YIKES!

I am in Singapore right now – and having a bitter/sweet morning.
Ronin is doing better though and I chatted him (via mac) last night and he is in good spirits. My youngest son Felix was all nervous about doing his 3 kilometre cross-country yesterday, but ended up doing very well; I wish I could have been there for that. What else … oh yes, a volcano has erupted in Iceland and thrown a monstrous volcanic cloud into the skies over Europe – hence, all airports have been shutdown. That’s the Yikes part! It is Friday here, and I am not leaving for London until Sunday night – so I am still hoping that the right winds will prevail and I’ll make it. I have eight seminars set up in the UK – and the prospect of not being able to fly has put a frown on my forehead – at 53 years of age, as of today, I don’t need any more of those! Things, of course, might have been worse, I could have been standing next to that Volcano when it erupted – that would have been a serious YIKES!
I remember one time in East Java when I scaled a volcano near Ponorogo and climbed down inside the crater (not smart) – I was walking around among the fissures peering in through the sulphurous smoke when it occurred to me that I was having trouble breathing – the long climb up and out left me breathless and coughing – as I reflect on the many silly things I have done to date, it occurs to me that I am lucky in many respects to even still be here.
On the upside, Singapore is a fantastic city – one of my favourites. The people are wonderful, the food is amazing, and the city is an anomaly in Asia. Everything works. I had the pleasure of teaching for my good friend Ursula Pong at the Singapore-American school yesterday. With over 4000 students, the school is the biggest and best in Asia. They offer the students a huge choice of programs for the physical education portion of their curriculum – and on average, they have 50 or so students sign up for a subject. When they offered MMA this year, they had more than 200 students sign up – with half of them being female. Astounding!
I ran these students through some fun training over three classes throughout the day – we had a blast!
Afterward, last night, I took a stroll down Orchard road; bought myself some Vibram Fivefingers footwear and got in touch with my inner ape. Walking around, feeling my toes interact with the ground is a great feeling. Here I am right now, shoes on, feet up and toes-a-wiggling, writing this blog in the most incredible food court I have ever seen in the new ION Shopping Plaza on Orchard road. Volcanic clouds asides – life is pretty damn interesting.
Best wishes all,
JBW
PS: Life unfolds in a myriad of ways. The process of the unfolding is sometimes a product of design but more often than not it is the manifestation of our reaction to circumstance. This is not a good, nor a bad thing, it just is. Sometimes we get to paddle, sometimes we are caught in the current, and our ability to adapt to the circumstance in many ways dictates how our lives turn out.