Survival artist

Senior Kim Long, a French and biology major from Munster, Ind., explains that martial arts are about more than just fighting. They are about building confidence and knowing what situations to avoid. Sometimes surviving is about more than the physical.

What kind of martial arts are you involved in?

I have a black belt in taekwondo and am working toward a blue belt in hapkido.

How long have you been practicing them?

I started in taekwondo  my second semester during my freshman year here at IU, and I started hapkido my sophomore year.

How did you get involved?

When I was young, I always kind of admired martial arts, but I never got a chance to get into them. And then coming here to IU, I found out IU actually has a very large, very well-known martial arts program. So I attended the Martial Arts Fest that is held by the SRSC and (IU Campus Recreational Sports)  and just kind of chose taekwondo.

How often do you train?

I usually train twice a week, Monday and Wednesday, for about an hour and a half, two hours. When I was training for my black belt last semester, I was doing probably triple the amount of time because Saturday we had four hour practices.

What are some situations in which martial arts can help you survive?

Martial arts definitely help in any situation where you might feel uncomfortable just on a day-to-day basis. So walking alone on campus, walking in a sketchy neighborhood, anything like that. It can really give you the ability to defend yourself but also the confidence to walk strong and avoid that situation in the first place. As a woman, this is especially important. I studied abroad last spring in France. The men in Europe are definitely a little more aggressive than the men here, so there were uncomfortable situations. My training in the martial arts definitely helped me survive those situations.

What are some basic self-defense/survival skills you are taught?

One of the first things my instructor taught us was if you’re approached in a dark alley, someone comes up to you and threatens you with a knife or a gun, whatever, and they say give me your wallet, take out your wallet and give it to them and walk away. Get away from that situation. That was sort of interesting to me just because stereotypical thoughts of martial arts is that ‘oh you would take them down or you would defend yourself.’ But really, martial arts teaches you how to avoid putting yourself in a bad situation. In that case, what is more important: your life or your wallet?

How can you transfer those self-defense skills into other aspects of life?

Martial arts definitely teaches you discipline, as well. So besides the physical aspect, you also get the mental aspect: the confidence, the discipline, and all of that. For me, it’s really situational analysis as well. Again, going to a survival type of situation, if you’re walking alone down a dark alley, being aware of your surroundings. Where are the shadows? Where can people pop out?

How is survival addressed specifically in martial arts?

We specifically train joint locks, which are basically when you put somebody’s joints into a situation when it’s “locked” and they can’t really control what they are doing. You have control, whether it be the wrist or the shoulder. You can apply pain. You can break their wrist if you need to, break their joint. We specifically train one-step, self-defense off of a punch, or if someone is hitting you. We specifically train those. Those are required for belt tests and everything like that. First of all, you learn the philosophy of avoiding situations. But you also learn the skills of what happens if somebody actually does attack you.