(10 hours) #35 Karate SLEEPY Boring Objects (Jason Newland) (7th March 2023)

Hello and welcome to Sleepy Boring Objects. My name is Jason Newlander and please only listen when you can safely close your eyes. Now the point of this podcast is to just talk about a subject or an object and hopefully by listening you can relax.

Your mind can slow down, your muscles in your body can relax and maybe even if you need to you can drift off to sleep. And even though I might talk about a certain subject it doesn't mean that I think that the subject's boring. It's just that I'm probably not talking about things with the most excitable voice possibly.

So I've done a few of these recordings and this one is going to be about karate or kawate depending on how you pronounce it. Oh I kept myself comfortable. So my, I guess my real first introduction to karate was Chuck Norris.

I didn't meet him in person, he didn't knock on my door saying, Hi Jase, can I show you some karate? I've got some wood, I want to break it in front of you. Do you want to see it? And like that didn't happen. But I did see him in, what was it, Way of the Dragon, the movie with Bruce Lee.

And he was, I think he was a karate world champion before that movie and of course went on to make hundreds of martial art movies and tv shows and stuff over the last 92 years. So he was kind of my introduction in a way. But if I'm honest I'm not sure I even saw him or even knew about him before I started doing karate.

I knew about Bruce Lee but I don't think I'd ever seen a Bruce Lee movie. I had a Bruce Lee poster on my wall when I was eight years old. Don't know where it came from but it was on my wall next to my bed so I just looked at Bruce Lee every day for about a year and a half.

And it's only really when I started doing karate that I became obsessed with martial art films. And that seems to be the rite of passage for most people that get into martial arts, especially kids. You just become obsessed with everything.

Kung fu, karate, kickboxing, Thai boxing, jujitsu, ninjutsu, ninjas, whatever. Wing Chun, Jackie Chan, Bruce Lee, Chuck Norris, and all the other people that have come afterwards. Now when I first got into karate it was probably about 1984.

And I think I was 14 at the time. I might have been 12 or I may have been 13 but I think I was 14, maybe 13. And I, basically what it was is my friend, Stefan, we were just talking and he said oh I'm going to the karate club tonight to have a look.

Because his brother, his younger brother was doing it, he was doing karate there. And he thought he'd go along and have a look. So I said to my friend Stefan, I said can I come with you? And he said no.

And I said please. And he said no. I said I'll pay you £2.50 over the next seven months if you let me.

And he said okay then. Because £2.50 was a lot of money back then. So we went along.

I'm not sure if I got a lift with him. I think I might have got a lift or we just walked up together. And the karate club was in a high school.

There was two high schools. It was at the other high school. So I went to one high school and my older brothers went to the other high school.

That's where the karate club was, where they went. And it was basically just in a gymnasium. It was in a big gymnasium, you know, with the wooden floors and all that stuff.

And there was all these benches pushed to the side of the wall, stacked up. And me and my friends sat on the stools watching the class. And from then on, from that moment, a little spark, a little spark ignited inside me.

It wasn't, I think, reignited because I used to watch Kung Fu, the TV show Kung Fu in the late 70s, early 80s. I loved it. And I always wanted to do Kung Fu.

And I used to ask my dad when I was little, even like 9, 10, 11, 12, can I go to karate? Can I do Kung Fu? Can I do karate? Can I do karate? And he always used to say no. I don't know why, but he would say no. Even though he himself did judo when he was at school.

He got to brown belt. So I, at this point, I didn't have to, I was old enough not to ask permission really to do stuff. And I knew from being there that I wanted to do it.

And it was every Tuesday and Thursday evening, I think it was 7 to 8.30, something like that. And I remember the first time just sitting there watching, thinking, wow. Like from two different versions, there was a wow of how good the good people were.

But also seeing the people that were just starting and how bad they were, was quite good as well. Because if I'd been there, I don't mean bad, but, you know, inexperienced and not having learned what they were doing yet, they're still novices. To be able to see the novices, and also to be able to see the higher grades, you know, black belts or high graded belt people, how good they were.

You could see the difference and realize that what you could become, what I could get to. So seeing the beginning and the end, well not the end, but the results. And it's quite nice to see people that weren't particularly good.

Because then I could like, I don't mean not good, but you know, new, because that's the bracket I was in. So I didn't feel like I was going to turn up and everyone was going to be really good. And I was going to be the only one that didn't know what I was doing.

Because there was quite a few people that didn't know what they were doing. Including the toughest kid, one of the toughest kids in my school. He was, he didn't even have, I think he had a tracksuit on.

So if you wore gi, which is the uniform, the cost, not costume, but the karate kit, you'd normally get that after a few weeks of going. You'd turn up with your tracksuit bottoms on or a t-shirt or maybe some shorts. And you'd do that for a couple of weeks to see if you like it or not.

And then you'd sign up and you'd get a gi and you know, you'd have a white belt. So there's quite a few people there that weren't very new. And seeing this kid that had been, I don't want to say a bully, but he was, you know, he was a tough, tough kid in my school.

Not really been able to do anything, you know, not, not knowing what he's doing was quite nice to see. You know, he's, I don't know, it's hard to explain. I didn't laugh at him, obviously, but it was nice to see that just because someone's good at one thing doesn't mean they're good at, automatically good at another thing.

So someone's good at boxing doesn't mean they're any good at chess. Not that that's really relevant. So and my friend's brother, who I didn't really know at this point, I became friends with him, but I didn't really know him.

He was a year below us. Yeah, it was a year younger. And he was really good.

And he'd only been doing it for a little while. He was really good. He kind of picked it up very quickly.

So what I did, me and my friend, Stefan, we went along the next day, I think it was, this might have been a Thursday, and we went along on the Tuesday. Or if it was a Tuesday, we went along on the Thursday for the first session. And I don't know how long we went there together, because he did stop going after a while.

But we used to practice in school, we used to like punch and kick each other and block and spar, you know, during a break time. And that was quite cool. And we, he stopped coming, I don't know why.

But he stopped going and I continued because I, I got the bug, you know, I just loved it. I just absolutely for the first time in my life, found something that I loved and felt that I was quite good at. Yeah, I felt I was competent, and that I could get better.

So that's what I did. And I continued and I did my grade in. And I think, I think I did my grade in the same time as my friend's brother.

So he hadn't been there for much for very long before I got there. I got a first class grade, a first class pass. Now, every grade I've ever had, whether it's karate or taekwondo, I did taekwondo when I was about 40.

I started doing that for a few for about two years. Every grade in I always got a first class pass, which I'm quite pleased about. But he, he got he actually got jumped up a belt.

He was so good. The he, I don't know what they called it, but they jumped him up. It's kind of the opposite to being kept back a year, in a way.

It was like, so he went from being a white belt to green belt, or orange, no, orange belt. Or was it white belt with a green stripe? I don't know, I lose track. It's like, wow.

And he was really good. He was, he was, he excelled at it. But I was pleased with getting a first class pass.

And every grade I did, I got a first class pass. And I remember having to travel to the next town to do the grading. Because that was where the main school was, there was actually a brick and mortar building school, martial arts school, with a martial arts shop next to it, adjoined to it.

So that was a club, it wasn't, you know, a room in a gym, or, you know, renting a roommate in a school, this was actually a proper martial arts school, which I would have gone to if I'd lived in that town, but I didn't. However, I think I went to the right place, because my sensei, or my karate instructor, he held the title of, it was, I don't want to call it, but the area, anyway, the area title of the top black belt in the area.

And the area would have been, you know, I don't know, probably a fifth of the country, probably that area.

It's quite a big area, maybe a sixth of the country, it's quite a large area. And he was the, the area champion, karate champion, out of all the black belts, and it's like, yeah, he's, he's my boss, he is, he's my instructor. Now, I'd love to say that I entered into some contests, and won, won lots of medals, and won trophies, and was in the newspaper, and went on to be in the Olympics.

But none of that happened. Well, apart from, I did go into contests. I think I fought in three different contests, karate contests.

And those were tournaments, basically, and they put people together that were the same belt, the same grade, or maybe the same age, depending on size. And even though I was little, I was a little all the way, all the way through school, even when I left school, I was, I couldn't have been more than five, six when I left school. I'm five, eight now.

I was five, seven last month, I've grown a little bit. But I don't think, yeah, I was pretty much the smallest kid in, in the history of time, you know, at the time. In the 80s, there was no one smaller than me.

But I got matched up with someone smaller, because he was younger. So I was, say, 14, 15. And I was matched, this is my very first contest, I was matched up with this kid, who was probably 13.

And he ran rings around me. I couldn't even see him. He just literally running around me, bash bash in my face in my stomach.

And that was it got point, point, point, point done, finished. It was just over with so quickly. And I didn't get hurt.

He couldn't hurt me. But he was so quick, I couldn't see anything coming. It was I was embarrassed.

Because to start with, because we were the same grade. And I saw that he was little, I had this and younger rather, or a little, I thought, yeah, this is, this is quite good for me. But no, he absolutely made me look like I was moving in slow motion.

Now the next tournament, I won the first fight and lost the second fight. And the third tournament, I won the first two fights and lost the third fight. So I kind of progressed and then I stopped going.

But I remember one of the fights I had, it's a fight, it's a contest. It's not an actual fight, fight, had pads and everything. It was, it was full contact, but it wasn't.

You know, we had shin pads. I don't know if we had body pads. I can't remember how to groin, groin pad, and pads on our feet and pads on our hands.

I don't think we had head pads, but we might have done. I can't remember. It's a long time ago.

And me and this other kid, we just got into a scrap. Like both of us forgot all about karate and we were just on the floor punching each other. And the referee kept pulling us apart saying, keep doing that and you'll be disqualified.

And in the end, I think he won. Yeah, he beat me in the end. But it's like, it's weird, even after all that training for a year and a half, two years, whatever, I still went back to basics.

But I loved it. Absolutely loved it. It was a great, great environment.

And I remember one, one point at one of the tournaments, my instructor or one of the instructors asked me, gave me his keys, said, and this is the person I came to the tournament with in his car. He said, can you do me a favor and go and get my bag from from the boot of the car. Gave him the keys.

I couldn't remember which car it was. So I thought, oh, there it is. I opened the door, and it's always already open.

And I start looking through the place, start looking through the boot, and I realized it's not the right car. So not only am I looking through somebody else's bag in their car, but I'm doing it at a karate tournament, which means that car is probably owned by a black belt karate person, which is not someone I really wanted to think that I was stealing off them. And in back in them days, I remember I used to get asked to do things and I'd forget what they asked me.

It's like soon as they start to ask me to do something, for example, when I was a kid, decide, can you go to the shop and get some bread and some milk? Once I got to the point of can you go to the shop? For some reason, I just stopped listening. And I'd take the money and I'd walk to the shop. And the whole way there, I knew that I had no idea what I was going to get.

And we didn't have mobile phones back then, so I couldn't phone up. So I'd go home with a bag of sugar and some flour or something. And the weird looks I'd get.

Yeah, just like the look you're giving me now. The weird. I don't know why I just would just stop listening.

It's just it wouldn't go in. And that's what happened with that car. It's like, can you go to the car? I forgot what the car looked like.

I didn't know. I think I went back and said, what color is the car again? It's yellow. OK, right.

Well, that wasn't the car then, because that one was red. And yeah, so eventually I found the right car. And when I say eventually, I tried a few.

And I did find the right, I think I did anyway. He seemed to be happy with the bag I got. Unless it was just a better bag than his and he just decided to keep it.

I don't know. I think one of the highlights of doing karate, just one of the highlights of my period doing that was one of the top people in the club, he was, I think he was still like a blue belt or brown belt, but he he purposely didn't take any other gradients because he wanted to do tournaments and being a lower grade meant he got a chance to win medals at that.

Rather than be a black, he didn't care about being a black belt.

He did become a black belt eventually, but he was still a young man. He's probably in his 30s, I imagine. Mind you, back everyone looked about 50 to me.

I was only little, but they were probably only young. And he got married. He invited me and another young kid that was there that was sort of the same kind of age, same grade or whatever.

I think we were green belts at the time, or yellow, orange belts. I don't know. He invited, he asked me and the other kids to stand outside of the church holding swords.

So basically crossing swords. So me holding one, him holding the other one, crossing it over as they walk out of the church. You know, the point where, you know, people used to chuck confetti over them and stuff.

And they got photographs taken and the photograph was in the newspaper and everything. And it was so cool. The thing is, I was a little bit worried that I might like fall asleep and the sword would drop down at kind of the wrong moment.

And it'd be in the newspaper for the wrong reason. But it was great. So also we were dressed up in our gi, in our karate gear.

So we didn't actually go into the wedding. Everybody else, all of other people from the karate club and the adults were there and everything. But we stood outside.

I don't know if it was the summer or the winter, I can't remember. But it was fun. It was a lot of fun.

And I'd love to see that picture. I'd love, I don't know if, that's the thing, if the internet had been around then it would probably still be available somewhere. But this was long, long, long before the internet even was even thought of really.

So that picture is probably in someone's photograph album. Not for me, you know, but that was the moment they stepped out of the church after being wedded. So that's, that's going to be, that photograph is going to be saved somewhere.

Because it's an important photograph, isn't it? Even if the two that got married don't want the picture, I'm pretty sure their kids want the picture. You know, it's a very important picture to someone. I'd like to see it myself.

So if you're listening and you've got a picture of two young boys holding swords, crossing swords, that sounds wrong, doesn't it? But you know, holding swords and crossing them above the doorway of the church as the two people, the man and the wife, are walking out. Then I'd love to see that picture. I just would, just one of those things.

It excites me no end. It really does. Strange, isn't it? What gets us excited? I think it's seeing something I haven't seen for such a long time.

It kind of confirms that actually happened. Because sometimes I wonder, did that really happen? You know, did I ever really, was I ever really quite good at karate? I say quite good. I was quite good.

I wasn't no expert. And I'm pretty sure if I'd stuck at it, I could have got to black belt by the time I was, I don't know, 18, probably. 17, yeah, probably by the time I was 18.

I think in them days, you couldn't even apply to be black belt until you're 18. It's changed now. But that's a long time ago.

And the other thing I remember is, and I've spoken about this before on my Let Me Bore You To Sleep, is at the club, there was no kids under a certain age. You had to be at least 12 or 13 to join the club. And I kept bugging my instructor for my little brother to come along.

And he was eight years younger than me. So he was about, really about six years old at this point. And my instructor said, no, we don't teach kids that young.

I said, well, why not? Because I taught my little brother some moves, some kicks, punches and stuff. Just because I think it helped him in the future as well. But eventually, my instructor gave in.

And he said, okay, we'll do a Saturday morning thing for an hour, hour and a half, whatever. And we'll open up for the rest of the club. But you can have the young kids at the back.

And you can teach them the basic stuff at the back. And I said, all right, we'll do that. And my little brother went, I think he got his first grading and he passed that.

I'm not sure if he did two gradings or just one. And then he stopped. He got a lost interest.

And then shortly after that, he moved away. He didn't move out of the house at seven or eight years old, but he moved. He moved with his mom.

And since I feel quite pleased about that, because not him moving away, but that club has now got 30 years or more of black belts for kids. Kids that started at a very young age, gone on to get black belts. And it all started with my little brother.

And I think a couple of his friends went along or something like that. But it grew as soon as they started allowing little kids to go. It grew.

And brilliant. I feel quite pleased that I kind of, I was very persistent on that. It's because I wanted my little brother to, I guess I wanted him to be part of what I was doing, to join in.

And he seemed quite interested. So that was cool. I mean, little kids were doing karate in other parts of the country and other parts of the world, but in that town, they weren't.

They just, you know, they wouldn't, wouldn't even think about it. I couldn't really see much difference between teaching a seven-year-old and teaching an 11-year-old or 12-year-old. It's, you know, be a bit gentler, but it's still, maybe they don't spar or, you know, but it's still fun.

And it's definitely, I would say, a confidence booster for a young kid. So, yeah. Now, I also did Taekwondo, I did Wing Chun, but that's different things.

So this is the end of my karate story. Thank you very much. Take care.

Bye.