On Being Asian in the World of Strength

Tomorrow night, Manny Pacquiao will defend his legacy as one of the greatest fighters of this generation. He is such a phenomenon in the Philippines that the incidence of crime literally drops on fight night because everyone is too busy cheering on their native son. Pacquiao is revered by many as one of the few Asian role models in existence. Rarer still, he is an Asian man excelling in the world of combat sports and physical activity.

My parents were born in Indonesia. My dad is Chinese by blood and my mom is a little bit Chinese, a little bit of Indonesian, and, strangely enough, has a surname that could be Indian or Filipino. I grew up in Lubbock, and have since lived in Texas for the large majority of my life. I want to get strong and fight for many reasons, but one of them is undeniably the fact that the only Asians I saw in popular culture were known for their martial arts prowess. As a kid, the only people who looked like me on television were the Black Power Ranger, Jackie Chan, and Liu Kang from Mortal Kombat.

I was skinny and of average height when I first picked up a barbell. My parents were supportive but told me that the Chinese looked at extra mass as useless and purely cosmetic, that the culture frowned upon ‘mirror muscle’ as vain and a sign of low intelligence. It made sense to me because even Bruce Lee, arguably the face of martial arts, probably never weighed more than 160lbs. Despite being an incredible physical specimen, Bruce Lee also dispatched his onscreen opponents with impeccable technique and skill instead of raw power. The largest male Chinese weightlifter placing gold at the 2008 Olympics was Lu Yong, who weighs in at somewhere between 170 and 190lbs for competition.

I’ve found myself in many American gyms surrounded by a sea of faces that are white, black, Hispanic, Arab, or Indian, but rarely East Asian. I witnessed the same trend at Saekson Janjira’s Muay Thai classes, the boxing club at my old school in New Orleans, and in nearly every group I’ve encountered practicing Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. I think the reason for this is that aggression and violence are universally frowned upon in Asian culture, and both of those things are necessary to excel in weight training and certainly unavoidable in a fight. Traditionally, the ability to maintain your dignity and composure under any circumstance is highly regarded by Asians.

At the same time, my best friend has Mongolian parents, and he can bench more than me and we’re rough equals when it comes to boxing and wrestling. Just last month I invited one of my friends, an Indian guy who plays guitar in a hardcore punk rock band, to work out with me, and he deadlifted an easy 365lbs. for several repetitions on his very first try. What many older Asians don’t realize is that weight training and martial arts also necessitate diligence, proper planning, hard work, and the desire to be better than everyone else—all of which are values that were instilled in me by my mom and dad.

As I write this, an extended preview of Pacquiao versus Marquez III is playing in the background, and I’ve just read about an MMA fight scheduled to take place in Jakarta, where my mom grew up. Two Japanese guys (one of which is the always-exciting Kid Yamamoto) will fight on the undercard of the UFC’s debut on the FOX network tomorrow, and next week, Vietnamese kickboxer Cung Le will take on Wanderlei Silva in the co-main event of UFC 139. Being Asian and training makes me a minority within a minority, but somehow, I feel like that is due to change.