Some of the participants in the passed YE "Gamification exchanges" and YE "Employable youths", which took place in Costinesti, Romania in June, shared that they are passionate about Martial Arts and wanted to present to us the specifics of those sports and why they love them so much.
Borislava Ivanova
"Hello, I am Borislava Ivanova and I will tell you a little bit about my biggest passion - Taekwondo. I have practiced Taekwondo for nine years now. This kind of martial art includes kicks with arms and legs, primary aimed at the top of the body (at the head). Taekwondo actually comes from Korea and i means ‘’foot, fist, art’’ or ‘’the path of hands and feet techniques’’. It can be said that Taekwondo is a way of life.
I started practicing Taekwondo when I was ten years old. At first I didn’t want to do this kind of sport and spend hours in the hall as I found this annoying and useless. But the longer I spent in the gym, I understood that it was actually very interesting and there was a lot to learn. Over time I have started to take part in competitions. At the beginning, I had to take part in competitions with imaginary opponents where I won a lot of medals for first place. Then I grew up and it was time to compete against a real opponents. I was very afraid of that but I had to compete no matter whether I would win or lose. Sometimes I lose and sometimes I win. It took me a little while to realize that to win and to be in the first place is not the most important thing. I understood that in order for you to win you must first face yourself and your own fears. Nowadays I’m still afraid to get on the ring and fight but that is not such a big problem for me, because I am sure that the more workout the better I will become.
I acctually got the interest in the martial arts from my cousin. Now she is a coach in Spain and I want to follow her steps. I acctually have a blue belt now which means I can even train the group when the coach has other work but I dream to be like mcousin and have a black belt one day."
Yulian Borisov
"Karate aims to build character, improve human behavior and cultivate modesty, it does not, however, guarantee it"
"I started practicing Shotokan karate-do at the age of 15, because of that time I thought it was cool and I really wanted to get better at fighting. I’ve got a blue belt which is the 5th belt of them all, but it doesn’t really matter what belt you have, what matters is the amount of training that you have done. In practices we train ability, coordination and physics. Mostly we are doing sparring. And of course, we have competitions. 4 months after I started training karate, I took part in to the competition and surprisingly I won gold medal. I have participated in 6 competitions and I have won 4 medals so far.
Martial arts are great for self-defense, the knowledge you gain could be enough to save your life. So, if your extra gym cannot help you to run away, you will know how to protect yourself and your loved ones. I’m happy that I’ve decided to start practicing karate because it has given me so much: I’ve learned to defend myself, it has increased my self-control and patience. I’ve also learned to respect people better than I did before and it has improved my physical and mental strength.
We also have summer camp to prepare for the World Championship. There we are training 2 times a day for a period of 10 days. The most important thing in any hobby is that you enjoy it. That is what keeps your interest no matter what else may be happening around you, so it’s a great way to relieve stress."
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