My Shaolin Master

Ever since Ryan was a young boy around 2, he has always been interested in `fighting’ and keen to demonstrate his `kung fu moves’ that he picked up from his favourite Ultraman movies. There are so many of his photographs that he strikes up a pretty impressive pose with his kung fu stance.

I, for one, have always been interested in kung fu although I don’t have the opportunity to learn when I was young. I remembered that I wanted to learn tae kwan do but was not allowed by my parents because they feared that I would be using those skills to fight even more, not that I fought a lot. I guessed parenting mindset then and now are significantly different. Modern parents nowadays would want their child to learn as much skill set as possible to equip them for hopefully a brighter and better future. Moreover, such opportunities or classes were not so easily available then and even if they were available, were rather expensive.

I am always impressed with my dear doctor friend, Dr Liew (our children’s paediatrician and also my long time class mate) who practised wushu. I remembered him demonstrated his wushu moves during one of our class parties back in ACS Ipoh when we were in Form Four and I had been mesmerized since then. I wanted Ryan to pick wushu as much as possible, knowing that it would do him a world of good, not only learning a skill to fight, but some form of discipline and to channel his interest in fighting in a positive way. Unfortunately, I was told that he can’t be practising till he was four. Hence, we have to wait.

Now that he has turned five, we started immediately to find out where and how we could enrol him for some classes to start him off. We were originally thinking of either starting him on junior golfing lessons or kung fu. However, I still think that at his age, kung fu would be a better choice since he is much more flexible now and is a skill set that would instil better discipline and self confidence.

While looking around, we were informed by one of our new neighbour who has also become a good friend and their son, Slevin, Ryan’s best friend is taking Shaolin kung fu lessons. We wasted no time to get Ryan there for a trial class and he is hooked. He loves it and from what we observed, he is totally focus and agile for this particular sport.

It was his third lesson yesterday after missing several weeks due to our travelling. We were happy and glad that the trainer actually came over and commented that he was totally impressed with Ryan’s commitment and focus during his lessons and training and is of the opinion that he has the talent to pick up this sport.

It seemed that my son is living my dreams. I am not looking forward for him to become another Jet Lee but I would be contended that this discipline would mould him into a better person.