When Luck Runs Out (276 hits)
Category: UberMadness! EntryRating: 1.33 on 3 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Domochevsky (View user info) at 2005-08-02 02:31:58 EDT
This post was an official UberMadness! entry. Click here to view the original matchup.
Tony was a big guy. Big as in 6'7" and looking as if wrought from pure muscle and sinew. You could tell by the way he carried himself that he had never been pushed around, nor had he any humility. His solution to problems was either intimidation or brute force. He had little tact or finesse. This hamartia is what brought him to the feet of a man no more than half his size.
I first met Tony during my stay with the JET program. It is an acronym for Japanese Education Training, a program run jointly by both the American and Japanese governments. Basically, you're dropped of in Japan whether you know the language or not, and are assigned an English teaching position. You are paid copious amounts for this valuable service, and the government picks up the tab for most of your expenses. As a Japanese major in college it was a natural move for me to make, and within six month of graduating I was set for the exchange.
At the time, I couldn't figure out exactly why Tony decided to come on a JET exchange. Maybe he wanted to travel on someone else's dime, maybe he wanted to get out of the states for a while, or maybe he just has a thing for Asian women. I suppose it really doesn't matter, since whatever his reasons were, they landed him in the same exchange group as I.
From the moment we stepped off the plane in Tokyo International, I knew that Tony was going to have a hard time. When his luggage didn't come through the conveyor in the first five minutes, he began trying to hassle the airport clerk, who, speaking nothing by poor Engrish proceeded to call security on him. It took me two hours to convince the supervising officer that Tony hadn't meant any harm and was just a "baka na gaijin", or "stupid foreigner".
That incident aside, our first few weeks were largely uneventful. Tony learned to say a few things in Japanese, and I and the other exchange-ees settled into our posts.
We were all stationed around Tokyo, at least for the time being, and would often run into each other at bars knocking back a few with the other teachers at our respective schools. Tony took to the Japanese custom of drinking oneself stupid after work like a koi to a backyard pond; pouring shot after shot of warm sake down his gullet whenever the opportunity arose, and in the Japanese social structure it arose a lot.
This led Tony into some sticky situations. As his consumption increased so did his already inflated ego, and by his fifth round he would start making threats at anyone who gave him fleeting eye contact. He got himself thrown out of the bar more than once while I was around.
It was one of those nights that I ran into him, stumbling around the street a block down from the bar he had recently been expelled from, other pedestrians noting him like some sideshow curiosity as he swayed to and fro. He was rather surly at his predicament, mainly because he wanted to drink more and his current situation limited that ability, but also at the man who'd given him the bums rush.
"Jaaaack" he slurred my name terribly "I want to get that fucker. He was a little guy and he just threw me out of the bar. I didn't even finish my drink." He trailed off in that way drunks do.
"You know, Tony, compared to you there are a lot of 'little guys' around here. May be you should just call it a night." I tried to calm him a bit.
"He can't do that to me: I'm bigger than he is. I'm gonna get him when he come out here."
"Tony! Remember the airport? I'm not bailing your ass out if you try to fuckin' attack a Japanese citizen. They'll revoke your visa and then where will you be?"
He calmed down and looked as if he were almost considering what I'd said, but, as an intoxicated person will do from time to time, he became distracted by the opening of the bar door down the road.
"I... I think that's the guy who threw me out." He snarled.
"Tony, don't do this. If you hurt him, it will be your ass. You can't just go around bullying people because you're bigger. A victory of strength is a shallow one, because eventually you'll meet someone stronger than you. Your luck's gonna run out one of these days."
"Whatever, Jake I-"
"For the last time it's Jack."
"Whatever. I don't care. I'll show him who he messed with. No one messes with me."
I considered trying to stop him, but his size and inebriation gave me reason to pause.
I saw the other man walking down the street. He must have been in his mid-forties, and no more than 5'3". He was just another unassuming salary-man on his way to the subway station. He was walking quite straight for having just come from a bar, and carried himself in a manner that made it look more like he was floating over the pavement. I felt sorry for this man, for the now-inevitable beating he was going to receive.
As Tony approached and prepared to strike, I was about to yell a warning when the man turned around, and with movements so quick and fluid that I could hardly see them, guided Tony and his fist gently to the ground, and applied some sort of elbow-joint lock. That must have been painful, I thought, even for a drunk.
Tony yelped and squirmed on the pavement for a moment until the man, seeing that Tony was not even a peripheral threat, stood and quietly walked away in the same manner as before.
He stood up, dazed and even angrier than before, but beaten none-the-less.
"He, He barely even touched me, and I was on the ground." He told me as we walked back to the apartment complex.
"Well, at least you got a free martial arts lesson." I joked.
He smiled briefly, rubbing his elbow.
We later learned that this particular man who Tony chose to go after was a sixth-degree black belt at a local aikido dojo. Aikido, a Japanese martial art and philosophy that utilizes fluidity, timing and grappling to turn an attacker's momentum and force against them, is one of the most simple, beautiful and effective martial arts in existence.
It's been eight years since I returned from the JET program, and when I visit Japan I always try to meet up with Tony, if even just for lunch. He's even speaking Japanese pretty well these days, and he's gained a little bit of the famous Japanese humility since he decided to live there.
I don't think he's picking bar fights anymore.
User Reviews
Submitted by ConorJS (user info) at 2006-02-16 18:58:30 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
Mr Miyagi died a couple of months ago...
Submitted by JonnyX (user info) at 2006-02-16 18:50:03 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
I knew this was you when you wrote it
Submitted by DonkeyOnTheEdge (user info) at 2005-10-29 10:03:55 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
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