About
Welcome to the new Tigh Gorum Tae Kwon-do website. Its been a long time coming. Enjoy!
About me
Not a lot to say really. My day job is as a new media consultant. Bringing people and technology together and illustrating how you don’t have to spend a fortune to be a success.
My Tae Kwon-do cv is pretty basic too. I’m going to nick Stuart Anslow’s family tree shortly so apologies in advance.
At the tender age of 13, back then we will still innocents, my cousin, Billy McFadyen, dragged me along to this tay kwaan doo club ( as the locals in Campbeltown still call it - they still call me Hong Kong Fooey but that’s another story;o) ) at RAF Machrihanish.
There were about 50 students in the hall, it was all a bit scary. I stood on the black belt guy’s (George Mellon 1st Dan) toe when he tried to teach me a walking stance. My clumsiness is still there these day as I head towards the big 50.
Years later, a US Navy Seal weighing in at 19 stone would stand on my big toe, when I was teaching a self defence class, and George I gotta tell ya - it hurts. Mind you, the big dude pulled my toe right out of the joint capsule and then crushed it into powder - so I’m not saying it didn’t sting a bit. Nice to see that the US Navy trained that ‘follow through’ into the guys - made my job a bit easier.
I digress. George Mellon was posted elsewhere by the RAF. What to do? We were all hooked by that point. The senior grade was a blue tag and he became the class instructor. Can you see that happening these days? Nope. Neither can I. There was a bonus though- we were one of the bigger clubs and we couldn’t just vanish. We got a new part-time instructor. All the way from Glasgow- the big smoke to us Tuechters - only Rhee Ki Ha - the man himself. Of course, we didn’t realise how lucky we were at the time. After a while the senior guy in our club ‘Dave James’, it just came back to me…. made red tags, I don’t think he got any higher, declared that we really need a full time black belt. Mr Rhee Ki Ha obliged in the form of Teh Hock Aun - newly promoted, at that point to 2nd Dan. Arthur de-Silva had stood in for a while and he was amazing!
More to follow have to get back to the day job:o)
Next why it took me 7 years to get to 1st Dan and why I was pissed off that the city boys had made it all the way to 4th Dan in teh same time frame - with less work!