Happened to watch Karate Kid in school the other day, and as much as it was predictable, the story line was enjoyable. There were some cringe-worthy moments.
English
Mandarin Chinese
The 1st time he meets the cloaked stranger is the first day they're in China.
Dre still remembers the heart wrenching feeling in his heart, like a gaping wound, still raw from bleeding.
He misses Detroit, there's no denying that.
"Stick to the main streets."
It's just one line, in crisp, clear English.
He takes this warning at face value, willing to believe a stranger in a strange land because the cloaked stranger speaks English.
Dutifully, he tugs his mom away from the side alley she had wanted to take a short cut through.
Later on, following a Chinese lady up to their new apartment, he throws a wistful glance out the window, out at the playground.
Harry, a blond haired, blue-eyed kid says hi, and he just thinks to himself.
Maybe things won't be so bad here.
Never let it be said that Dre Parker gives up easily.
The Chinese lady mutters a couple lines of somewhat broken English.
"The landlady, her English not so good. You call Mr. Han, his English, very good."
It's decipherable, but, he notes with a frown, that the Stranger's was much better.
"You should come by our playground. I'll see you around!"
Harry's farewell was that much more cheery.
"Sure, that'd be cool."
His reciprocation is less than enthusiastic.
He sees a group of drunkards stumbling out the alleyway his mom had almost entered.
The 2nd time he sees the stranger is while out looking for the maintenance man, Mr Han.
Mom says the hot water's spoilt, and he goes out on the hunt for Mr Han.
Unable to speak even the slightest bit of Mandarin, the language barrier proves inconvenient.
The security guard behind his glass screen makes neither heads nor tails of his English.
"Mr. Han?"
At least, he recognises the name.
Jabbering too fast for Dre to comprehend, said security guard has an extremely pleased look on his face.
Lost and bewildered, he has no choice but to nod dumbly and walk out of the housing block.
He picks a random direction and runs.
No less than 3 awkward attempts at communication with other people, Dre is ready to give up.
Quiet chuckles catch his attention.
"That door leads to Mr. Han."
Things devolve from there, really.
He meets Meiying in the park and is smitten, instantaneously.
He gets beaten up by a gang, led by this guy who clearly has a crush on Meiying.
Cheng, he learns is his name.
Then, he learns that this Kung-Fu gang goes to the school he's going to.
He also learns that Meiying is in the same school.
He's glad.
Over the course of a week, he is systematically bullied and degraded.
His mom yaks at him to hang up his jacket.
It's a tipping point, and everything boils over.
He screams and cries, shouts and raves.
"I hate it here! I want to go back home!"
The coil in him loosens, and at the end of his tantrum, he's unwound and spent.
He wanders aimlessly.
The 3rd time he has contact with the Stranger, it's after running out of a Kung-Fu dojo. He had intended on enrolling, but Cheng and gang are there as well. They yell Mandarin phrases he cannot understand, but he can feel the malice and strength those words hide.
"No pain, no weakness, no mercy. An enemy deserves to feel pain. Do you agree?"
Too surprised, he doesn't answer the question.
"Wow! This is the first time you've said more than a sentence to me!"
His questions pour out one after another.
The Stranger, cloaked in navy blue, now that he can see him clearly, keeps to the shadows.
But when he says he agrees, he gets the feeling the Stranger is appraising him.
"Then perhaps you can understand Cheng. You are his enemy. But no pain, no weakness, no mercy. People like them…that is their greatest flaw."
He does.
He does understand Cheng.
That's why, a few days later, he drenches the entire gang with filthy rainwater.
He's beaten real good, and it hurts, sure.
But it's worth it.
He doesn't regret any of his actions one little bit.
He shields his face, waiting for a blow that never comes.
Mr Han, the maintenance guy, is amazing.
He uses his attackers against each other.
Within moments, even Cheng is on the ground.
But Dre…Dre is the only one who saw the dark blur who diverted the kick at Mr Han's unprotected back.
The Stranger had merely changed the angle of trajectory slightly, but the fragment of time he gained for Mr Han was enough.
That is the 4th time Dre sees his mysterious guardian.
Upon being lifted into sturdy arms, he watches detachedly as Cheng and gang flee.
Looking into the shadows of the building, he shoots a smile and mouths, "Thank you," to the person he knows is there.
Mr Han probably chalks this up to him having hallucinations.
Dre is alright letting him think that.
With his magical fire powers, the maintenance guy heals him up, and all his forming bruises no longer hurt.
Looks, can be deceiving, in one way and in others.
"That is not Kung Fu. There are no bad students, only bad teachers."
As much as Dre would like to deny it, he considers himself a fairly bad student. He wouldn't shove all the blame onto his teachers.
But Mr Han's statement is filled with conviction, and Dre says nothing to argue against his frame of thought.
Offhandedly, Dre then throws out a suggestion, having meant nothing of it.
Now that he muses, sometimes, words left unsaid are often the best.
"We're here to make apologies."
He understands nothing of what Mr Han says, and inwardly he's horrified.
They walked into the dojo, having intended to correct the false, 'bad' teacher.
They also walked in on a student, Liang, one of Cheng's gang attempting to show mercy.
In the end, he's forced to attack his already downed foe, and is presumably slapped for his hesitance.
No pain, no weakness, no mercy.
Do you agree?
Mr Han does most of the talking, and Cheng points at him once.
"He's the one that fought us."
His master smirks almost cruelly, and the students fall back, seating themselves in a ring.
"Prepare for a match."
A hand grips his wrist, and both he, and Mr Han turn to leave.
He mutters down at him, "We are not here to fight."
As they near the door, the imposing master of the dojo, Master Li, holds a hand out, barring their way.
"One of you must fight today."
Dre can only turn frightened, uncomprehending eyes onto Mr Han, who looks unfazed.
He jerks his chin towards a poster on the wall, and seemingly, Master Li lets them go.
"However please ask your students to leave mine alone while he trains."
Mr Han lays down what sounds like a criteria, and the reply is condescending but an affirmative.
"My students will leave that little thing alone."
The language barrier is bad, but human body language is universal.
In exchange for not being beaten up, he's been entered into the Championships.
There's no way he can get out of this, and the only thing he can think of is that he's going to die.
"I will train you."
Doubtful not in his self-appointed teacher, but in himself, his brows furrow.
Nonetheless, he nods determinedly.
13 days into training, and all he's been doing is hanging up his jacket.
He arrives every evening at Mr Han's home, and politely asks to come in.
Only upon being given permission can he go to his training grounds.
He walks past a beat up car that Mr Han polishes and fixes as he 'trains'.
A stick is stuck in a thick pole, and he hangs his jacket on it.
He takes his jacket off,
Then hangs it up,
Then wears it,
Then takes it off,
Dumping it on the ground,
Picks it up,
Hangs it up,
Wears it,
And repeats.
The monotony drives him mad.
"Kung Fu is a lifestyle, not a fighting technique, Xiao Dre."
He figures this is Mr Han's way of inculcating respect and self-discipline.
But 13 days, is more than enough for him to crack.
And he cracks.
The 5th time he meets the Stranger, is within Mr Han's backyard slash training ground.
"The movements will train your muscle memory."
He looks up at the Stranger, and while he doesn't see what actions his body remembers, he appreciates the explanation.
When the stranger lunges at him, he raises his arms to block, and when the stranger aims for his neck, he ducks.
The Stranger resettles, his cloak melding back seamlessly.
Under the hood, he can see a smile curve into place.
"Putting on your jacket and then picking it up. Understand?"
He does.
Mr Han comes in a moment later, and tells him to put in more attitude into what he's doing.
He asks Mr Han to tell him why they're doing all this.
The Stranger is right, and Dre, armed with prior knowledge, manages to shove Mr Han back.
He grins like an idiot for the rest of the day, feeling accomplished.
Secretly, he reflects on how short the Stranger is.
Not that he would admit it, he knows he's a midget, but where does that place the Stranger, who is barely taller than him?
His training regimen is upped and he does high kicks, push ups, pull ups and endurance, strength and speed training. The last is something he asked for.
Speed is one of his strengths, and he's going to use it.
One of the weekends, Mr Han deems him ready, and they go on a trip.
The train journey is 3 hours, but the trek up the Great Wall is much, much longer.
Along the way, he learns what water in Chinese is.
"Mr Han, I really need some water. I'm super thirsty."
In the end, he does get his water.
At the pinnacle of their climb, a tower awaits.
He watches a lady and a hooded cobra both balancing in a precarious position.
It's only later that he realises the snake for copying the lady and not the other way around.
He finds this crazily cool.
"I wanna learn the snake thing and control people!"
Off a slab of carved marble, he drinks deeply.
It's a self-sustaining water fountain, and the heart of all Kung Fu.
Ying and Yang.
"Balance and peace. Your mind must be as calm as the unbroken reflection of water."
Training passes in a blur, and within weeks he has progressed far.
Training has become his life, because he's going to the championships, and he's going to win.
Within this period of time, he sees the Stranger more and more often.
Over the time, he helps him develop his own, personal style.
"Hit hard and fast. Never let them hit you. Never."
He obeys this, adhering to it steadfastly.
Picking out holes and weak points, the Stranger hones his reflexes and ability to adapt upon dissecting someone's play style.
"Never let your guard down, and show mercy only in the killing blow."
This he can accept, because he has no intention of committing murder.
The Stranger takes hold of bamboo poles with loops on either end.
He controls, and lets Dre control their movement.
"Know your enemy, and you will know how to control him."
It's on his off day that he finds his Master drinking and wallowing in his misery.
The car he fixed up a tiny bit every lesson, he was smashing it up.
Red-eyed and emotionally a wreck, he watches and accepts, the worst of his Master.
Dre is 12, but he knows.
"I can only hope we were arguing about something important. I was angry. So angry I lost control of the car."
His Master is still pained by the loss.
A steep hill, an argument, a car crash, and 2 deaths.
Every year he'd fix the car.
Every year on the death anniversary, he'd smash the car up.
Like with the Stranger, Dre takes hold of the bamboo poles, looping them onto Mr Han's hands.
Tugging, he leads him out of the car.
They move to the training grounds, and the Stranger's voice resonates.
"Upwards, you reach for the sky. Downwards, you remain grounded in morals. Eastwards, you reach for the rising sun. Westwards, you know that everything ends. Life will always bring you down, but it is your choice whether you want to get up."
He gets up, and fights.
He knows because that sounds like what drove his own family apart.
The next time he sees the Stranger, is after the Championships.
He's won, and couldn't be happier.
Cheng and his gang respect him now, and they have recognised Mr Han as their master.
He doesn't hold any ill will against Liang for hurting his leg, he will hold it against Master Li.
The look on his face when his students bowed to Mr Han was priceless.
But everyone, at least, almost everyone, missed that face morphing into hatred.
2 blurs collide in the area before Dre and Mr Han.
It catches everyone off guard, but Dre recognises the navy blue cloak.
His Stranger gets up first.
"That was aimed to kill. If I wasn't too busy feeling horrified, I would have commended your skill, Li."
Shielded by the Stranger, his former students look horrified.
He doesn't understand the Mandarin, but he knows it's bad.
Mr Han and the Stranger converse in rapid fire Mandarin, and at the end of it, he takes off his hood.
Plain ear length black hair, a gently pointed chin, slightly tanned skin, and glittering black eyes.
In short, his Stranger looked perfectly ordinary, if not for the fact that he was special to Dre.
Owing someone does that.
He smiles, and Dre is struck by how feminine that makes the Stranger look.
"You can call me Grey."
There are so many things he wants to say but when he blurts it out everything comes out wrong.
"Why did you help us?"
He winces, knowing how coarse and ungrateful that sounds.
But Grey…Grey merely laughs.
"No pain, no weakness, no mercy. Li was once my friend. I… would still say so."
Mr Han gestures at Grey.
"Once, there were 3 students. They had a flaw each, so said their Master. Grey was too merciful."
He gestures at Master Li.
"Black was too inclined to causing pain."
He gestures at himself.
"And the last, White was weak in resolve."
Grey turns back to Master Li's former disciples, and Mr Han translates for me.
"No pain, means to avoid feeling pain yourself, and to avoid causing it to others. No weakness, refers to your resolve. Finally, no mercy means to never, let yourself be taken advantage of."
They look back at their still downed Master, and back at each other.
How terribly corrupted the originally right thoughts have become.
Still everything has a happy ever after.
Master Li is imprisoned on attempted murder charges, and Grey takes in his former students.
He takes over their dojo, and they continue practising, now changed people.
Dre joins them, and some days, Mr Han teaches.
Suffice to say, the Elemental Dragons have not lost the Championships since.