Before I left Japan to come home for Christmas, I had a chance to play the role of a basketball player on TV and in a print ad. Although the actions they needed me for didn’t require too much in the way of actual skill, the predominance of my time on both sets was spend hanging out and shooting hoops with the other actors (and actual players) on set. Initially, I was hesitant to take the jobs, but at the end of the day, I had a great time on both sets, and was actually surprised by the fact that I did pretty well. After almost 15 years, I could still shoot, dribble, and do lay-ups pretty much as well as I could when I used to play before. (But then again, I didn’t actually try dunking or anything fancy either- who knows what a disaster that might have been).
As I was on my way home from the shoots this really made me wonder just what I might have done with basketball had I stuck with it, and what life directions it might have taken me in. At the time that I quit, I certainly loved to play. When I was a kid most of my childhood went towards more intellectual pursuits like reading encyclopedias, memorizing dictionaries, and either building or trying to invent things. As a 9th grader, Basketball was the first sport I’d ever actually tried. And I loved it. Unfortunately however, as I had no previous experience with it, I just wasn’t particularly great at it… and as an African American I caught hell for it all the time. As a genetic anomaly or something. Finally, after a year and a half, I was convinced that I was just awful at it, and I walked away from it, embarrassed to play. And it wasn’t until I did these jobs that I finally came to realize that I actually wasn’t that bad at it at all.
Besides that, given how many other sports I’m come to play well, and just how many things I’ve had to figure out on my own in order to build a company and an action movie career at the same time, Im confident that I could have been really good at it had I simply ignored the mockery, and kept with it.
Perhaps that’s why I’ve developed such a fetish for trying to achieve the impossible and prove everyone wrong. It’s almost certainly why I ended up loving Asian martial artistry so much- 1)It wasn’t black or white. It was politically neutral. 2) There were no teams involved. No teammates or opposing teammates to have to live up or get along with. In the ring, there was me, and there was the other guy. He talked to his coach. I talked to mine. During the match, there was no talking, because there’s no time for it. At the end, we shake hands and walk away. It was pure…and I always loved it for that.
Perhaps this is also why being set up in that kickboxing match 2 years ago was such a hard experience to swallow, and why it still makes me so angry to think about. It took that neutrality away from me. They did all the things they did because I wasn’t Japanese, and as a taekwondo player, I came from a Non-Japanese style of Martial Arts. (My opponent was Japanese and from a Japanese style, and the crowd was also 100% Japanese.) The few other American fighters taking part were sponsored by the American producer himself so of course, they couldn’t do anything about them. It didn’t take a Ph.D to see what the domestic side fight producers wanted- even before the match took place. And the events that transpired in both the weeks leading up to the match, and the day of the fight itself certainly seemed to be directed towards that end.
One thing’s for sure though. If having the racial experiences that I had in the west pushed me to explore new cultures, then the raw-dogg racial experiences I’ve had in the east has pushed me to rise above them. Afterall, if you can’t fit in anywhere, you might as well be a role model everywhere ;)
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