National Teacher Appreciation Day

I see that Teusday is National Teacher Appreciation Day. I've had many good teachers but today I was thinking about a teacher I once had who wasn't a college teacher but a martial arts teacher - Tri Thong Dang (traditionally, Dang Thong Tri, or Mr. Tri, as we called him).

After college I decided to try a martial arts class because I was terribly shy and I thought it would help me be more comfortable with people. Also my sister and I were fans of Kurosawa movies like Seven Samurai, Rashomon, and Yojimbo. There was a school just down the road from my college and I talked my mom into going with me to take a tai chi class. Eventually I ended up taking all three of the classes Mr. Tri taught - tai chi, aikido, and kung fu - but I was only any good at tail chi and my mom was better ;) I was there for about five years, made many friends and also met my (now ex) husband there. Here are a couple of pics of me at the dojo ...





Mr. Tri was from Vietnam and had also spent a lot of time in France before coming to the US. It's kind of hard to describe him - he was formally friendly, sometimes very stiff (and yet confided he liked BB :) ), but other times he would invite some of us students out to a restaurant or to his home for a snack, and he came to my wedding. He was very adept at martial arts - here's one of his books: Beginning T'ai Chi ...



What made me think of Mr. Tri today was a mention of Vietnam on a blog I visit. I had mostly put away thoughts of him and the school and martial arts for many years. I had gotten married while at the school to another student and within a couple of years we were getting a divorce. I tried to stay at the school despite the discomfort of seeing the ex all the time, but eventually I gave up, moved on, and tried to forget about it all. But I've realized that it's ok now to remember what an interesting time that was and what a good teacher Mr. Tri was. You can read more about him here.