Thursday, July 1st-
evening
I had been exchanging messages with the Golden Eagle BJJ WhatsApp account for a couple of days. I had found them on Instagram and was messaging them using WhatsApp from there. I just told them my name was Sam and that I was a purple belt. Timor, the guy who responded to me with voice messages in English, was very enthusiastic. He had invited me to come train on Thursday at 7 pm and emphasized that I could train without paying the entrance fee.
Yesterday had been very uncomfortable and I felt objectified. I just wanted to be myself. After what happened at KGZ Top Team, I had decided that I was going to go to Golden Eagle and present myself as I am. I was going to let them assume what they wanted about me and my gender based on my appearance. I was thinking three things. First, I wanted to be able to train with the guys. I didn’t want to be limited in my training partners. Second, I was feeling like a guy and not wanting to get misgendered as a girl. Had it been in the States, I think I would have just said, “My pronouns are he or they,” and let them assume the rest. But it’s not so easy here. So, I just didn’t say anything about it. Third, I wanted to see if I could pass. I wanted to see if I would be treated differently and how that would feel.
Arriving at Training
Earlier today, Timor asked me to send him my picture. A wave of fear came over me as I thought maybe he was trying to figure out what gender I was. Sam is, after all, an androgynous name.
“Why do you ask?” I messaged him.
“So I can give your picture to the reception desk and they won’t charge you an entrance fee,” he explained.
I sent him one of my pictures from a couple days earlier where I was looking appropriately like a teenage boy, acne and all. He responded with a thumbs up emoji. I took a deep breath.
I took a Yandex taxi there, KGZ’s version of Uber.
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| My Yandex driver to the jiujitsu gym. |
When I walked in to the gym, I was 15 minutes early and two men were teaching a kids' jiujitsu class. I stood by the side and just did some joint mobility exercises while I waited. As guys came in to the gym, they approached me and shook my hand. They did not say anything to me, but shaking hands is a common greeting between guys in Muslim countries so it was clear they thought I was a guy.
“It’s working,” I thought. “I’m passing.”
At the end of the kids' class, I introduced myself to the main coach, using my lowest masculine voice, and I explained I was a visitor coming to train for a couple weeks. Timor arrived a couple minutes later and we shook hands.
“So, our coach is out of town, do you mind teaching class for us tonight?” Timor asked in English. “You can give us a seminar."
“Uh, I don’t really know what to teach,” I said.
“Don’t worry. They’re all white belts, just think of something to teach us, it will be fine. If you don’t mind, just show us something you know,” he said.
“OK, sure,” I said and I freaked out inside. This was more attention than I wanted. I also didn’t know what to teach. After a few moments of panic, I finally resolved that I would teach what I had taught many times before doing seminars in China, which was the single arm choke from the back with a transition to arm bar and reverse triangle.
“Just keep your voice low,” I told myself and willed myself to calm down.
From being segregated to the white belt class and only being allowed to train with two other people, to being asked to teach a seminar, presenting as male certainly was a change in perspective and opportunity.
Warming Up
“First, we warm up with basketball,” Timor said.
Suddenly, 10 guys rushed onto the basketball court (which was right next to the jiujitsu mats) and started a game of pickup basketball.
I momentarily freaked out. I hadn’t played basketball in years. But a voice inside my head said, “Yes, you can. You played basketball for 5 years growing up on teams at school, you got this.”
As I ran up and down the court, blocked guys, went for rebounds and layups, the game came back to me quickly and felt like second nature. Like riding a bike. All those years doing drills multiple days a week with the Word of God and St. Maurice teams was suddenly worth it. The times of my youth running up and down the court flooded back to me as I was able to handle the ball with ease.
After I got the ball a few times, I was frustrated because the ball was slightly deflated and hard to dribble. But then the guys explained to me that they were playing a revised version of basketball—it was a combination of rugby and basketball. Dribbling was not required.
You could hold the basketball like a football and run down the court. Also, tackling was allowed. Suddenly my years of playing rugby in college came back to me, and there I was dodging in and out of players, tackling and being tackled. I even made a couple of shots, and the guys patted me on the butt in congratulations. I had never played such a rough and physical sport like that since my rugby days. I’d never played pick-up basketball like that. It made me wish I had played with Ruth and Dad more.
After 25 minutes of sprinting back and forth across the court, I started getting winded and I felt like sitting out.
“If you were a guy, you wouldn’t quit,” I thought to myself, which was a cruel version of misgendering myself.
“Holy shit, I’m in a whole different world here where it’s not okay to just quit, you have to keep pushing yourself,” I thought. It felt good to know that I could and wanted to push myself. I kept going but felt myself slowing down.
Finally, we stopped playing basketball and got onto the jiujitsu mat.
Sparring and Passing
We did a few warm-up drills: front rolls, back rolls, shrimping, stand up and base, and triangles. Then they called me over, and asked me to give the seminar. I started with a basic back take. Then I showed the one-handed kimura, one-handed choke, and arm trap to the choke. After drilling for about 45 minutes, we called it and sparred. I got some submissions and was also submitted. It was exhausting but fun.
We took a bunch of pictures at the end of class.
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| They thought I was a teenage boy. |
Several of the guys were Uyghur and were excited that I could speak their language.
A few of them spoke very good English, explaining that they had been taught English by a Peace Corps volunteer in their village about 20 years ago. One guy even took a video of me speaking Uyghur and put it on his Instagram.
After the pictures, the Uyghur guys all got together suddenly and prayed toward Mecca for 15 minutes or so. I started panicking then—so these guys were more religious than I expected and that kind of freaked me out. What if they found out I am trans?
My heart started beating fast and I felt light headed and sick. I started to have a mini panic attack, just thinking about them putting those pictures on Instagram and getting found out somehow. What if one of the KGZ Top Team guys saw their Instagram?
I walked outside with a million thoughts running through my head. What if I get found out? What if they already know? I thought of some excuses if they confront me—that I had a disease that caused my penis to fall off. That the girl at KGZ Top Team was my twin sister.
Or, I could tell them.
Or, I could just never go back.
Every scenario possible ran through my head.
I was scared. It made me sick to my stomach thinking that I could never really be true to them about who I really am.
Reflections
Afterward, Brai assured me that nobody is going to try to feel your crotch and if they did, they wouldn’t say anything about it. Brai said that men have a “I’m not even going to try or pretend to know or act like I am even thinking about what is going on between your legs.”
Nobody would say anything to me. What would they say? “Wow, you have a small dick”?
I also processed it with my best friend Kevin, who said, “Well you are a guy so it’s not like you’re lying to them.” He encouraged me to get some pepper spray so that I could defend myself if something goes wrong.
My mind was reeling. It was amazing and beautiful; I felt better than I’d felt in my whole life. But at the same time, I was terrified of getting found out. But I loved feeling solidified in my masculine identity.
It felt good, it felt right, but I was terrified and not even sure if I should go back.
I love being a guy. I love being seen as a man. I love being treated as a man. But being trans is hard.
But you know what they say, fear means you’re doing something right. Follow your fear. Embrace your fear. It means you’re stepping outside your comfort zone.
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