like hours, he took a few steps toward me. Instinctively, I stepped back and raised my arms to defend myself. I was used to all who came near to hit me although this time it was a bit soon considering the last beating was just an hour ago.
Channarong came within twenty inches of me and looked at me funny. He raised his hand and I shrugged waiting to take the first hit, but instead, what he did was grab my arm and stretch it imitating a punch.
“Not like this,” he said in a pretty decent English as he shook his head. “Not like that. No, no, no.”
He grabbed my arm and stretched it again, this time with more force. Forcing me to turn on my hip so I don't fall.
“Move hip, hit hip. Move hip, hit hip. Do you know what to call this prison? The Big Tiger because they say, “it hunts and eats.” Want to be prey or hunter?”
He kept repeating that phrase as if it were a mantra, over and over again, as he moved my arm and patted me on the waist. He was correcting my movement! Not only did he not want to hit me, he was teaching me to hit the right way. He let go of my arm and encouraged me with a hand gesture to keep trying. I threw a new series of punches using my hip in the punches as Channarong corrected my movements.
“Muay Thai's tenth lesson,” he told me very serious after a while-training and exercising regularly. “You continue, I watch. Very good. Muay Thai are eight-armed warriors. Fists, elbows, knees, and feet. Train everything, look for balance.”
So, he had been watching me training without me knowing. It was clear that I wasn't hiding it as well as I thought. Just a minute! Did he say tenth lesson? What about the previous nine? Anyway, I did another series of punches focusing on doing everything perfect, as he taught me, paying attention to every detail of the movement, trying to not allow the pain in my body to influence me. I turned satisfied to see what he thought, but Channarong had already left. He disappeared the same way he showed up. Quietly and without warning. It left me puzzled. Why was he helping me, why did he leave without giving me the opportunity to thank him? I didn’t know the answers or had the chance to get them at the time, so I did what was expected of someone practical like me. I kept training my punches, using my hip to hit harder. Trying to ignore the pain caused by every move in the places where I was hit in the beating.
Next day I looked for Channarong to thank him, but I couldn't find him. I also did not go searching the entire complex, because with my background it was better not to be seen too much to avoid problems. When you were used as a punching bag, the wisest thing to do was not to be found. I kept training my punches and the rest of the moves. I would have loved it if he decides to be my mentor as Mr. Miyagi in the Karate Kid or as Angel, the boxing teacher who taught me what respect for others and myself was, but I doubted that this so loved man and with whom I had never talked had any interest in me. On the other hand, he had helped me, hadn't he? In any case no one ever spoke to me; so, I felt grateful at least for that.
A couple of days later I met Channarong in the cafeteria line. I approached to thank him for his interest, but he sent me away from him with rapid hand movements and a snake-like sound.
“Lesson number two” - screamed as I walked away confused, “to make oneself useful to others.”
While eating, I tried to unravel the meaning of those words. Did he want me to help people in the prison, did he want me to think of myself? Eastern people sometimes liked to talk like this. Was it not easier to say what you meant? Make oneself useful to others... to defend others from thugs instead of myself? Cheap philosophy. With how useful it is to say things directly. I looked toward Channarong and he was pointing toward my table and telling something to his teammates, who were laughing hard. I didn’t know what to think anymore. I was completely lost. Maybe he was just laughing at me, but then why help me?
I noticed that the group that had it in for me was coming into the cafeteria, so I got up, left the tray with everything I had left to eat and exited quickly. As my mother would say, “Whoever avoids the occasion avoids danger.” That was useful advice. And... of course.
I went to the cell to train. It's not that training after eating was a good idea, but it was one of the few times when no one was there, and I had to take advantage of it. I did what needed to be done. What was necessary. I started my workout routine. Stretches, push ups, sit ups ... Working every part of the body independently and together. Then I continued with the blows in the air, first punches, then kicks, finally, knees and elbows like I saw the prisoners training in the yard. As Channarong said, the eight-armed warrior. As no one spoke to me for fear of also becoming the target of those who beat me, I had a lot of time to think. In one of my daily reflections, I had considered that, apart from building up my body and trying to improve my technique and my speed, I should also condition my body to blows. Which is why I added to my routine a series of punches with fists, elbows, tibia and back of the hand to the wall covering myself first with pieces of fabric and starting gently. Sometimes I exaggerated with the blows and I had some part of my body inflamed for a couple of days, but I considered it necessary to teach my body to overcome pain. When I was messing up in training, I only had to remember one of my antagonistic enemies from youth or any of the beatings received; me on the ground being the target of kicks and punches, crouched like an animal and waiting for it to all to end. Like this I increased the momentum of my blows, the effort of training drawing forces from fury, fear, and the intensity of despair.
I also had to greatly increase my stamina, so I spent my time running non-stop in the yard; which my stalkers celebrated with taunts and laughter because they must have thought I was training to run away from them. At the same time, it served me as therapy. I didn't always like running. Shortly after I started boxing in Madrid, I had to add running routines to gain endurance and to be able to stand up through a full fight. It was exhausting, but necessary. In the end, running half an hour every day turned out to be a forged balm to indoctrinate my body and mind.
Soon it would be my time and the situation would change completely. Soon that laughter would turn into screams. Screams of pain. Or at least that’s what I wanted to believe. It was that or death.
There were no other alternatives.
Singapore 4
At last Monday. First day of work. I got up at six-thirty in the morning, had coffee with cereal and a glass of juice. A full breakfast. In the meantime, my roommates told me that what they used to do, and also a lot of people, was to have breakfast at work in the company cafeteria, where there were free drinks, fruit and pastries, or in the places in the building if they wanted something different. This way they could chat with their co-workers before they started the day. Sometimes there were people having for breakfast, especially the foreigners from Asia, things like noodles, soups, stir fried vegetables... It was very strange to see them eat that for breakfast. I got dressed and waited ten minutes for the others to be ready.
We were a bit disorganized and decided to take a taxi to go to work. For just ten Singapore dollars, paid by Josele, we were at the door of our building in fifteen minutes, an entrance like that of hotels where the cars stop to unload the bags.
The area was a complex of four white octagonal skyscrapers called Raffles City Tower. Apparently, it had a giant shopping mall, offices, convention centre, restaurants and two hotels occupying two of the towers. Each skyscraper had to be forty or forty-five storeys. It was impressive. To the right of the entrance where we were there was a bar called Salt Tapas & Bar, a premonitory name for the Spaniards, like those back home. Fate, in which I did not believe, seemed to tell me that I was where I needed to be.
Our offices were on the 36th floor of the Raffles City Tower office tower. The views must be spectacular. At the entrance, since it was my first day, they had to identify me and give me an access card. Once I had it, we took the elevator to the
