St. Patrick's day

I sort of felt like we did St. Patrick's Day last weekend because that is when we went to a parade. The 17th was actually my first official day teaching Kung Fu Class at Murray Hill Chinese school. All the previous classes I taught were lion dance classes and I have a feeling I'm not really going to see the two students I trained for the CNY performance that much.

The class I ak teaching now is Kung Fu first, but I snuck in some lions and dragons and drums. Drummers are actually a hot commodity in the lion dance world because for some reason... not that many lion dancers can drum. To br honest... I heard the drum and I could do it. Of course I still had tips and improvements. Yes I've gotten better... but basically  I could just play. And that is actually true of a lot of drummers for lion dance.

But I also know that the skill can be trained. So I handed out 10 pairs of rolled up magazines and we did drumming meditation and stretching. The drumsticks were held for Chuen pow cup... and then used for light sabre dagger fencing...ie. the kids play fought with the them under the condition that they didnt actually hit or hurt each other. It was just for a few minutes but I figured it was important to introduce the concept of fighting in their minds and not through a static drill that might not even be that effective. Better to break up the class with some fun.

So my St. Patrick's day wasn't that Irish.

Then I realized that Grace's cousin had sent me a picture of tha parade the week before... of himself! Marching and playing the bag pipes... suddenly I totally aanted to do that. Truth is as a kid, I wanted to do lion dance... and bag pipes. Hell maybe both at the same time.

Maybe this is a sign that I should get on that.