Dragon Boat

Okay, this might seem a bit of a stretch, but Dragon Boat figures into Urban Flute Project. I pride myself on a 6+ L lung capacity - handy for those long phrases - and I owe that in part to 5:30 a.m. swims as a teenager with Kingfish in Ottawa…special thanks to my parents for their car-pooling efforts and helping out when I occasionally slept through my alarm!

Beyond sport’s role in enhancing physio and building a sense of team spirit, musicians often find sport rich in analogy for enhanced education and confidence - the groundbreaking ‘Inner Tennis’ and the like often figure in pedagogical discussions relating to performance preparation, along with discipline, training schedules and such techniques as visualization.

For me, Dragon Boat was enshrouded in mystery for the longest time, and I realize now that it still is, since I’ve started in the off-season - finally won over by my neighbour, Xenos, who’s been at it a few years, and recently travelled to Japan to compete - and all I really know is the tank at the Mississauga Canoe Club.

The pratice tank reminds me of my year in Cambridge, grade 11 and being part of crew at BB&N, out rowing on the Charles, where we had dimly lit boathouses with practise tanks just at water level…the Mississauga Canoe Club has one of the only paddling tanks in the Greater Toronto, and it has turned out some of Canada’s finest Olympians!

A variety of sites are listed below…Amateur Sport and The Arts often fight for scraps at the funding table…perhaps Urban Flute Project can help forge an allegiance?!

wwww.mississaugacanoeclub.ca/programsdragon.php

www.mastersswimmingontario.ca/index.html

www.bbns.org/athletics.htm

BB&N espouses the philosophy of “educational athletics,” participating and competing in athletics in an effort to learn more about oneself and the world. Goal-setting and challenge, teamwork and self-confidence, succeeding and failing, are some of the lessons learned and values strengthened through involvement in athletics.

www.gokingfish.on.ca/