I love ur posts Gerbil, its so interesting to see how a foreign see my country and etc... I was just trying to make an opposite point of view, sometimes I think in creating a thread about how Brazilians see Brazil.
What does this means?
Quote:
parties are literally dry hate fucking
I really don't know how to dance Hip Hop and never thinked about the right way to do it, any videos? In Brazil parties are made so ppl can meet each other and have fun/kiss etc... Americans to me look too exuberant, I always say to my foreign friends that a European/American girl doing topless on the beach draws less attention than a Brazilian girl using a bikini, ppl are just different.
The weather is beautiful and the sun is hot. Some days I think I'm going to melt it's so hot, other days I feel like I'm going spontaneously combust because you can literally feel the sun weighing you down. It is an odd combination of feelings, to feel like like a puddle and a bonfire at the same time. I literally sit in a pool of my own sweat sometimes wondering why my teammate would turn off the fan.
The truth of the matter is, most of the Brazilians don't think it's hot and even when I'm melting away, they don't see the vital connection between my life and that little bit of breeze the fan creates. Sometimes when we move into the later rounds of training I position myself so that I can benefit the most from the fan. Hell, it's so bad that sometimes I'll pass my opponents guard in the direction of the fan so that after I've stabilized I can feel the artificial breeze. Nothing is more motivation to avoid being swept than realizing your opponent will be between you and the fan...I've literally done some Olympic level gymnastics to avoid that...seriously.
I try not to complain, because honestly, deep down inside, I know that I wont die. I know that it gets hotter here in Rio and if I can't handle it now, I'm in some deep trouble when the real heat hits, but apparently I look like I'm in rough shape sometimes. A couple weeks ago I was laying against the wall and Gordo was sitting on the exercise ball next to me. He looked down at me and with genuine concern on his face said “I think you're going to have to go home”. I thought he was joking at first but then I realized he was serious. He went on to explain to me that it gets a lot hotter and if I'm still here I might have problems training because of the heat. I thought the concept of going home because of the heat to be pretty comical...I wish I had thought of that excuse for the year I spent in Iraq. I can only imagine how that conversation would have gone with my Captain.
One thing is for sure, when the weather is hot people all around the world are attracted to large bodies of water. The beaches are packed, pools get more use, and people enjoy cooling through swimming. In and around Rio there are a lot of islands. Some of them are vacation destinations and some of them are homes to locals. There is one island just outside of Barra Tijuca, that many people live on.
The island (I forget the name) is large enough that it has restaurants and a few small stores, but small enough that most of the community knows each other. The only way to get to the island is either 1. own a boat or 2. use one of the small ferries/water taxis. It creates an interesting dynamic because there is no reason to go to the island unless you live there, or you want to eat at one of the restaurants, and this leads to a low crime rate and tight knit community where most people know each other.
We have a couple of guys that train with us who live on the island so I have always known of it's existence but I've never had a reason to go over there. This week Kathy invited Igor and I to go to one of the restaurants to see what it was like. So on Tuesday Kathy and one of her friends picked us up and took us to the island. We didn’t have to drive very far but after parking the car we used one of the water taxis. I took a picture so you can see what it looks like to be on one, and what one looks like from a distance.
Apparently this island was a very popular place 30 or 40 years ago due to the extremely clean water. When the island was first inhabited it was given a name by the indigenous people based on how clear and clean the water was. As you can see from the photo the water does not look very clean. Apparently it went from crystal clear to what you see today in a span of less than 10 years. If you're wondering how, this water is the same water that I talked about the sewage smell coming from...what a shame.
Changing subjects
Training has been great for another week in a row. I continue to feel like a monster on the mat. I'm transitioning well and dominating a lot of people that were giving me problems before. I don't know what it is, maybe it's a combination of my body not feeling like it's going to fall apart, my cardio finally being up to par, and all the hard training paying off. One thing is for sure, training comes and goes in waves and the up waves are a hell of a lot more fun than the down waves.
I took some videos of myself training this week. Last week I promised to get some film grappling with some higher level guys and I am happy to report two purple belts agreed to have our sparring sessions taped. When you watch these videos keep in mind that we are training and keeping it light. I outweigh these guys by a little bit, but I hope you can tell that I'm not using a lot of my weight to crush or dominate. I've really been focusing on changing positions and dominating technically.
Also, we were doing 3 minute splits (one person in for 6 minutes with a new person coming in every 3) so the videos are pretty short.
I am not the only person getting in good training. For those of you who are following the training of The Russian (Igor), he is putting in some hard mat hours. His weight is looking good, and we're doing the best we can to break him down. Igor, like any fighter, has holes in his game and we're (Dennis, Jack, Torryn and myself) doing the best we can to focus on those holes. But, I think I speak the truth when I say that the hardest part for Igor is not eating refined sugars. Igor is very coachable and when you tell him to do something he typically does it (when the language barrier is not a problem), but I catch him looking longingly at chocolate, soda and other yummy treats. I think the ability to eat dessert and pizza is his motivation to train hard and crush his opponent.
Here is Igor working his ass off during an afternoon training session in preparation for his upcoming fight:
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here is a link to the cost breakdown for a trip to Brazil
Brazilian jiujitsu, and fighting in general, draws an interesting crowd of guys. I know I've talked about how the house is always changing, but some things between guests are always the same. Everyone that has trained long enough has had some type of injury. The severity of the injuries can differ, anything from a broken finger to a blown out knee, but when you live in a house this size just about every injury you can think of has been experienced. There are ups and downs to this. The down side is that sometimes the house can smell like a retirement home, a mix of Icy Hot and green soap. The up side is that regardless of what is happening to you, there is someone in the house that can give you advice because they have had it happen to them.
Last night we all decided to go out for dinner together. I was waiting in the living room for some of the other guys to finish getting ready. After standing there for 5 minutes I went to see what was taking them so long and this is what I walked into see.
If a normal person walked into a room and saw one man sitting with his pants around his ankles, another man taking off his belt and third man in the background with his shirt off, you might ask yourself what the hell is going on in here. But this didn’t even occur to me, I knew what was happening. The topic of conversation had turned to knee injuries and the guys were showing off some of their scars (and trying to explain to Igor what the meniscus looks like). This is just one more example of how a fighters behavior differs from a “normal” persons. I wish I could say that this demonstration would have gone differently in public, but I'm fairly confident that it would have looked quite the same (although that guy in the back would probably have a shirt on).
Speaking of acceptable and unacceptable behavior, I witnessed one of the most disgusting things I have ever seen this past week. Some times when it gets really hot people will clear the sweat off of their forehead with their kimono sleeve. When you're sweating so hard and the whole kimono is soaked anyway, it doesn’t really matter (at least in my opinion). This typically buys you about 5 solid seconds of a semi dry face. Typically your opponent appreciates it because you're not dripping all over them (which can be pretty disgusting in it's own right). Sweat is about the only thing that I'll wipe up with my kimono but I guess one guy in the academy does not share my views on kimono sanitation.
I was training with a particularly good black belt last week and when we ran into the wall we stopped and started to move back to the center of the mat to start again. I reached the middle first and sat down to take the same position that we had near the wall. As I looked up he lifted his kimono and blew his nose on the inside of it. Let me be VERY clear when I say he blew his nose. This was not him clearing the sweat (nor the snot) from his face, he actually held his kimono lapel to his face like a Kleenex and blew his nose....umm who does that? Well, this guy does.
I had never seen this before, nor have I heard anyone bring this up. I've given opinions on walking barefoot to the water cooler, not wearing shoes in the bathroom, and a host of other disgusting things associated with grappling and/or training in the martial arts, but to see this I was absolutely shocked. Now the real question is, what do I say? Well, I said what any hard training brown belt would have said... nothing. A mental note for everyone that is reading this. If I come to your academy, and I see you blow your nose in your kimono, I'm not rolling with you and I'm probably going to make fun of you. Please go to the restroom and blow your nose, and please wear your shoes when you go to do it.
Changing subjects
This weeks move is a very important transition, Half Guard to Full Guard. As many of you know I'm a Closed Guard player and having the ability to move between the variations of guard is very important. I really like this transition because it provides a lot of resistance on your opponent's hip using that leg that normally holds Half Guard. This move works great against people who like to base off of their feet and drive forward with their weight. Sometimes it can be a bit overwhelming having someone large and/or strong bearing down on you, and this move is a life saver.
Also keep in mind that you do not need the underhook for this move. Although I start off the video using the underhook, one of the great things about this move is that you don't have to have it and getting back into Closed Guard really eliminates the effectiveness of your opponent having the underhook.
Keep a close eye on how my body is angled and how that allows me to bend my knee and create space to get my leg back in. Try and rep it out a few times before you use it in rolling...and please remember to switch your hook in the back or you'll be cussing me out telling me how terrible of a transition this is.
The last topic of the day is about intensity. Different games (strategical planning) call for different levels of intensity, speed and pressure. I understand this, fully, and sometimes I have to remind myself that Brazilian Jiujitsu is an evolutionary process. You view grappling in one way when you're a beginner a totally different way as an intermediate and of course differently when you're advanced. There is no doubt in my mind that as I become better and more experienced my views will change again.
Sometimes I look at how people train and all I can think is “how is that helping you”. As an advanced belt I try to give advice, not just on technique but on concepts and grappling philosophy. The purple belts get it, they really do. I can sit a purple belt down, explain something to him/her and off they go putting it in their game (again strategical planning) and incorporate it into their training. Now the white belts, and even more so, the blue belts, are going to give me an ulcer.
Typically when I speak to a white belt they realize they know nothing and listen intently. Then when they understand it, they struggle to implement it. Almost like a child that see's people running. They understand that it happens by putting one foot in front of the other but all of that stuff that happens below the surface, the proprioception, that screws them.
The blue belts have another problem all together. They have enough of an understanding of how grappling works to be dangerous, but the truth is, most blue belts are their own worst enemy (myself included when I was a blue belt). This week I have been told on two different occasions to “not go easy” while rolling. I know I have talked about this in the past, but this time I took a different approach. Instead of getting irritated and explaining to them that it doesn’t help either of us to do that, I just gave them what they asked for. Although it can be an enjoyable experience to totally destroy someone and submit them 10 times in 6 minutes, I really thought that the blue belts might realize that maybe there is a better way to train.
I was horrified when these training partners thanked me and went on about their way. I really, really...really don't get it. I understand every once in awhile, but these guys want it like this all the time. How are they ever going to learn to underhook, move the hips, practice submission defense (every submission I want I took) and progress as a grappler?
So here is my advice to you lower ranking guys. When you get the opportunity to roll with an advanced belt, how about you let that person decide what intensity they want to go at? Maybe I'm just to much of a traditional martial artist, but I find it mildly disrespectful and insulting for to tell me to submit you. I'm fairly confident that I'll do the best thing for your (and my) training.
That brings this week blog to a close, thank you for reading and I always appreciate your comments.
The Gerbil
P.S. If you were a novice in boxing would you ask this guy to try and knock you out?
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here is a link to the cost breakdown for a trip to Brazil
So many people i blow with blow their nose on their sleeves. Like snot rocket onto their forearms. I just chalk it up to were training and being men so fuckkkkkkk itttt
Being lower ranked, when I go with higher ranked belts, I never try to dictate the pace and follow the pace of the one I am rolling with who is higher ranked than me. Hell, even if they are the same rank - I try and go with their pace. I feel good going at any pace and want experience doing it all.
I do find it hard to deal with guys who are letting me do things, and leave it so open that it is obvious which has happened a few times. I understand they want me to learn and they want to practice whatever position they would end up in but it does create a bit of an awkward feel. If something is given, I have a hard time taking it (as in an obvious guard pass or they they almost completely stop the roll). I have been told by a few higher ranked belts that I am to passive and generally to "nice".. If a guy lets me take his back, I almost feel guilty working hard for the finish.
When guys stop almost completely in the roll I almost feel a need to stop or slow down to do the right technique and almost always over think what I am doing...
Ive been rolling with a higher ranked guy a lot recently, who puts a good pace but allows me to attempt techniques and get positions, but doesnt stop and actually wait for moves (unless it is a move to reverse) - Then at the end we usually go through the mistakes I made.
This is the best way IMO (what do I really know when it comes to bjj though..lol) for a higher ranked belt to roll with a lower ranked belt, because the higher ranked gets to try new techniques while at the same time allowing the lower ranked to see what does and does not work while keeping a decent pace.
That being said, the community is great and almost all the higher ranked guys are willing to help if you are willing to learn...
BTW, great videos, Ive been able to practice a few of the techniques from your videos.... Ive been trying to avoid pulling full guard from half (always used to be my go to, so Im trying to add new stuff) but as a safety and another move to add - I will be practicing that one on monday. Great videos, thanks!
BTW, great videos, Ive been able to practice a few of the techniques from your videos.... Ive been trying to avoid pulling full guard from half (always used to be my go to, so Im trying to add new stuff) but as a safety and another move to add - I will be practicing that one on monday. Great videos, thanks!
I'm glad that you're enjoying the videos, I'll do my best to keep posting them.
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here is a link to the cost breakdown for a trip to Brazil
Gerbil not to get too off topic but the new movie for Twilight is filming in the Lapa region of Rio, you should go over there and try to get in a scene with your Gerbil JJ Gi on!
that would be priceless. Random dude standing in GI in back of fight scene between vampires
Gerbil not to get too off topic but the new movie for Twilight is filming in the Lapa region of Rio, you should go over there and try to get in a scene with your Gerbil JJ Gi on!
that would be priceless. Random dude standing in GI in back of fight scene between vampires
what do you think?
I think this might be the best damn idea I've heard in years. When is it filming and do you have any more specifics than "lapa region"?
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here is a link to the cost breakdown for a trip to Brazil
There is also this article. Looks like it was at the Intercontinental Hotel. I don't remember there being one in lapa but i know there is one in Copacabana on the beach. You could search for "34 hostages held in Rio hotel" or ask around to find out about it.
