Amanda Takes Off...

"Amanda, your turn, go" my studiomates whined.

"Wait!" I snapped at them in Banmal. "십초!" Ten seconds!

We were working on poomse, eight of us, each of us counting off a form. I was counting the last form in the color belt sequence, pal jang.

My studiomates were rushing through their forms, sloppy. They weren't saying "바로" or "시엇" (return, bow), both of which I consider important parts of practicing forms. These acts return you to your original position. They act to center you, to close the form, to bring your energy back to its original state. Of course, these steps may be skipped depending on your training purposes, but tonight was not the time to skip them.

They were going from a sloppy ending of one form into a sloppy beginning of another. I was not going to encourage that habit.

"Ten seconds! Wait!" I growled.

I waited until every child was standing rod straight. I used my strongest (not loudest), clearest voice. "Tae guek pal jang! Junbi!" I waited. They fidgeted. I waited until they were still again. "Hana!" I checked everyone. "Dul!" I checked again.

Master said to go slowly, I was going to go slowly.

When you've learned forms, you can sort of get on autopilot and do them without thinking about the next step. Again, this sort of practice has its place. Tonight was not it. I wanted to confuse them just a bit. Make sure they really knew the form. "Set!" By slowing down, I was going to test them.

(My problem is counting in Korean. If I slow down, I can lose my place, especially when I get around the tricky 17, 18, 19 area. But I didn't make any mistakes tonight. I passed my own test.)

We went through the form, slowly.

I scolded them when they bowed long before I said siot. We went through each form again. I was dripping in sweat, my arms trembling from the power I was trying to use. The boy next to me kept trying to poke me for fun, kept whispering my name. I glared at him. Forms are my favorite aspect of taekwondo and he wasn't going to ruin it.

My turn to count came again. I did the same thing. Strong, clear voice. Slow count.

Master spied me across the room. He grinned and shot me a thumbs up.