I remember seeing a demonstration of Ju Jitsu on television when I was in high school and being amazed by it. Perhaps the appeal lay in the fact that my athletic ability was well recognised by my peers. I was the kid who never made the first 13, even when there were only 12 to choose from. And how I hated it when they nominated two captains and let them pick their teams. Invariably I was the last pick - which did absolute wonders for my self-esteem.
It was Stan who first got me interested in Tae Kwon Do. I was in 77 Squadron when Stan got posted in from Vietnam. While there he had picked up a black belt from the Koreans. He was a few years older than me, a member of 18 apprentice intake, and we became good mates. One night on our way home from enjoying an after work drink or two with a few mates - not that we ever drank excessively, we simply sat and savoured the taste for a few hours - we found a house brick. ‘Come on Stan’, we said. ‘Show us how you can break it.’
Stan tried to oblige. I can’t remember how many attempts he made, but he persevered for a while. And finally, success came. He threw it off the first floor balcony of our block and it broke on the road below.
Stan also agreed to teach us his art. We lined up a few times in the hangar after work but it didn’t last long. It seems there was always something to celebrate. In September 1971 I was posted to Butterworth, Malaysia. Again, I took up Tae Kwon Do - for a week or two. But hey, I was a young bloke in a foreign country and there were bars, and birds, and bikes and I just became immersed in the cultural scene. So much for martial arts.
I returned to Australia in March 1974 and was posted to 38 Sqn, Richmond. I had thoroughly enjoyed my time in Butterworth and in November of that year I married my first wife - a girl I had met in Penang. Butterworth was again at the top of my posting preferences with a twin pull - the Butterworth lifestyle and the desire to return so that my wife could keep closer contact with her family.
At the time I was considerably overweight and no where near as fit as I should have been. One day I made a decision - I was going get fit so that when I went back to Butterworth I would be ready to take up Tae Kwon Do. So it was off to the pool at lunch time and I bought a bike of the pedal power variety to ride to work.
We returned to Butterworth in July 1977 and our house was within easy walking distance of the RAAF School Penang Annex - off Jalan Gajah. This worked out well for me for it was in the Annex that Mr Lee, a 4th Dan Tae Kwon Do practitioner and Malaysian champion, taught us his skills every Tuesday and Thursday evening. As I progressed through the grades to black belt I ended up training five nights a week - two at the Annex and Monday, Wednesday and Friday at the main centre in Georgetown. At the main centre I attempted back-to-back classes but never made it to the end of the second class. We trained on very smooth concrete floors and as I progressed through the second class I would end up sweating so much that it became like training on an ice rink.
Lunch time would often find me running around the airfield or doing laps in the Base pool. I once took part in a relay around Penang Island. We had a RAAF truck that carried the team, stopping to let one of us off at the start of our leg and picking up the bloke that had just finished. I can’t recall if this was part of a race. Towards the end of my time in Butterworth I was doing a 30 to 40 minute run before work, swimming at lunchtime and training at night. No longer was I ‘Bigada Ken’ as some blokes called me at Richmond. My weight was around 85 kg and I did get some favourable comments from the ladies on my appearance - something that definitely appealed to my male ego.
As I got further into Tae Kwon Do I began to wonder if diet could make a difference to my performance and so I began reading. I subscribed to Runners World and bought books on diet and health. The first book I read advocated a high protein, meat based diet - meat three times a day - and I started out on this. But as I read more I began to question this approach and eventually became convinced that vegetarianism was the way to go. This may well have been influenced by a comment I remember from primary school, that top class athletes were vegetarian. While I now know that is not necessarily the case I know that Murray Rose, one of Australia's all time swimming greats, was a vegan. And while I cannot confirm it I have always believed Herb Elliott was a vegetarian. Elliott was coached by Percy Cerutty who had become a vegetarian following a severe health crisis before he went on to become recognised as one of our coaching greats.
The move towards vegetarianism was accompanied by a shift towards more natural foods, such as whole grains and less refined foods, including sugar. The Penang Adventist Hospital had a store that sold very nice wholemeal bread and brown rice - probably the only place in Penang where you could buy it. And as I changed my diet there was an unexpected - and unplanned - outcome. I lost the taste for beer.
I never intended to become a tee-totaller. After all, I used to enjoy a cold beer on a hot day, and every day in Penang was a hot one. But I found that after one or two beers I would switch to soft drink, so after awhile I decided to skip the beer altogether.
While the Tae Kwon Do didn’t last for long after I returned to Australia I have retained a predominantly vegetarian, non-drinking lifestyle ever since. Occasionally I eat meat, perhaps half a dozen times a year if I feel it is too much of a hassle, especially for others, or just not practical, to eat vegetarian. When I returned to Penang for a work conference around 2008 I was determined to have a murtabarb and beef satays. And on the last night of the trip I had to test myself out on the curries. The hottest I could find was mutton and I am pleased to say that I still had what it takes.
I have come to appreciate the vegetarian lifestyle for different reasons. While there are no guarantees in life, studies continue to confirm the health advantages of more natural diets that are either vegetarian or that obtain protein largely from vegetarian sources. These benefits come in both lower disease rates and increased longevity. In a society where many of the diseases we suffer are the diseases of lifestyle, it makes sense from a purely economic perspective that healthier lifestyles should see a reduction in the demand on our health - or more accurately, ill-health - system.
Then there are the environmental considerations. It takes a lot less land and water to feed a vegetarian than a meat eater. With an increasing world population, and a growing middle class that demands more animal protein, the current and rising level of demand for animal protein is unsustainable. Fish stocks are in serious decline. The demand for beef is leading to the destruction of the Amazon rain forest, which in turn is impacting on the lives of indigenous people, causing increasing rates of species extinction, soil erosion and affecting world weather patterns. Livestock production is now rated as the number one cause of greenhouse gases - outstripping transport and energy production. All this without consideration of animal welfare practices.
In 2007 I took up martial arts again, this time karate. While I do not train as intensely now as I did in the late 1970s, I am fitter than I have been for a long time. It is often said that an exercise program for the sake of exercise is hard to maintain and that we should find a physical activity we enjoy. In my case, this has been martial arts. Karate, and before that Tae Kwon Do, motivate me to push myself harder than I would otherwise. And as a 63 year old I feel good that I can keep up physically with people that may be more than half my age. For me, vegetarianism is only part of the health equation. Physical exertion is just as important, if not more so.
June 2013
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