yourself or go ahead and yell 'em out as you see them.

The trainer being assigned or kind of having ownership over a fighter is the norm, I think. It just sucks when you're stuck with a shitty trainer, or one that just doesn't go well for you personally. I was stuck with a real pain in the ass for probably 7 months at my old gym. He would have days when he just couldn't be bothered and it drove me nuts, but nobody else would touch me. In those cases, being pushy and getting more trainers to work with you or get that possessiveness in check is such a relief. I'm excited to see how your training pans out at Eminent Air, Kelly. Your updates so far have been great :)

I've likened my experience with this kind of thing as being like having a wife and a mistress. They know about each other, but you'd better not f***ing talk about each of them to the other one!

Yeah, the initial visa is going to start as soon as it's issued, so you don't want to get that too long before you actually enter Thailand, but certainly not so close that you don't have time to work through any hiccups that might occur upon trying to get it. As for the extension, that one you can get prior to the expiry of your 60 days, but again you should probably do it within a week or so of the expiry. I'm about to get an extension and the lady told me that regardless of when I go to immigration, the extension begins upon the date on the expiry stamp. That's an immigration, however, and I don't know if that's the case at a border, where you're actually exiting and re-entering the country. That probably is a cancellation of the old visa if you go too early.

This is so cool that you're interacting in a language exchange! Reading/writing is like pulling teeth until all of a sudden, like almost overnight, you just start seeing everything and comprehending it straight off. It's like magic. I'd caution you a bit about noting the difference in spelling between casually written Thai and properly written Thai, as there are tons of differences - I only mention it because the Thais you're speaking to are likely using the former. It won't get you into any trouble, but since you're learning to recognize words you're going to be doing twice the legwork by seeing both at such an early stage. As for resources, womenlearnthai is a good site and you can look for children's books to just work on reading very simple sentences and single words, like sounding out names and such. Another trick is to turn on the subtitles on movies, if you can find any. Thai soundtrack with Thai subtitles will help you read as you hear it.

I would LOVE to fight either of them again, multiple times. I don't think I'll fight Lommanee again. I asked her in private message about fighting again and she seemed like she didn't really want to, and I've asked Yokkao about it, but they don't seem interested - she's not fought for them since my fight with her. The only way it would happen probably is if a large sidebet was raised, and even then probably not. I don't have the money so it would take outside interest, and she doesn't fight a lot, she would have to be convinced. I am a very different fighter than when I fought her. At the time I didn't even know how to clinch or guard. Not saying she wouldn't be difficult. She's one of the best fighters in the world at a weight class two above mine, but it would be a wonderful challenge. Loma though is a real possibility. My head trainer knows how much I want to fight her, and is even asking Max Muay Thai if they would take the fight this month. Outside Max though, again it comes down to sidebets. I think she would fight me if there was substantial money involved.

That was awesome.

Blocking teeps with knees is totally reasonable. I can see why you would not want to do it in training through, as it can result in the bruised or broken feet. You just have to bring the knee up much higher, I think, so you're not catching people's toes.

Reading this I thought, "wait, do I do this when we spar?" I think that's a result of being unfocused and so people default to what they learn in padwork, which is aiming for the mitts. Gloves = mitts. Great note of learning to be mindful of this though, because you'll totally bring that to fights without realizing it.

I'm happy you brought this question here! I'm interested to see what other people bring up. Yeah, what Kevin wrote covers a lot of what I initially thought when reading your post. Mostly in terms of the hierarchies of gyms. We don't "see" a lot of that because we're literally socially blind to it, but it's super deeply ingrained. We had one trainer who would just do the weirdest things at Lanna, making everyone laugh at him on the sly, but they never said anything to him because he's older. You just CAN'T say anything because he's older, even though his rank at the gym was pretty low otherwise. Can you imagine in the west your boss not being able to say anything to one of his employees because that employee is older? But then there's the struggle between your two trainers because their social ranks aren't so clear-cut. I sympathize with you because when one trainer is flaking out, it feels quite natural to gravitate toward someone else who is showing interest. The difficulty is that it's totally normal for everyone to cycle up and down in their energy, interest, focus, etc. We, as fighters, do it also. I have days when I'm just not focused and my trainer still works with me, but from my own perspective if he's having an "off day" it feels like personal disinterest... which isn't really fair. I don't know that in Thailand you can really level out this issue. You can't smooth it over by demonstrating equal interest, which is what I think our western culture tends toward. In the end their tension is beyond you, so there's not a lot you can do about it. Be Thai about it and ignore it, smile, pretend it's not happening and be respectful and friendly to both trainers, regardless of who you're working with. You're simply not going to get a trainer who is 100% focused and invested 100% of the time - this is the "way of life" world of Muay Thai and on a long enough time line those hills and valleys kind of flatten out. But if one trainer is more invested or more focused, go ahead and gravitate toward that... just know it will go through the same cycle. Same with fighters - you see how trainers respond when fighters fuck off for days or weeks at a time. You just let them cycle out and reward them when they cycle back in.