My Kid Can Beat up Your Kid

This post was written by Robyn

In December of 2019 Dad took me to front Sight. Front Sight is a cool place that Dad is taking us to when we turn 15. He took June a couple years ago, and she came back a pro fighter. I was pretty excited, but also pretty nervous, because June came back with MASSIVE bruises and she was sore for several days. I was ready to take on the challenge though.

DAY ZERO: Front Sight is in Nevada, in the middle of nowhere. I got some driving experience on the way down, because Dad didn't want to drive the whole way, and I wanted a shot at all this freeway driving. We stopped to eat some food at Rib and Chop House.

And since they gave us crayons I drew a little picture. I had never eaten Rib eye and it was really good. We drove the rest of the way to the AirBNB and met our hosts. Cindy and Keith. Both of them were really nice. She was working on getting a degree in hospitality or something, and her project was the AirBNB, and if I was her teacher, I'd give her and A, because it was really good. They had food and fridge space available, and soap in the showers. Keith really liked soccer or football or something, and we came home one night and we was in the garage, smoking a weird tube thing like the caterpillar from Alice in wonderland, and rooting for his team. They were really decked out for Christmas, it was a little crazy, but super fun.

Our room was snug, and pretty nice. This picture was before all the pain and suffering...

This is the view from the door. Pretty compact. The host was a photographer, so he had a bunch of nice prints up. Quick story about the bed with the red blanket on it: It was terrible! The first night that we came back from fighting all day, I had the taller bed because Dad wanted to be closer to the humidifier. So I slept on that bed. I hardly slept at all that night. I thought maybe it was just me, but the next day, Dad switched me beds because he wanted me to actually sleep, and then he hardly slept at all on that bed. But after that when we came home, it didn't matter. We were so exhausted that we slept through basically everything.

DAY ONE: Here we are in the 'Arena'. (Just a big room with mats that we would fight on a lot) It was frigid in the mornings and we wore our coats through most of the opening exercises and stretching, but usually it got pretty warm in the afternoon, so we would take them off.

That day we worked on hand to hand combat. We learned the four gates drill and a couple punches. We did all of the stuff over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again.
It was pretty exhausting, but Dad said that it was nothing compared to the stuff that he and June did.
By the end of the day, I was tired, but not really sore.

That night we ate at Ohjah, a Japanese steak house and hibachi. Dad took me there because he wanted a cool experience. It was a tepanyaki grill type a thing, and it was really cool.

I was really glad they gave us forks because I was really terrible with the chop sticks. This picture is right before I stopped using them. 

The Asian chef came in and he's cracking jokes right and left, and he's getting out his cooking tools and whatever, then he lit everything on fire. It was crazy.

After everything was nice and hot he cracked some eggs to make that fancy rice that Japanese people really like. I thought it was pretty cool, and Dad happened to catch a video.  

DAY TWO: Next day Dad braided my hair. He doesn't really know how to braid, but it looked close to a french that turned into a dutch, and it held up for most of the morning. On this day we did some kicks and some situations that could happen, like what do to if a person grabs your collar, or what to do if a person comes up behind you and puts an arm around your neck, or if a person grabs your wrists. That's Tracy who is fighting with me in that video.

We also happened to see Kolby and KJ there. It was really a strange moment. Me and Dad are sitting on the other side of the room, looking at these two people who are complete look alikes to our relatives, and we're just staring.
We decided that we would go talk to them on day three, but they didn't stay for the knife defense, which was really too bad, because it would have been a weird moment when they saw the pictures we had.

Day two was winding down and coming to an end, so we got some pictures with the instructors that were pretty nice and funny. That's Phil on the left, and Peter on the Right. They were both really nice, and helped me out a bunch. I was easily the youngest person there, and I think they felt good helping me out. Whenever they see my dad in later trips they ask if I'm still kicking butt, and he says yes.

We ate at a funky Indian restaurant that night called Mantra Masala. We walked in, and there was nobody there. The store owner came out and gave us a seat. The really fun part of that meal was the plinky music playing in the background. It was a sitar or something, and the music was just loud enough that you definitely had to talk a little louder than normal, and when nothing was being said, we were both just listening to the funny music playing.
The food was fabulous though. I really liked it. It all came out in these little pots, and you could just dish yourself up. They had a spicy scale, and Dad got something pretty spicy, and I got something mild. It was really good. They had naan, which made the food even better.

Dad also made me try this mango drink that he said he loved. I'm not a super fan of mango, but the drink was sweet and a good balance to the mildly spicy food I was eating. Overall, the meal was super good.

DAY THREE: This was the first day of knife defense. It was all drills about what to do if an attacker comes at you with a knife, if you have a knife, or if you both have knives. They gave us all pocket knives that flip out, and had us practice with them. It was very educational. We didn't get any pictures from this day, but we did get pictures of where we ate that night! We went to this place called Texas de Brazil. The food there was amazing, but it was also really expensive. The first thing you did was go get some salad or whatever, but here's the pro tip. Don't get any salad. Just get the beans and rice, because that's classic Brazilian food.
Here's the best part, these people dressed up in nice clothes come to your table with huge pieces of meat on a stick and they ask you if you want some. If you say yes, they cut you a piece. and then you can eat it. IT'S AWESOME!! And it all tastes AMAZING!! The sad part about this, is that I couldn't fit all the meat I wanted on my plate because I had too much salad. But it was a really cool experience.

DAY FOUR: Last day! This day was all knife defense, and some special situations. Near the end we put away the knives and worked on some more punches because if you do the punches right, no one wants to bother you. The trouble is, they're kinda hard to get right. During lunch, me and Dad compared wounds. Apparently, if you punch too hard and often enough, you get a little blisterish thing between your ring finger and pinky, because both of us had one. Every day we ate lunch in the car because it was cheap, and we could then spend more on dinner.

If you look closely in this next video, you can see some of the instructors that helped us out, while also seeing how to preform a punch correctly. (The girl who I'm fighting with is named Hannetka, or Hananiah or something. She said it was from the bible. She told everyone to just call her Hannah though.) You can tell if they're an instructor if they are wearing a black or gray shirt with a white front sight logo over the heart, and tactical pants (Tannish pants with a lot of pockets. Phil said, earlier in the week, that if some guy was to come into a store or something and start shooting people, he would shoot him first, because of the tactical pants. Smart guys with guns wear tactical pants.) There is some guy in the back who I can't remember his name, but he always had energy, even if it was the end of the day, and everyone was pretty tired. He always had energy. Then there is Franky who walks by just as the video is starting, and then you can see Chris, fighting with a guy in a yellow shirt. Chris was the instructor for the knife class and his dad was the instructor for the hand to hand combat class. (Side note: Chris would always say some scenario and then say 'That's not how it works, okay?' then he would describe how bad guys actually work, and how to realistically defend yourself. He said it at least fifteen times during our four day class) You can see some other guy who I didn't catch his name, and then Peter, way in the back wearing the gray, and then you can see Day, the guy with the eye patch. He never told us why he wore it, but it made him look pretty cool.

We took a picture by the sign, because you always have to do that, and then we hit the road. Sadly we didn't go to any cool restaurant because we wanted to get home as soon as possible. I think we grabbed Wendy's or something on our way back.

See you later Nevada!