Savawud Kongkiatttiwong, 24, is a human resources officer at Toyota Motors. He’s tall, slim and wears glasses—an educated urbanite your mom would approve of. But twice a week, he’s on a mat somewhere on Surawong, trying to wrap his legs around another guy’s neck to stop the stream of blood to his opponent’s brain. He practices Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, a martial art that’s rapidly gaining popularity in Bangkok, if the new gyms that opened in the past few months are anything to go by.
Brazilian Jiu Jitsu’s origins go back to the early 1900s, but it took the boom of the Ultimate Fighting Championship on US pay-per-view television to put it on the map. In the UFC’s “no holds barred” fights, it seemed that nothing could stop Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. “I used to do Muay Thai and taekwondo,” says Savawud. “But when I saw UFC, four years ago, I switched to Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.”
Savawud is already a blue belt but Bangkok is still playing catch up. “We’re a little behind,” says Adam Kayoom, a black belt, three-time Australian champion and one-time Southern State Brazilian champion. Originally from Australia, he currently teaches at gyms in Bangkok. “Thais have a lot of potential,” he says. “They’ve crossed over into international boxing really well, so why not Brazilian Jiu Jitsu?”
Here, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu started picking up at Bangkok Fight Club, a gym frequented mostly by expats. It is Niti Techottiasnee, founder of Executive Martial Arts Center (EMAC), who really helped to take the sport to Thais. “Five years ago, when I started teaching, I was just a white belt with three months of training. But there were no instructors in Bangkok willing to come to my gym.”
Now Niti is close to getting a purple belt and regularly gets top instructors like Kayoom to teach at his gym. Meanwhile, Atiwat Suvinijjit and Satoru Luke Chayavichitsilp, who used to practice at EMAC, have both opened their own gyms in the past year: 3 Monkeeez and Bangkok BJJ (See Grapple Here). “Unlike the expat crowd, most of the Thai practitioners are still university students,” says Kayoom. “So we hope they’ll spread the gospel.”
As well as being popular, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu has also proven its efficiency in self-defense. “It’s probably the only martial art where a white belt already has the skills to get out of, if not win, a street fight,” Niti says. “This is a sport about the little guy learning how to defeat the bigger guy.” For Kayoom, another factor is that you train the skills most needed in a tight spot: “It teaches you how to control yourself in certain situations that could be risky. You put yourself in uncomfortable predicaments [while training] and you know how to get out of them. If you’re on the ground, you know how to get out of that and get back up.”
What really gets people hooked to Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, though, is the mental dimension. It’s often compared to chess because of the complexity of the moves and counter-moves. “It makes you know yourself,” says Surawud. “And it teaches you to stay calm.” Kayoom describes it as a process of increasing self-awareness: “You can get quite a buzz from learning how to control yourself in certain situations that could be risky. Compared to a gym, BJJ gives you the same workout, but you not only look good, you also feel good. It’s an extra challenge and it exercises your aptitude in dealing with your emotions.”
Grapple Here
Bangkok’s Brazilian Jiu Jitsu schools
EMAC
3/F, Executive Building, 410/3 Surawong Rd. 02-631-4606.
www.emacthailand.com
NEW> Bangkok BJJ
15 Sukhumvit Soi 1, Sukhumvit Rd. No phone, visit www.bkkbjj.com
NEW> 3 Monkeeez Jiu Jitsu
2/F, 39 Coffee Bar, 573/140 Soi Ramkamheang 39, Wangthonlang. 08-1616-6785. www.3monkeeez.com
Bangkok Fight Club
10/F, Panjit Tower. 117 Soi Thonglor, Sukhumvit Soi 55. 08-1846-2010.
NEW> Boxer Rebellion.
Not exactly a BJJ school, they teach MMA and no-gi (see Tap Talk) fighting techniques.
11/F, Sukhumvit Suites, Unit No. 19/92. Sukhumvit Soi 13. 08-6610-9230.
Tap Talk
Know your MMA from your BJJ
BJJ: Short for Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, a grappling sport developed in the early 20th century in Brazil.
Grappling: Fighting using holds, chokes and/or joint-locks but no punching or kicking.
MMA: Short for Mixed Martial Arts, a full contact combat sport using a wide range of techniques from Muay Thai to Karate.
Tapping Out: During a fight, tapping the mat or your opponent means your opponent has won, usually because you are in a hold or choke that you can’t escape from.
Gi/No-Gi: Gi is the Japanese word for a martial arts training uniform. The Brazilian Jiu Jitsu gi is similar to a Judo gi. BJJ can also be practiced in shorts and t-shirt, and is then called no-gi BJJ. No-gi BJJ with some striking thrown in (such as Muay Thai) constitutes a solid base for MMA.
