 "Photo: Stephanie Colaianni")
No, it's not Jackie Chan - it's a 5-foot-10-inch Asian guy jumping from building to building on the Boca campus.
But, he's not just Asian, he's Vietnamese, and he's not just jumping, he's performing the art of parkour.
"I'm not a daredevil or anything, I'm just training and FAU has so many great places to do it," says Nhan Du, who graduated from FAU last August with a degree in English.
In fact, for the last seven months, he's been training six other FAU students. Du says college campuses like FAU are the best places to train and practice because of the variety of rails, staircases and walls.
Although Du has only been practicing parkour on campus for a little more than a year, his roots go back to when he was younger.
"The monkey bars and the jungle gym - that's where I lived," Du says, adding that he always visualized himself climbing trees and rocks as a child.
Being a Jackie Chan fan and playing the video game Assassin's Creed helped him push further in the sport, which he discovered on YouTube.
Jumping around on campus hasn't really made him a top priority with FAU police. Although they aren't fans, they usually just tell him to stop. In the Breezeway, the professors are the ones who typically rat him out to FAU police.
"What are they going to give me a ticket for, anyways? I'm not doing anything reckless. I'm not jumping for the sake of jumping," Du says. "No, you can't go up the stairs that way; you have to use the steps like everyone else."
The spot you may find him the most on the Boca campus is the Social Science (spaceship) Building. He likes the ledge behind the building because there's a lot of variety for different jumps and moves. The highest he's been, to his memory, has to be the awning above the Starbucks at the end of the Breezeway, which Du says is about 13 feet.
When it comes to the sport of parkour, Du says safety is a high priority. He doesn't recommend anyone just watch a traceur - a person who does parkour - then attempt to jump to the second floor of a building using just walls. (See page 10 for tips on how to do it yourself.)
Du currently has a few friends that he trains, and he always makes them try their moves on the ground.
"It's really important to get the message out that parkour can be very dangerous and should be approached with caution," says Du, who has never broken a bone from parkour. "Parkour is not only for the super-elite, but it takes time. Anyone can do it."
What is PARKOUR? Wikipedia.com says: "Parkour or 'l'art du deplacement' (English: 'the art of movement') is an activity with the aim of moving from one point to another as efficiently and quickly as possible, using principally the abilities of the human body."
AmericanParkour.com says: "Parkour is the art of moving through your environment using only your body and the surroundings to propel yourself. It can include running, jumping, climbing, even crawling, if that is the most suitable movement for the situation."
Reference.com says: "A person who does parkour is a traceur. Traceur and traceuse are substantives derived from the French verb tracer which normally mean 'to trace,' or 'to draw,' but also translates as 'to go fast.'"
from traceur Nhan Du Practice safely. Just because you see someone on YouTube diving off a two-story building doesn't mean that you should. Before that dive took place, the traceur took hundreds and hundreds of smaller jumps, gradually building up to that level. Even then, it's not a routine practice. Consider big jumps to be stunts, and stunts need serious preparation to go well. 2 Pace yourself. Parkour is a strenuous physical activity that takes time and patience to master. Just because someone else might be more experienced or progressing faster than you doesn't mean you have to match him or her jump for jump. It's the same way you wouldn't start playing football by facing off against the pros. Little league was invented for a reason. Start small and progress.
3 Shoes. In parkour, having the right shoes is important both for proper conditioning and for safety. A good pair of running shoes will usually do the trick. Just make sure they're light with a relatively flat sole (flat soles allow more surface contact with walls and such providing much more traction). And, most importantly, the shoe has to fit. You don't want to jump to a railing only to have your foot slide inside the shoe and throw you off balance. In fact, Google "parkour shoes," and you'll be amazed at the variety of options. 4 Have fun. Spend time looking for parkour tutorials that teach the basics. My favorites are the ones done by Ozzi from Urban Current Clan, a Hawaii-based parkour team, and the ones on www.americanparkour.com. Watch, learn, and train - enjoy.
Interested in hands-on training? E-mail Nhan Du at spidernhan@yahoo.com or hit him up on MySpace www.myspace.com/nonfatcomedy.
Be the first to comment on this article!