This past July I was again privileged to attend the All Tang Soo Do International Championship (which was held in Providence, Rhode Island) as a guest of Grandmaster Charles Ferraro and the Mi Guk Kwan Association, Inc. I have participated in this event several times over the years and always look forward to attending. As is customary because I am his current instructor, Grandmaster Ferraro asked me to make a few comments at the opening ceremony. This year (2007), I selected a theme for my speech which I entitled, "All You Have To Do Is Just Show Up!" The purpose of this article is to restate some of the remarks and comments that I made during that impromptu speech for those that were not in attendance and also to reiterate and explain why I chose this particular title and theme.

First of all, I feel it important to explain why I made the statement earlier that I "was again privileged to attend" this event. As some of you may be aware, throughout my many years of involvement in the martial arts, I have on many occasions organized, coordinated, sponsored and hosted many similar events for a number of martial arts organizations. Therefore, I have a tremendous amount of respect and appreciation for all of the planning, hard work, creativity, coordination as well as the negotiation and organizational skills that are required to sponsor and host an event of this magnitude. And, you know when everything has been properly planned and professionally organized when, "all you have to do is just show up" to be "privileged" enough to be a beneficiary of such a successful, rewarding and memorable event and experience.

After this year's festivities I recommended that in the future Grandmaster Ferraro might consider renaming this event as the Mi Guk Kwan's "Annual Tang Soo Do Exposition" instead of continuing to promote it as a "Championship". The reason for this suggestion is that in addition to the two full days of competition for all Yu Gup Ja, Yu Dan Ja and Ko Dan Ja levels, this year's event included: a variety of seminars and clinics that were personally conducted by Grandmaster Ferraro and the highly accomplished members of the TAC; a special weapons seminar conducted by an Okinawan weapons Master Instructor; an unprecedented certificate and belt awards ceremony of recently promoted Ko Dan Ja; a special Mi Guk Kwan Hall of Fame inductee ceremony and barbeque dinner; business seminars and a special breakfast for studio owners; an annual Banquet which included outstanding traditional Korean entertainment; a variety of social activities for the children in attendance; the opportunity for everyone in attendance to meet Tang Soo Do practitioners (of all levels) from all over the country and around the world; and of course, ample opportunity to develop new relationships and to share in an incredible Tang Soo Do experience. And believe it or not, all those in attendance needed to do to benefit from these activities was "to just show up!"

Of course if you didn't show up this year, you will never really be able to fully comprehend and appreciate exactly what you missed. I, therefore, challenge all of you to be in attendance at next year's event which is scheduled to be held in July in Arlington Texas (near Dallas), to ensure that you not miss out on another opportunity to benefit from a Tang Soo Do experience that you will never be able to acquire or replicate anywhere else. If everything that you are currently doing in Tang Soo Do simply occurs at the dojang where you train or in the region that you reside in, then you are hindering yourself from being able to have a more complete Tang Soo Do training experience by not attending events such as this. And remember, "all you have to do is just show up!"