The other day after work I was browsing the Fat o' Sphere and came upon Elizabeths' post over at The Extender on Sharran Alexander, the UK's only woman sumo wrestler. From there I went to the Daily Mail article for more details as I didn't even know there WAS women's sumo! The article itself isn't important here, but my son's reaction to the pictures there of Sharran is. And then we had a conversation that went something like this:
Gabe: Mom, that lady is really big!
Me: Yes she is, she's very strong. She's a sumo wrestler.
Gabe: Sumo wrestler?
Me: Yeah, it's a sport from Japan.
Gabe: Japan!? (Gabe loves the idea of Japan) ... her skin is black. (Gabe hasn't seen very many black people in his life, so this is still new for him)
Me: Mmhmm. And ours is white. (We compare arms) People come in different colours, like black and white, brown, kind of yellow, all kinds.
Gabe: I want to see some sumo.
Me: *opens Youtube and we watch a match from National Geographic for a few minutes*
Gabe: Mom! Those guys are huge!
Me: Yes, they are! They're VERY strong! They're sumo wrestlers called 'yoko zuna' and being big is part of their sport. *I open a video of women's sumo wrestling. The women are much smaller in comparison and the match is much faster*
Gabe: Mom, those ladies look like you. (And they do. If I trained, I could probably qualify to do sumo)
Me: Yup. It takes all sizes, honey. You'll probably be tall and slim like your dad, I'm short and fat, and then there's everything in between. And it's all good.
Gabe: Ok mom. You come play with me now?
And we did.
This is just FYI and beside the point, but female sumo wrestling is not a sport in Japan. It used to be done as a joke hundreds of years ago, and only in various regions. Women are not allowed to touch the sumo ring (called a dohyo) because they are considered impure. A female government minister was denied the privilege of presenting the trophy to a champion at the end of a tournament because she was not allowed to touch the dohyo. So, there really is no such thing as a female sumo wrestler in the actual sport, only as an exhibition and only in unofficial competition.
Also, "yokozuna" is a ranking in sumo which means "grand champion". There are many different names for different ranks (e.g.,ozeki means "champion"). Very few sumo wrestlers are referred to as "yokozuna" as it is a hard rank to attain and hold.
Finally, more on the point of what you are saying, your son says, "huge" and you reply with "strong". In the case of sumo wrestlers, this is absolutely true, but isn't it a bit misleading to imply that size means power? There are many people who are fat who are weak, not strong. Power isn't related to weight. If your son said some average person (not an athlete) was "huge", how would you reply? That would be a more typical conversation about fat people with a child and I'm curious about how you'd handle that.
Re: Yokozuna-at the time, we were watching a video that specifically said yokozuna were the guys we were watching or I wouldnt' have used the term. As for looking at a more average sized person and the word huge, I'm not sure Gabe would call an average sized person huge. He knows the difference between small, average and big. Even so, if/when he comments on people of different sizes, my answer will be "It takes all kinds and all sizes." Thanks for the info about women's sumo. I'm sad to hear that it's not an official sport in Japan.