Our 5 Odd Squad Youth athletes participating in the OSP Physical Literacy
and the Duke of Edinburgh Award programs have recently completed 16
days of traveling extensively through two Asian countries: Taiwan & Japan.
While travelling on this OSP travel trip, they were able to hike 3 mountains;
visit Yangmingshan Hot Springs; experience 5 major cities; undertake
extensive judo training at Chin-I’s original judo club in Taiwan, train with 2
national university teams and work out with 4 high school judo teams. The
OSP youth team attended 12 practices of very intense judo training (3 hour
practices) over 16 days and in two countries, including private training and
workouts with Yang Yung-Wei – Taiwan’s judo sports superstar and silver
medallist in the Tokyo Olympics / former world champion in U60kg. They
were also able to attend an IJF Judo Grand Slam world event in Tokyo. In
between, there was dedicated homework time, 4 laundry days, and
independent time to explore Taipei, Taichung, Tokyo, Kyoto and all places
in between. The youth team was able to move through airports, customs
over multiple flights, travel all over Taiwan in a 9-person van; drift pass
Mount Fuji on a clear via day high-speed bullet train to Kyoto; drag lots of
luggage with multiple judo gis via the very busy Tokyo Subway system
including pulling luggage up countless stairs to finish up the last destination
in Kyoto, Japan.
The warm welcome and incredible hospitality was outstanding from our
hosts in Taiwan and Japan. A few of the kids were able to pick-up new
language skills, new techniques and drills for judo, new food tastes, new
high school friendships and much more. This trip was not your average
tourist trip to another country, but a hard and challenging take on travel,
and brought the youth out of their comfort zones exposing them to different
cultures, and having them learning and adapting to new environments and
unpredictable situations over a very short period of time.
This team effort would not have been possible without the support of our
Odd Squad organization. Special thanks to our Pres Bob Rich, ED Mark
Steinkampf, corporate supporter Doug Lunde, the City of Burnaby
(provided 100 pins for gifts as well as general grant support to help with
travel) and Brian on helping with the fundraising through personaldonations, grants and our ongoing bottle drive campaign (over 8000 bottles
collected!). We also had help from OSP Junior Judo Coach Yuki
Yokosawa in setting up high school judo training in Japan, and OSP’s
Wakana for travel arrangements in Kyoto. Our former OSP youth coach
Yoshimasa Matsuoka was able to connect and help guide us around
Tokyo. And special thanks to OSP member Chris Graham for joining this
trip and helping chaperone as well as be such a good sport and excellent
liaison for our hosts!
Overseas travel is expensive and not everyone is able to afford these
opportunities. Special thanks to the OSP families who believe in and
support unique sport developmental opportunities for youth like this. These
5 youth are very lucky to get this experience. The cultural experience along
with judo training has provided an amazing journey. This trip will be forever
in their memory and hopefully they continue to make positive life and
choices, continue with their OSP volunteerism, and pay it forward for the
future.
Chin-I Hsiang,
Director, Physical Literacy Programs,
Odd Squad Productions
