Originally posted: March 15th, 2014
Helloyoutubes!*
I was planning on writing all of these posts as chronological installments of my trip, and have been meaning to write one focusing on the past few days since my last post (which you should probably read if you have absolutely nothing to do right now, or a ton of stuff you need to do but want to procrastinate). However, this morning totally thew a wrench into those plans. When I came to India, I had three goals (apart from visiting all the standard historical sites and attractions) that I wanted to check off my bucket list. 1) To wrestle the traditional kushti style at an Akhara 2) to experience an Indian wedding 3) to ride an elephant. Well, four goals if you want to count 'not getting "Delhi Belly" and shitting my brains out' as a goal. Anyway, thanks to Apoorva and the marriage of her friends Sahil and Devika, the wedding was checked off on the first weekend! The elephant ride still remains to be put in motion. The wrestling though, perhaps the thing I wanted to try the most, has officially been checked!
After a lot of asking around and a little research online, the Mathur’s had a lead on an akhara not too far from the apartment! An akhara is a wrestling training facility, where wrestlers go to train for up to 8 hours a day. They have two practices a day, one at 6 am and one at 4 pm, and are open every day except Tuesdays. They have been around since the 8th century, and originally were split in two parts: religious ascetics and professional fighters/martial artists. The first akhara (pulling from Wikipedia) had a section of monks and “a highly militant order…to act as a Hindu army.” Today, wrestling is the only remaining martial art taught at akharas, and after India’s recent successes on the world wrestling stage (ie. Sushil Kumar, Olympic gold medalist), enrollment at akharas is regaining in popularity.
Sushil Kumar, the best wrestler in India and part of the reason for the resurgence of wrestling there
Today I woke up at the crack of dawn and went with Auntie in search of this shindig. With the help of Google maps and some roadside bystanders, we found its location and walked inside. Auntie handled the talking, because it seemed not many here spoke great English (some did), and they were very welcoming. The place consisted of a fenced in dirt yard about the size of a MLB infield, and had a central one room building. In front of the building was a raised square pit about 25 feet across, or a small mesa, if you will. It had mounded mini-Cahokia style walls of super hard packed dirt and was filled with dark, very soft dirt. They call it mud, which almost makes sense because it was so soft, but it was not wet. According to handy dandy Wikipedia, they add water, red ochre, buttermilk and oil to this dirt, which serves as the wrestling surface. There were about 20-30 wrestlers standing around or training, climbing the rope suspended 20 feet off the ground or doing this one type of pushup I can’t remember the name of. Everyone was watching us curiously and were smiling and joking around when they realized I wanted to wrestle them. It felt like they were thinking, “oh look at this white boy, wants to come get a taste of some culture and thought wrestling would count. This will be amusing.” They must not have known.
I PLAY FOR KEEPS!
Best photo of the akhara I have
They directed us to the guru, or leader of the akhara who told me to go change in the building. I walked in and found a large empty room with a few more people, a bench press, a few other old pieces of weightroom equipment, and a table (really just a stack of some type of gym class lookin mats). I stripped down to my Under Armour compression shorts and t shirt as the guy kept motioning for me to take more clothes off. Then I went outside and they told me to warm up, so I ran around the yard for a while and stretched. Then they brought out this other powerful but not very lean looking fellow and pointed to the center of the pit.
We wrestled. I did ok initially, taking him down a few times in the first few minutes. I’m definitely so far from wrestling shape though so I gassed (hit a wall), and after that he started scoring. His style and tendencies were slightly different than what I’m used to feeling from US wrestlers, so it was interesting to feel his steps and trips and handfighting. I noticed one rule change, you’re allowed to pull and bend back individual fingers here, whereas in the US folkstyle (the type of wrestling that schools and colleges use) you need four. My thumb is on ice. Auntie translated afterwards that the guru (head teacher) was telling the rest of the wrestlers to learn from me, and that he was yelling at his own guy for being a disgrace and letting the white guy beat him. Not sure if that’s true or if she was just trying to make me feel better. The guy I wrestled wore me down though and after that he started beating me up. That part was embarrassing.
Monkey’s on the walls of the training facility
Kushti is a trip. GET IT!?!?!?!
CCNF Domination Station in the beginning… until my lack of cardio caught up with me. Then it got ugly
After wrestling live for about 10 minutes, I was spent. Auntie told me that I should touch the guru’s feet, as a sign of respect. I felt like throwing up and they told me to lie down on the special dirt because it had medicinal properties. After doing so, I actually felt much better. I was so out of shape that I felt nauseous for about 15 minutes. They had a rope to climb too so I did that a couple times. We chatted for a bit, meaning Auntie talked to them in Hindi, and I stood there trying to pick up what I could. Then I went over to the washing area, where I washed myself down with a hose until I had cleaned off most of the mud and dirt, then I toweled off and changed back in the building. After a bit more chatting, discussing freestyle and Greco among other things, we headed home. Auntie told me they refused to let us pay them and invited me back for every day for the remainder of the stay. I think I will go back Sunday and do it all over again, although I’m dreading wrestling without being able to tape my thumb.
Some rope climbs after the wrestling
*Ronald Jenkees reference
