Here's. The. Thing. About. Tai. Chi. It. Is. Very. Very. Slow. And. When. You. Watch. It. Done. By. An. Expert. Or. By. The. Chinese. In. Parks. En. Masse. At. Dawn. It. Is. Very. Very. Soothing. And. Beautiful. To. Behold. But. When. You. Try. And. Do. It. Yourself. It. Is. The. Hardest. Work. You. Will. Do. All. Day.

Mentally, that is. Tai Chi is, as I'm sure you know, the slow motion Chinese martial art. It is intended to be performed with as relaxed a musculature as possible, and has more to do with teaching awareness of your body and balance than with chopping your way through concrete slabs or an assailant's nasal cartilage.

Because it's concerned more with meditation, concentration and physical moderation, it has become hugely popular in this country and elsewhere as a healthy exercise rather than selfdefence, particularly among the older demographic. Which is why I'm in a Tai Chi class with my 84-year-old friend Henry, and may explain why he is moving smoothly along with everyone else while I get distracted and left behind.

I had no idea it was so difficult to move slowly. (I also had no idea that Henry could touch his toes, but that is probably of less fascination to you than it was to me, so I won't dwell on this.) At various points, we have to close our eyes and I find myself unable to keep them shut - I have to keep opening them to see what everyone else is doing. This, coupled with the fact that the class is held in a Victorian primary school hall, instils in me the disconcerting sense that I have regressed to the age of six.

We begin by slapping various parts of our bodies (to stimulate acupressure points, but it edges me further towards the unleashing of my inner six year old), go through the warm-up exercises and then the instructor shows us an entire routine, moving through it with an eerie grace that even after a lifetime's study I'm sure I would find impossible to replicate, which we all attempt, and then we do some work with staffs. This is so beyond me that I have to give up. Bested by an octogenarian and a stick. Great day.