Heyo everyone, this weeks blog is about what happened at Canada day today because a lot happened and if I write it down now I'll be able to remember it better later. Plus I may throw in a quick lesson I learnt about leadership if I can think of a good way to turn it to words.
Today was certainly an enjoyable day. The big ol 151. I still remember Canada day from last year, in a crowd of hundreds of thousands of people trying to catch a glimpse of all the royalty and big names who were attending the ceremony on parliament hill. Despite the crowd there today, it was still remarkably better. Spending a day with everyone from the Kwoon is also enjoyable, even when it was as hectic as today. Overall, no matter how sore I am now, today was a really good day. I enjoyed it. I learnt quite a few things, and I've begun to discover that I have indeed changed as a person over the last few years.
The first thing is the dragon. I lost track of how many demos we did but I think it was around 6 or 7. But man, theres no better time to get practice then that. My big thing is still working on my attitude and approach of the head in comparison to the tail. I transitioned from the lighter, quicker piece from the heavier, slower one. After three years of the tail, I still sometimes run at the same speed as I would as the tail and now I'm pulling everyone through the wind at a sprint. Another thing being the tail was that the only person I had to worry about in terms of spacing and speed was me. I had no one behind me I had drag, all I had to do was keep up to number 8, stay out of the way, and look flashy. Now, especially in the barrell roll, I have to figure out the spacing for all 9 pieces on the fly. I messed this up the first few times and I ended up squishing some people and whacking the lion, because I was paying attention to myself, and not number 2, 3, 4, etc. However, as the Sifus begun to point out what I was doing wrong, I slowly became more cautious about the responsibly of the head as not just the first piece, but as the leader. There's much more I have to learn and polish, but I think I got a good start so far.
Another thing was the wind! Most times it felt like I was dragging the dragon through water, there was so much resistance. Every single time we coiled I felt like I was going to be blown right out of the middle. By far the worst one was the Stony Plain demo. I'm pretty sure we gave the Malaysian lion dancers a run for their money on that one. My biggest fear in that demo was being too fast, too unpredictable or too risky for the rest of the dragon. Yet at the same time I had to focus on keeping my own piece in my hands, the wind was so bad. There was one point, leaving the barrell roll in which I was unable to walk forward until that gust of wind had died down a few seconds later, it was so strong. Overall, I count that as another valuable learning experience.
And my board breaks. Despite the fact I have to redo them, I'm still happy with the progress I have made. There was a time where I couldn't break through a board for the life of me, and this time I was able to get through 75% of them first try. It also serves as an important learning opportunity. I now know that I need to fix, and I already have a game plan on how to fix it. Overall, I see that not as something I messed up, yet rather an insight into what I can improve and do better.
I think the biggest surprise for myself today was some of the things I had said. When some of the other kids had went to go do the big ball tackle game, I wanted to do it, yet there was a voice in my head that told me not too. Despite the chance of serious injury being rather low, I didn't want to take any chances. A few years ago, I would have said what the heck and done it anyways. That little voice didn't stop me from playing archery dodgeball however. Man that was actually quite fun.
I mean, the only person I hit was someone in the crowd (casualties of war I guess), yet it was still a fun experience. I'm also proud to say I was never shot. I got stabbed a few times by Mr. Sollinger by an arrow but hey. I didn't get shot. (FYI if anyone can get some bows and marshmallow arrows I think it would a lot more fun playing in our backyard forest. Wink wink, nudge nudge)
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