Black Belt Club

I've been meaning to write about this for quite a while. One of the things that amazes me most is how well jitsu players here are networked. Once you reach the black belt you know more or less every other black belt in your state, and they know you. People are not afraid to ask favors, and everyone seems to get a lot done.

I've been very fortunate to be part of the group, through my professors, and to get to do and see things that average Joe the tourists would never even see. Things just seem to work out pretty well in this massive extended family.

Today I got to train at Serginhos "Merck Fighting Club" academy with some of the top level black belts again. I even got to roll with Serginho, the owner of the club, and he went on the trouble to fix problems in my guard passing even though he doesn't really speak English. He was giving me submissions, but I didn't know what to do and kept releasing them, until he told me to finish.

After the training we spent the day at Pepe, in the Barra da Tijuca beach. Was nice to hang around although I barely understood any of the discussions. I must start working on my Portuguese again.

Following the beach we went to a private "executive" club, with the contacts of one of the black belts. Now this club is really exclusive, and there is no way to pay for entry. It's pretty much a paradise with two different saunas, gyms, swimming pools and everything. We went in free, and none of us is even remotely wealthy.

To finish the day we had a rodizio of meat. Well actually only two of us paid for all inclusive meat rodizio, and rest paid the half prize pizza & pasta rodizio. Somehow meat kept appearing in front of the other guys too tho. One word to describe the sharing is a family, and I'm most happy to be part of it.

We were supposed to go to a hiphop festival, but thunderstorm hit the city and I woke up two hours late from my nap so I think it's called off. Regardless, a perfect day.