Once upon a time...

Once upon a time, I was a Division I athlete. I pumped iron, ran sprints, and played tough. Unfortunately, the fairy tale ending, “And she lived athletically ever after,” has evaded me. I would most certainly collapse under the weight I used to squat. I only sprint to escape the jaws of stray dogs. I experience the thrill of victory when my students pronounce the “s” at the end of a plural word. Times have changed.

The time is 2:30, Thursday afternoon. I’m used to hearing “Teacha! Teacha!” as I walk around campus, but I heard a particularly intent beckoning from a few students and looked up to see them gesturing for me to come closer. I approached and was redirected to the gym teacher, Pi Ma, who had interesting news for me. “Teacher. You run Saturday five kilomet. Meet here 6:30 morning. Tell Chinese teacher, June. Stay. I bring you shirts.” As I waited for her to return with the race gear, I counted on one hand the number of times I’ve run since arriving in Thailand. This was going to be interesting.

Saturday morning came in the blink of an eye. Butterflies raging, I laced up my sneakers and secured my bib. Given the choice between the numbers 0329 and 0330, June chose the former. Nine is an auspicious number in Thailand, and apparently in China too. I liked the symmetry of 0330 anyway. Plus, three times three is nine so I was counting on some subtle luck to kick in. I was definitely going to need it.  June and I warmed up by jogging for thirty seconds in the direction of the school gate. Turning the corner to a sea of students, my initial reaction was to run. Not toward the finish line, but back home. The realization that my UT running shorts were outrageously short for Thai social standards sparked a minor panic attack. Luckily, June was able to quell my anxiety and I reluctantly surrendered to the madness that would characterize the morning. After a useless attempt to stretch my shorts to some level of modesty, I scurried toward the sign-in table and endured the customary stares. Twenty minutes and forty seven pictures later, we made our way to the starting line. The teachers assembled behind a large banner for one last photo op, all of the students behind us, raring to go. Out of nowhere, Pi Ma yelled, “Go!” and the charge began. Trapped between the banner in front of me and the stampede behind me, I exploded with laughter at the absurdity of my current situation. Untangling ourselves from the mob, June and I fled to the outer edge of the pack and watched as the bulk of the students tore past us at full speed. “Slow and steady,” I told her, burying the fear that maybe this race was actually a 500 rather than a 5K. Sure enough, the kids began dropping like flies. It was classic tortoise and the hare. June and I moseyed along, not sprinting, but not stopping either. Whenever the boys would catch a glimpse of us closing in on them, they’d kick it into the next gear, temporarily avoiding the embarrassment of being overtaken by the foreign girl teachers. At one point, two boys approached on a moped, camera phone pointed my way, capturing the sweaty splendor of my endeavor. I flashed the customary double peace sign, hoping in vain that they were taking a snapshot rather than a video. Start to finish, the race was ridiculous. To top it off, thirty minutes after that chaotic start, finishing first among the female competitors was yours truly, Kelsey Nawalinski. I was treated like a bionic woman after a performance that would have had me plunked in my coach’s office, re-evaluating my future as an athlete. I received a lukewarm juice box of strawberry milk and a mayonnaise-filled, pork-topped bread roll to help me refuel post-race. In the wake of my victory, the boy who finished first overall has taken up the habit of shouting, “Champions!!” arms lifted Rocky-style over his head, every time he sees me at school. I’ve now realized that the most impressive feat was finding a way to identify myself as more of an oddball.

Our students and long distance running just seem to be like oil and water. Give them a soccer ball, however, and it’s like seating Mozart at a baby grand. Asking them to run three miles is more like handing him a paintbrush. But we all have our strengths and that’s the beauty of humanity. Another brilliant man, good ol’ Einstein, recognized that, “everybody is a genius, but if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.” When it comes to long distance, my students are like fish out of water, but ask them to belt out some karaoke, bend it like Beckham, or whip up some killer Thai food, and they’ll do it swimmingly. 

I'm not sure if "30.21 MIN" means .21 minutes or 21 seconds, but either way, its impressive.