Off to Korea

I'm flying to Korea tomorrow morning for a judo competition. The tournament will take place on Jeju island, located south of Korea. I'm going to meet my grandaunt at the train platform in Hon-Atsugi, and from there, we'll take the bus together to go to Haneda Airport.

I've just finished packing. I think this is the fastest I've ever packed! lol Maybe because instead of having all my things scattered around my house in Canada, they're all scattered in one room. So I'm all set to go.

My goal for Jeju is to fight to the best of my abilities. That may seem easy... but it's not. In judo, unlike a marathon, or a 100m sprint, where you're only fighting against yourself, you're fighting against an opponent. Therefore, you can't predict how a match will go. You have to have an open mind and be ready for whatever comes your way.

Lately, practices have been hard. I'm not throwing as much as I would like to. I'm not committing to throws and so I get countered easily, which doesn't help my confidence. Judo is really a hard sport. It's even harder here, away from all the coaches who usually help me out at practice, pointing out certain mistakes I'm doing or giving out advice.

But I still have some coaches who are helping me all the way from Canada. I'm sending out a special thanks to a couple of people (you know who you are) who have given me great advice. It's helped me a lot to stay focused and to keep going, even though I've taken I don't know how many falls already.

Time to go to sleep now. I'll post competition results and pictures from Korea as soon as I get the chance. Oyasumi!