Kickboxing Sundays

Sundays is now kickboxing day. No surprise that Boudie loves it and is progressing well in class. Unfortunately the other two can't cope with class protocol just yet so we have to shell out for private lessons for them, after Boudie's Sunday morning class.

Zeno has got a couple of difficulties which he is managing fantastically - one is the fact that no hoods are allowed in the dojo, the other is just the whole martial arts discipline of the dojo. The sensai is being very understanding, he gave Zeno a headguard to wear in place of the hood which Zeno accepted quite easily; he continues to wear the jacket for the first part of the lesson but after building up a sweat it comes off, and so does the headguard which is quite surprising to me after all the brouhaha at school about insisting on keeping the hood up (sometimes pulled down over his face as well). I can see that Zeno does feel very uncomfortable and self-conscious at the beginning of the lesson as there are usually a lot of people around, some of them have just finished a class and are leaving, but some will stay and another private lesson will go on in the other half of the dojo, and of course there will be other sensais around. But he is very motivated to do kickboxing, and seems to get sufficiently into it so that he is able to forget to be self-conscious. Zeno's not all that physical or sporty usually, apart from rollerblading in the park. The sensai is really working him hard and trying to build up his fitness levels, and we'll be working on that during the rest of the week too, as well as trying to improve his diet. Not easy as he has a very limited range of fruit and veg that he will tolerate (no cooked veg at all) and he craves carbohydrates and sugary fruit juices. He likes his meat though, as long as it's dry and not saucy........he's got a lot of potential as he seems to have inherited his father's physique, if he decided to take up a sport I think he could do very well.

Zoudie loves kickboxing but only in the house, he refuses even to do the private lessons with his brothers, I did try to explain to the sensai that he needed to just sit and observe for the first few weeks and eventually he might feel comfortable enough to join in, but he kept trying to include Zoudie - in a nice way, just getting him to 'give me five' and asking him to punch the pads ten times just from where he was sitting on the sidelines, but Zoudie didn't like it. He cooperates because he doesn't want to cause a fuss which to him would make things worse, but he doesn't like it and gives me grief afterwards, all the way home and for hours afterwards. And then when Sunday approaches - say from Friday - he starts perseverating about not wanting to go to kickboxing, crying and begging, and it's just like school all over again. So far (it's only been 3 Sundays) we have been ignoring him and telling him we've got to go there, no choice, and he doesn't have to do any kickboxing, but he says "I don't like that man talking to me". Today Zeno was talking in the lesson about how he was so hot and tired his brain had become a black hole, or something like that - and I said to his Dad "Zeno just can't stop the yakkety-yak" and Zoudie said "yes and the man too can't stop yakkety-yak". I need to try and persevere and carry on bringing him but it's quite draining and so much easier to just say "okay don't come stay at home with Baba".

I'm so tempted to have a go myself, it looks like great fun and ages since I did anything physical.