Fencing club, Mahidol university, Thailand in 1994. #1

What did you do after class when you were in the university? There are just all kinds of activities you could choose depends on your interesting, right? In the campus, you could do the real personal stuff like taking a nap which I know it must be tons of the students have chosen that. Or you could walking around for a peaceful sightseeing even you might have seen everywhere for many many time. Or you could do some exercises with friends like bike riding. Or you could do the musical thing or other kinds of hobby in the club.

Yes, in the club where is not the musical club in the night that you could dance like tomorrow would never come. I only meant the club where people gather to do something they love in common.

When I was in the university I chose to do fencing. Ooooooooh... NO NO! You did not hear anything wrong. Not even a bit, my dear. I was a fencer but unfortunately I was not the real good one.

Picture credit from GooGle search engine.

Around the first month or the second month of the first trimeter after the students got into the dorm. It was one evening that all of the clubs with the members came to the campus to enroll the new members for their club. Yeeeeeeeeah... they could get as many as signatures they could imagine just to sign up and saying that those new members would go to the club realistically. But for sure and everybody knows about it that is not everyone of those new enrolled member would do.

Among those popular clubs, it was just one club that really caught my attention. It was a fencing club where I saw these amazing stuff like the fencing swards, that cool masks, and of course, the suits on the enroll table.

" Oooooooh My Holy GOD!!! That is for real? " I must be that rude girl who said that out loud in my mind when I saw them. It was just really the dream and definitely I only saw this stuff only in the movie. For sure, I signed up myself to the fencing club and went to attend the competition at  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chulalongkorn_University the next weekend. 

Picture credit from GooGle search engine.

In 1994, it was a big competition for the college kids like us all year round to practice. Sometimes it was at the university, sometimes it was at the pre-cardet school for the military guy  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armed_Forces_Academies_Preparatory_School  where is right now they have moved that stadium to else where. And if I remember it right, that stadium was in the heart of the city right next to Lumphini park http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lumphini_Park   where is right now is one of the biggest public park in Bangkok.

Most of the members in this club were the medical students from Siriraj hospital. Can you imagine how they have free time? But they did and we did practice the fencing many times a week including to Saturday morning together.

Picture credit from GooGle search engine.

The picture above shows the basic pose that all of the fencers know that you have to practice pretty much all the time. Not even mention many many many many tiiiiiiiiiiiiiimes until you perhaps do not know how to walk properly. In my opinion, it needs to be practice so much because it is the basic pose which give you score in the competition.

In order to be a good fencer you need to be a very healthy and strong person. The competition takes all day unless you lost since the first competitor in the morning. It takes a lot of energy to attack your competitor and defense the attack from your competitor as well. Plus, we were not in the a/c stadium though. Therefor imagine the weather in Thailand with that fencing suit, can you?

Picture credit from GooGle search engine.

For practicing, we usually started from running around the stadium where was the basketball field plus a few rooms where the shooting clubs located. I don't know how many square foot of it but it was quite big for me to run before the fencing practicing. Especially when you have to run in the no a/c for about 10 or 20 rounds of the basketball field. Anytime when I thought about that practicing I always wondered if there is anybody would run in the sport bar and short shorts like I am doing these days or not. It was freaking hot in that building.

It was a 2 stories building closed to the medical students' dorm in side Siriraj hospital. It was  I think right now it must transform to be something big and more useful already. It was such a remarkable place for all of the students and staff who love sport though.

Picture credit from GooGle search engine.

The picture I found on GooGle search engine above is a picture of the dorm where the female medical students stayed in the 1900's and it was located right next to the stadium or the sport club where we practiced the fencing. 

Getting back to my practice session, after running on the second floor of the sport club. We will do the basic pose that I showed you by the picture above to stretch out the legs. Then we will practice the same pose with the dummy or with the other members. After all of those practicing, we usually have a small competition among us. Putting the suit on, getting all the mechanical stuff on and then letting the attacking and defensing go on for real. 

Picture credit from GooGle search engine.

It was such a good time to have something to do with friends in the weekend beside just hanging out for something silly. Being the member of the fencing club was one of the very good decisions while I was study. Too bad it was not a fencing club around my house right now. Otherwise I would get back to practice and do my best to be a better fencer.