The next thing I’ll have to learn if I want to stick with Muay Thai is to stop being so damn Canadian. I can’t even help myself. Every time I punch someone in the face while sparring, I quickly follow up with the word “sorry!” What can I say, it’s a tough habit to break.

That being said, I do think my Muay Thai has begun to improve now that I’ve been doing a lot more one-on-ones. My trainer is a Thai guy named Comrade. He makes me laugh every time I train with him. It’s not because he’s funny per se, it’s just that he’s incredibly blunt. I imagine what my reaction would be if this were a trainer back home in Canada… Well, they probably just wouldn’t be a trainer.

The most common of his bluntness is him calling me stupid in one way or another. “Why you not understand me? I speak English? You understand nothing?!” It’s funny because it’s kind of true. Everyone else here seems to understand the Thai instructors just fine, but truthfully, I’m terrible at understanding any kind of accent. When people talk to me with an accent, I typically just stand there with a dumb, blank look on my face.

When he saw my sunburn, he said, “Why you soooo stupid? Why you take your shirt off? This is Thailand? Why youuu dooo that?!?” Haha, thanks, Comrade. My inability to move due to the pain of this sunburn has kind of re-instated the obvious… perhaps I’m not always the brightest crayon in the box.

In the next session with Comrade: “How much weight you loooose?” I replied, “Ugh, none since I got here actually.” (It’s true; I’ve been going to town on the Thai food. I love food in general, particularly yummy, spicy Thai food, so I haven’t held back at all. Not to mention my daily visits to Nommy, the to-die-for frozen yogurt shop up the street.) “No, how much you lose?!” he insists. “You fat when you got here. You look much better now.” He starts pointing out on my body exactly where he is convinced I’ve lost weight.

Even though the scale hasn’t budged, with all the workouts I’ve been doing, it’s likely that my body’s composition has changed. If I were at home, and anybody said this to me, I would write it off as them just being polite, i.e., Canadian. But here, you get told the way it is. If he hadn’t seen any changes, he would more likely have said, “What’s wrong with yooou? You’ve been here for 4 weeks and you’re still fat. What you dooo? You sit in your room and eat candy all day. You fat.” So even though I don’t have my six-pack yet (still checking daily), I am happy to hear he sees changes and truly believe his opinion.

As my time here at Tiger Muay Thai draws to an end, I look back and feel so incredibly blessed that I got to spend a month here. Sure, my room was a little sweatbox and yes, the bathrooms are less than my ordinary ideal, but as I look over the past month, I have met some great people who have become good friends, explored a lot of this area of Thailand, swam at some beautiful beaches, tried new Thai cuisine, and enjoyed my daily fro-yo. Most of all, I feel I challenged myself physically and mentally, and with challenge comes growth.

Onto the next part of my adventure: Malaysia, let’s see what you’ve got for me!