Tag: korea

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Our black belt test was held yesterday in Seoul. In Korea, TKD is a major operation: every weekend, officials test hundreds of athletes for their first dan black belt and beyond. The test itself is extremely short, not more than ten minutes. We demonstrated basic blocks and kicking, then performed poomses 1 and 8 and sparred for one minute. Because there was an odd number of women testing, I sparred twice. I made a stupid goof in poomse 8,  but sparred really well. I think I did-I hope... Read More

Sophia held our belt promotion test last night and we all passed. Our class now has six blue belts and one red belt.The new red belt (formerly a blue belt) was feeling quite down yesterday thinking that all the former green belts (now blue belts) would meet and then surpass his level. But our classmates all encouraged him to at least try taking the test and if he failed, he could always try again in two weeks. Wouldn't you know, he passed! Congratulations Gareth!  For clarification, th... Read More

i'm a member of a taekwondo club here in korea. it's a club specifically for foreigners, most of whom are english teachers. teaching contracts are all one year, so the program is designed to help us earn our black belt in that time. our coach will be gone the last month of most of the other members' contracts, so they want to take their black belt test almost two months earlier then they really should. consequently, even though we literally just earned our green belts, next wednesday is our blue... Read More