First Training Session

After a painful experience of looking for the training grounds and discovering that SJF stands for Singapore Judo Federation, I began my first Kalarippayattu class the first time I was there. First thought in my mind was... there's only girl in the class other than me. Second thought was... besides a Caucasian guy and a Chinese guy, everyone else in the class was Indian. I found out later that both the Caucasian guy and the Chinese guy are half Indian which effectively makes me the only non-Indian in the class. Not that I mind but it shows me that the situation in Zarrilli's Kalari school is not happening in Singapore. Here, it doesn't seem to attract learners from other races.
Having attended a few sessions in Taekwondo, my only experience in martial arts, I was comparing my observations with observations I made in Taekwondo. I didn't do it consciously but I knew I was comparing at the back of my mind. Firstly, the uniform they were wearing were like the taewondo gis which were unlike what I see Zarrilli wearing in his practices. Secondly, they seem to have a similar belt colour system. Thirdly, they also train in an open court on bare feet.

However, when my practice started, the difference in the movement style was immediately obvious. It was totally foreign to me. I haven't quite seen anything the likes of it. Especially a move where they have to turn their entire body in a move that looks like something I've learnt in Chinese Opera.

And there seems to be an emphasis on tumbling. There are 12 Kalari falls of which beginners like me are only required to do 8. It also seems like an awful lot of memory work as there seems to be a fair bit of sequences to learn. And somehow many moves are named with numbers rather than some poetic malayalam words which was what I had expected.

I begin to wonder if the alertness trained from this martial art stems from the amount of moves you have to memorise and execute at the master's command. Rather than motor-neuron activity.

Other things that are unique are spine stretching exercises and yogic breathing.

Furthermore, there is a greater emphasis, at least in this class, in overall physical fitness. We are made to do running, sit ups, push ups and carry each other on our backs (a practice often used in theatre except that we do lifts and squats in this version). Taekwondo does seem to do too much in this area.

At the end of the class, there was a mini performance of some of my classmates where the only other girl classmate demonstrated sparing with 4 other classmates surrounding her. I think it was a rehearsal for an upcoming performance. What struck me about this performance was the fact that my master chided one of the students for not acting. The ones that got "attacked" were supposed to react in a way that convinced you that they are reeling in pain. Observing this I realised that I forgot about the performative aspect of martial arts as a display and how that involves a fair bit of acting and pondered about the relations between these two.

In the first lesson, I dun think I've tasted anything like meyyu kannakuka. I think this is going to be a long journey. :)

K8