The Main Event, One Way or Another

The following are two tales of combat and cultural intrigue. Or, as our school is big on promoting, different ways to "resolve conflict." And while we're in the intro and conflict resolution, I wrote an article that was published on a real-life news website. So feel free to read that.

Nothing that happened surprised me. Still, I didn't think ahead to expect it, so the events bemused me more than they might normally.

Boris, my coach, set up a workout for me in Ashdod, about 30 miles to the South of Tel Aviv. There was a club there who boasted of the #2 wrestler in Israel at my weight class. As the #1 man is suspended for the year due to shady doings, this guy is the default top man. A pretty good opportunity to test my mettle, no?

We met, Boris and I, at our regular Thursday practice. I laid down as he coached the three small guys who showed up for the greco practice through a 35-minute workout. After their preliminary efforts, we left the basement and walked out to Boris's car. It was time.

I sat in Boris's front seat. Within five minutes, Boris had given me a life prescription - "What you need to do is find a good job, get married, to a Jewish girl, and have a good life" - stopped to buy his dinner of warm pita and yogurt, and showcased some memorably clumsy driving skills that made me question my safety for the next hour. He also discarded his first cup of yogurt by opening the door of the car and dropping it. That was cute.

To clinch the deal, as soon as we got on the highway and done talking, Boris put on a CD. Boris, a 50-year old man from Bukhara, a city in Uzbekistan; Boris, a gym teacher and wrestling coach who moved to Israel in 1992, a time when a lot of other Jews left Bukhara, because as he said it, "There are Arabs there. They don't like Jews, there was anti-Semitism,"; Boris put on a CD of Russian dance music. Music that rode over a fast thumping beat and featured lyrics in Russian and English about hearts pumping, missing you, and the like. It was delicious.

Anyway, after making one wrong turn, we got there just a little late. The Ashdod practice room was a true gym hall, with space for a full mat and some extras, a bike room and a locker room on the left, and space for twenty or so people. There was the slight stench of cigarettes, surely starting from at least one of the four gray-mustachioed coaches until it permeated the room. The room reminded me of the Olympic Village gym where I wrestled in a tournament in Moscow, if a little bit smaller.

Boris briefed me as we arrived. "You're going to get there, greet everybody, change, warm up, and wrestle two matches. You're going to win the first match, to show them your skills."
"What about the second match?"
"You're going to win that too! What did you think?"
That's what we call good coaching.

I was already changed, so after meeting the coaches, I put on my shoes and stretched out. For whatever reason, I didn't really warm up. Considering I had played soccer earlier in the day, and that I had been going on 5 hours of sleep a day for about a week (as for the reason? I'll let you use your imagination), I probably should have prepared myself better, but I figured maybe saving energy wasn't bad either.

So after 15 minutes, I told them I was good to go. There was a live takedown group of older guys on one end of the gym, so I thought I'd just work in with them, especially since little kids were wrestling on the other parts of the mat. But oh no.

"Clear the mats!" the head coach Lyova called, and Boris reminded me I needed to have a singlet. Already familiar with this, I strapped up, realizing that we would be in the center circle, me and No. 2. I was the spectacle, and all wanted to see me and whether I measured up. Or they wanted to see my mutton chops and whether they would affect my wrestling (yes, I've pulled them out again).

No. 2 wore a blue singlet, and I wore my red singlet which formerly boasted the Russian flag and RUS on the front and back, respectively. Now it's just a red singlet; Eastern European quality. I wore headgear, an added oddity. He was a decent bit taller than me, with short light hair. We shook hands in the two-handed congenial Russian wrestling way, and then we began.

He scored the first point offensively, as I just didn't sprawl. It was kind of silly, but maybe that's what warm-ups are for. Anyway, I came back with the next takedown, a defensive one, and then scored a three point offensive takedown to take the first period 4-1.

The second period went closer to my plans, even though it was a closer period. I scored the first two points on a takedown, and then while going for a bad gutwrench, I gave up a reversal and a 1-point turn. Tied, I decided to get the last point just in case and took him down for a 3-2 win.

In freestyle, as I've written somewhere before, you only need to win 2 of 3 periods, kind of like tennis. So if this was an official match, I won 4-1, 3-2 against Israel's top current man, without being in good shape, training form, or a state of readiness. That was nice.

But since it was practice and not the Israeli Championships, I figured there had to be more. I agreed to go a 3rd period, which I'm pretty sure he won 4-3 (a Brands brother would have been very displeased with my efforts). By that point I was quite exhausted. My legs hurt, my breathing was poor, and I felt out of shape again. And the rest of the club wanted a piece of me as well.

They gave me a break for 10 minutes or so to recuperate. I fought with the dueling impulses of wanting to be the bad-ass, in shape, tough American, and wanting to rest because I felt old and out of shape. Nevertheless, after those ten minutes, I returned to the mat for another match.

This match didn't go so well. I gave up a silly three points going for a lat-drop. I didn't do a good job in par terre (on the mat). I felt exhausted. I only lasted two periods, and then begged off.

The rest of the time I walked around or laid down, inside or outside, trying to collect my thoughts. I haven't seriously trained in 18 months. There was the tournament just after Spain where, after my second, far more difficult than it should have been match, I threw up 9 times (as if to make up for never throwing up from wrestling and not throwing up since I was 5 or 7). After that tournament I joked to myself that I was at last old. But of course, that's ridiculous; I'm just really out-of-shape compared to competition form.

At the same time, to get back into shape would take work and time. It requires a level of commitment that I could give in college with no second thoughts. But with a job, in a new country, with social life aspects I want to maintain, and a desire to keep my hand in a bunch of pots, I'm not sure I can dive back into wrestling at that commitment level. The goals aren't as strong, the payout is unclear, and I don't know if it would be all worth it. Especially considering that to this day, wrestling is the only thing that can drive me to the edge of my emotions, to positive or more often to negative ends. Oy.

Anyway, that's what I thought through outside, until a coach told me I'd get sick. So I walked back in and found the four coaches and Boris talking about me. Where I was going to work out, when, could they get around the citizenship requirement to let me wrestle in the Cup of Israel in December, what I needed to do. It almost felt out of my hands. But they all liked me at least.

In the end, we agreed on continuing my 3 days a week practice schedule, just two of them would be at this freestyle club instead of in Tel Aviv. I picked the days such to coincide with the Tel Aviv days, so I wouldn't need to "skip" those if I wanted a break. I'm going to take trains to get there, which is fine because the Israeli train system is quite good (and yet somehow all the teachers who wrote letters to new teachers told us we absolutely had to have a car, and that public transportation in Israel stinks. Hmm...). All and all, everything should be ok. And maybe we'll reach a point where I'm one of the guys and not all that special. Unless I make the national team, of course.

***
That same night I called my man Ido, the Hebrew Hammer himself. I just wanted to check out if I would run a practice this weekend - for various reasons, a cash stimulus would be good for my economic condition.

I did indeed have a practice to run, but he had bigger news to share. "I wanted to call you to invite you to a fight we're having this weekend, it should be really good." He told me I was on the guest list, plus 1, and gave me the details on who's fighting and what styles. Those details meant nothing to me, but I told him I'd come if I could find the appropriate plus 1. And then, to my surprise, the plus 1 I had in mind was quite eager to go see the fighting. So I was all set for a Saturday night at the ring.

I picked up my +1 and we headed out a little after 7. The place was purportedly 15 minutes away, and since google maps has really come a long way in Israel since we've gotten here (from roadless blobs of land to difficult to nail down because of transliteration but rather accurate street addresses), we had directions that should have gotten us there fine.

It should be no surprise, however, that +1 and I found ourselves somewhere in the West Bank. While we weren't sure about that fact on the ride, a map check confirms it now. Although the security checkpoint should have been a big clue.

We backtracked, found the appropriate exit, and then had little trouble finding our street. As soon as we turned on to Menachem Begin Blvd, we saw cars parked on the street and in a lot that looked like it belonged to a high school. "A bunch of dudes are outside, that's got to be a good sign," +1 suggested, and so I pulled in, called the Hebrew Hammer, and confirmed that we had made it.

Once out of the car, our next challenge was to get into the fight. We had to find the guest list and mingle in a crowd that spoke both Hebrew and Russian. There was a genuine energy as we stood in line, with boxing shorts on sale, signs advertising clubs up, and the schedule of the fights available on the table. One tall woman with cropped blonde hair and fur in her clothes stood in front of us in line, and we agreed she looked very Russian. If she made it out to the fight, it must have been a big deal.

Fortunately, the VIP list was in order, and we were given our orange bracelets. We entered to what had to be a high school, judging by the basketball floor whereon the ring was set up, the hall with a concession stand selling hot dogs and other goodies, and the size of the building. It felt like I was going to watch a big wrestling match. Well, except for the signs. This was advertised as Dogfight 3, with signs featuring my main man the Hebrew Hammer, as well as his younger, bigger brother, and some other dude. Now all of a sudden +1 and I were feeling the excitement, the anticipation, the buzz.

We arrived just after 8, and while the fight hadn't started, the doors did open at 7:30, so most of the good seats in the bleachers were taken. We tried to get seats near the center, but an older couple told us, "seat's taken", so we were all ready to take some seats on the right side of the gym, which wouldn't give us a very clear vantage point, but would probably suffice for our less than diehard level of interest.

At that point I saw Moshe from Team Franko Pariente (HH's last name is Pariente, so that's his club). Moshe was the guy who likes how I say, "Bring it in." Anyway, he was on the floor, so I walked down to the end of the bleachers to say hello. Moshe was busy preparing fighters, so we shook hands and he moved on.

That was enough for the security guys on the floor to start talking to us before we turned to our seats. What they were saying I couldn't tell, so I gave them the ol' "anglit o russit", which led to responses in both. Being a jerk, I chose to talk to the Russian, who told me that we could sit on the floor with our VIP passes. "Backstage passes to Alice Cooper? No way!" Or something.

The seats were plain white lawn chairs, and we were in the fifth row behind kids who had a penchant for standing up during parts of the fights.

Wait, that doesn't sound that great. Let's rephrase.

For Dogfight 3, the biggest MMA show in town, my guest and I had floor-level seats, right with all the family members and celebrities that frequent the Israeli MMA scene. Pretty sweet! (Maybe if I take care of the wrestling thing, I'll live up to this sort of "status".)

Our lateness also played into our favor - instead of sitting through about 45 minutes of preliminaries, we had to wait about 5-10 minutes. And then the scene unfolded.

Picture a high school gym, with pentagonal painted areas on the basketball court rather than rectangles. Picture a boxing ring at half court. Picture rows of white chairs to one side of the ring, filled with family members and young kids who are in the respective clubs. Picture tables with wine bottles and other goodies on the other side of the ring. Picture two video screens flanking the back corners of the ring, and an interview area in the back corner of the gym. Picture a high school gym filled with 200 plus people, excited and revved up about hand to hand (or foot to foot) combat. Picture yourself in a boat on a river, with tangerine trees and marmalade skies. That's what we were dealing with, for the most part.

Then the lights dimmed. The music over the loudspeakers switched from general hip-pop to an epic Pink Floyd song that I can't identify. The crowd roared as the Israeli Michael Buffer (I can only assume he's the best around) stepped to the ring. After some waiting and some technical difficulties, he began the intro, welcoming us all to, "DOGFIGHT SHALOSH!!!" (Shalosh=3 in Hebrew). Needless to say, everybody was delighted. +1 and I for slightly different reasons than the rest of the crowd, perhaps.

The actual fight was interesting too. It started off with two Muay Thai fights, which had correspondence to what I know (wrestling) but was also quite different. Both fights had a Franko Pariente fighter, and both times FP won. The first fight featured a Russian by the name of Dima Zuckerman, who earned cheers and plaudits from two Russian gentlemen a row in front of us and to our left. They had suits on and looked very Russian, or at least quite Caucasian, as if from Chechnya or some such place. Actually, one of them looked a little like a Klitschko. Basically, they didn't seem like people worth crossing. And Dima pulled out a win despite backing up all match and looking like the far less classier boxer. At the same time, despite a gut and no muscle definition, Dima was in better shape and wore out his opponent. Maybe he took strength from the ring girl who strutted around the ring, showing the change in periods. +1 and I agreed that her figure was gorgeous, even if her face was a tad mousy. Israel's almost all the way there.

After the second fight, a TKO for FP, we earned an audience with the Hebrew Hammer. He was looking for us to make sure we found the VIP seats on the floor. When I gave him the horizontal, European football thumbs up, he found us and came over to say hello. He told us that two more FP guys were fighting, in matches 7 and 9, and wished us well in enjoying the rest of the fights.

We made it only one more fight, an MMA match featuring two 62 KG fighters, one with bright blue hair styled in almost mohawk form. It was kind of lame. So was the fight. And we hadn't eaten dinner yet. So our time with Dogfight 3 came to an end, a little early but wholly satisfying.

And today there are two things I can recall in the aftermath that are vital bits of info.
1. I procured a poster of Dogfight 3.
2. I confirmed with Ido that when the second FP fighter, Raz, won his match, he called out somebody for revenge (which they adopted into Hebrew for the post-match interview) from Dogfight Echad (that's 1), looking for a showdown in Dogfight Arba (that would be 4).

So in other words, for DOGFIGHT ARBA!!!, you can expect +1 and I to be there, if again invited. Maybe we'll show up early to get front row seats, so we can feel the sweat and heat of the ring. Or maybe that's too much intensity.