Continuing Rudeness

I witnessed a boxer shove a female volunteer with the World Boxing Championships yesterday. I had gone to see some of the matches that afternoon. Since I had my volunteer badge on me, I decided to ride the shuttle bus back downtown from the event venue. The female volunteer was trying to make sure that the bus we were on wouldn't be overcrowded. It could only hold so many, and since it was a coach bus, standing passengers were not allowed. One boxer decided he was going to get a seat regardless. She grabbed his arm, but he snatched away from her grip.

She told a police officer and another volunteer who were standing outside of the bus, "They are not supposed to touch me!" Then she snapped at the guy, "Do you want to walk to the hotel? It can be arranged!" He probably didn't understand English, but there was no mistaking that everyone on the bus knew she was ticked off. She told someone via her walkie-talkie, "These guys don't respect a woman in charge!" as she reported the boxer's behavior before the bus took off. That's been a major problem throughout the entire event.

Jordon, a guy who showed up once a few weeks ago, returned to the gym last night. He claimed he just now scraped together money for the gym fee. Then he proceeded to tell JJ about his training regime, which included shadowboxing with 10 pound weights strapped around his arm. JJ was giving him pointers on how to use free weights during shadowboxing to make his hands faster, but Jordan wasn't listening. That was the first strike. After all that pumped up talk in the hall about training, Jordon didn't do much once the gym door was open. He spent some of his time just staring at people when he wasn't half-doing the moves he claimed he already knew how to do. He had pointedly ignored me and Nina, the only two women in the gym. That was the second strike, so I didn't feel the need to act friendly.

In fact, he stepped on my foot twice while doing some light sparring with Ben. The sparring was a no-no, because Steve hadn't approved it. I was sitting off to the side, watching. I hoped Jordan wouldn't accidently hurt Ben. The whole time Jordon was bragging on his dubious skills: "Man, I could have hit you twenty times by now!" He wasn't aware of the space they had -- they were sparring amongst the heavy bags -- which is how my foot was stepped on. The second time, I pointed out to Jordon that he needs to watch out. He told Ben, "Let's move over here," but he never apologized to me. That was the third strike.

Steve was in the middle of showing Andy something, and Jordon felt the need to interrupt by giving Andy advice. Since he had already struck out, I didn't know what to call that. I knew Steve didn't care for that much, but to his credit, he held back on calling Jordan on it. It was hard to tell what was up with Jordan. I've said it before -- boxing gyms attract some odd folks, and it looks like we've got another one.