WOW Comments…Awsome…Thank You.

Oh My God. I have two comments. Unsolicited comments that is. Ones that cpopme from people I don’t actually know… yet at least….one from gintonic - sounds like my sort of joggler - and one from factdaily who somehow slipped under my email radar - sorry factdaily. I will respond to your comments individually as each of them deserves, but publicly here as a post, for let me just say, you guys have made my day. I have blogged nothing since July 27th , and despite my laziness, the blogosphere has found me. Thankyou guys.

There is some synchronicity in these comments too, as only this morning I was a jogging on Mt Taihang, thinking how enhanced the experience would be with a few lemons or even juggling balls. See the truth is, I have let joggling slip from my daily routine, ousted by a couple of new obsessions, namely, uphill cycling (with my new florescent yellow Dahon fold up bicycle), and meditation jogging, where you focus in on the patterns and textures of the terrain across which you are running whilst choosing a jogging meter based on music blasted through an mp3. This worked particularly well in Sydney where I was running from beach to beach, whenever I had an excuse to drive down to the coast, over a glorious last summer spent there.

But hey. the excitement of receiving unsolicited comments has re-inspired the joggler within me. Joggling, I am sure will reach new heights this year with the integration of meditation jogging and maybe even uphill cycling–though I envision this to be rather dangerous.

Stay tuned and think of using a programm like bloglines to subscribe to this feed.

You guys rock. Thank you thank you thank you.

The universal trump card!

It’s been a long time since I uploaded and there is so much to tell.

Like Sleeping Beauty Joggle blog has been in a transformative phase; through the centre of the earth, fighting off demons and rediscovering the beat that meters the poetry of life.

What happened you might ask? Well , the joggle blog almost died from neglect and from me basically listening to people urging me to blog about something more serious. Yes it was a moment of weakness, or eight moths of weakness to be precise. On a recent trip to Spain however, I happened to mention joggling to my friend Laura, and before the words “lets go down to the beach” were out of her mouth we were down there on Bogatell Beach juggling lemons pilfered from the wooden fruit bowl on the kitchen table of our friend Cate.

We practiced knee deep into the Mediterranean hurling lemons into beautiful cascades that would catch the morning sun, emanating a warm brandyesque glow, the ocean catching any fumbled lemons in an aquamarine embrace– a very handy thing as it means you don’t have to bend down so far to pick up dropped lemons. this was juggling bliss!!

“I am just enchanted”, were Laura’s words, a chiropractor of the Network Spinal Analysis (NSA) persuasion, who immediately understood the neurological significance of juggling as an exercise that facilitates eye hand coordination and tunes the brain into the poetry of life.

From ocean to sand we moved onto joggling … AKA jogging and juggling at the same time… up and down the beach. Once again I became addicted, and totally excited about having recruited a disciple. Over the next few weeks in Barcelona I juggled stones on Mt Juic an old Jewish citadel guarding the port; fresh peaches from the Boqueria market in the back lanes of the Ravel, and finally, in a historical nod to the Arab’s who have a phenomenal juggling tradition, at the Alhambra in Granada, again with lemons, packed in a special care package by Cate, a wonderful Californian Somato Respiratory Integration Practitoner who works with Laura in Barcelona.

I am back now in Hong kong , and once again on the joggling track. One man almost split his ass laughing at me  in the park this morning, but walked off to work with a big smile on his face, giving me the thumbs up. Humour, as my friend Laura says, is the universal trump card.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

No Balls Bangkok

The gaffa wrapped rice socks have served well. They floated in the surf when I dropped them in the Andaman Sea off the Phuket coastline, and didn’t swell up or smell or anything. I still rate them highly and will keep them for training. But being in Thailand (on an intensive training schedule) I thought i might also be able to invest in some showy joggling balls. Fifteen years ago when I was on Koh Phangan, bone-bearded hippies not wanting to go home had set up a travellers-market along a small path leading to Hadrin Beach, selling all varieties of hand stuffed and stitched juggling balls, and other assorted circus toys. This was the sort of place Hadrin was. People would eat magic mushrooms, roll down the sandy pathways in their underwear, dance at full moon parties, stay in bamboo shacks for a couple of dollars, or just sleep on the beach with the warm beach dogs snuggled up to them. Fire twirling was popular and people made a living selling hippy apparel. I knew that Phuket was not like this, and never was, but maybe in Bangkok some of this scene might still exist and there I could find some good souvenir juggling balls en route back to China.

So I bought a cheap flight and headed to Khaosan Rd in Banglamphu– the most likely area. This temple littered area of old Bangkok has evolved from travellers ghetto into a nightly carnival attracting crowds of all classes and nationalities– even local Thai’s. I set about my search on foot. Phad-thai noodle carts jostled with balloon sellers and bamboo flute sellers, weaving in between tourists sitting on stools at getting instant-dreadlocks fused to their own conservatively cut hair. I was tempted away from my quest by the layabout attitude of drinkers at the street side tables downing Singha beer and Song Sam whiskey, but compromised by purchasing a takeaway green coconut.

I surged with the tide of Khaosan carnivalians along the glittering mile of too-cool-for school-funky-retroness. Akha hill tribe women smiling cutely under headresseses sewn with old coins thrust at me with carved wooden frogs that croaked when you stroked their ridged backs with a stick.  I briefly considered the novelty of joggling the resonant frogs. There were shops selling pyramid shaped Thai cushions which would be far to heavy to joggle; “I’m a hot bitch” G-strings (too light), knock-of CD’s and DVD’s (just silly), “Eat More Rice, Bitch” t-shirts (mmm?), jewelled wooden lotus stems (too spikey), mango sticky rice packets (messy), hand-carved chess sets ( expensive), bottles of mandarin juice(quarantine issues), silk hangings, Bob Marley Bandanna’s, variations on everything Louis Vuiton and Diesel (potential problems with future sponsors with the whole issue of copyright infringement.)

Tuk-tuk drivers touted “Boom Boom” as they pulled brochures of semi naked Thai women from their pockets; Kombi vans converted to parked cocktail bars pushed strange coloured concoctions; foot-massage and facial makeover parlours set up shop right in the thick of the street action, all of this to the beat of competing knock-off CD stalls combining their speakers and woofers and sub woofers power to produce a retro, funk, hip hop, dance, urban,Afro-Cuban reggae, mishmash musical journey. But no juggling balls. Or was I just too diverted?
Maybe someone can report from Koh Pangan and tell me if they still sell juggling balls at the Hadrin Hippy market. I just refuse to go to Toys Are Us here in Hong Kong.

Intensive Beach Training

Sorry, my avid armchair jogglers,

Have been in intensive training down in Phuket and on Koh Pee Pee in Thailand,  practicing the joggle on the beaches, which I highly recommend.

The Competition

Time Magazine recently published an article called Up in the Air featuring two Russian teen prodigies smashing juggling records, and paving the way to making juggling a competitive sport rather than clownish entertainment. See their U-tube video here.

Their coach Garfield has formed a federation designed to promote juggling at a competitive level. I wonder if his eyes are also on Beijing and where joggling fits into his scheme. The competition is looking just a little bit more professional than I had anticipated.

Balancing the Brain and Smashing World Records

I’ve reverted to juggling indoor, out of the unbearable heat and pollution of Hong Kong in August. I do occasionally joggle around the room, but have taken to sitting in front of the fan yoga style practicing variations on the cascade, and working particular hard on a left hand clockwise half shower designed to bend my rightist brain left (China is still a communist country) and make-ambidextrous my technique. Whilst ambidextrousness is not necessary for increasing my speed on the track, it is useful for moving onto four and five ball joggling.  I figure the more specialized one gets, the easier it will be to smash world records.

Petitioning Hu

Did a 100meter joggle in 24 seconds this morning, knocking 4 seconds off from yesterday’s time–4 seconds closer to  Beijing you might say.

Really it is just 700 and something days to the Olympics now; I must start petitioning Hu Jintao for joggling representation. Not sure what the process might be. I am wondering if anyone has any suggestions. Ms. Mitchell from Connecting Cultures www.concul.net, a cross cultural consultancy in Beijing suggests taking the joggle to Tiananmen Square where the boulevards are broad and petitions are traditionally made.

28 Seconds

Yesterday I timed my hundred metre joggle.

I went from 40 seconds to 28.

I now have a benchmark.

Washboard Abs

I am practicing joggling palm down catching the rice-socks like flies. This seems to exercise my stomach muscles as they power the unusual bottom-spin rice-sock fling required for the juggle. My beer belly is slowly receding. Maybe this is from the constant bending over to pick up the rice-socks that I drop. Whatever the reason, I can see the first signs of a six pack emerging. Surely this makes joggling a little bit sexy.

Into the Light

Joggled my way out of a red wine hangover yesterday after a fantastic roast lamb dinner at my friend Helena’s house, remembering my failed attempt to promote joggling to her friends. Rolled eyes are a better reaction than feigned interest, though no reaction is worse, when you are marketing a movement. Really I can’t blame people for a lack of enthusiasm, for it is not like I wasn’t dismissive of all things sport in the past as well, but now that I have seen the light, how do I open people’s eyes?
I feel like a missionary or a born again Christian. I need converts now.