MyNewPlace Employees Fight Breast Cancer with StreetFighter

September 20th, 2010 by Snow Conant| Posted in About Us, Life in a Startup | 1 Comment »

As we’ve been alluding for over a week now, MyNewPlace has been involved in helping one of our employees raise money for a breast cancer cure (Susan G. Komen Foundation) and we have invited her along with one of our other employees to weigh in – on both the cause and the fund-raising effort! We also provide a link to donate, if our readers are so inclined. A link to all of our pictures can be found on our Facebook Fan Page!

Beth Yesko, MyNewPlace Employee and Guest Blogger

With less than 3 weeks to go until the Susan G. Komen 3 Day for a Cure I’m still $1,000 shy of my fundraising goal and it was an incredible feeling to have my colleagues rally behind me.   I’m so grateful to them for really going above and beyond when they thought of a way to help me reach my fundraising goal for the 60 mile walk and kick some ass Street Fighter style at the same time!

My sister-in-law lost her mother to breast cancer over 13 years ago and she wanted to do this walk to honor her mom.  I couldn’t let her do it alone and vowed to be with her every step of the way.  It has been a tremendous experience training for this walk while sharing this journey with her and I’m looking forward to the final steps of mile 60 in October!   It’s awesome to know that my fellow MyNewPlacers were willing to donate their hard-earned cash to this great cause for a chance at office glory.

All proceeds from the 3 Day are invested in breast cancer research and community programs.  If you are interested in donating any amount, please click here!

Joe Takeuchi, MyNewPlace Employee and Guest Blogger

With our MyNewPlace.com Street Fighter 2 “Fireball for a Cure” fundraising event in mind, we here at MyNewPlace would like to take a more introspective look back at the high-flying and powerful moves that inspired us all beginning in March of 1991. Many of us couldn’t wait to toss our allowance into arcade cabinets, and were floored when given the opportunity to perfect each move on home consoles throughout our adolescence. For some of us, this fascination with the best fighting game of all time has followed us into adulthood. Even if you haven’t played the game in years, most can recall the trademark battle cries of the series’ characters.

You may have wondered, however, as you flicked your arcade stick and button-mashed your way to victory as a player, what exactly are those fighters saying when they unleash their famous fireballs and high-flying kicks? Today, we will look at two of SF2’s signature characters, Ryu and Ken, who are brothers, but not blood brothers. Actually, they were trained by the same sensei, Gouken. Their three famous special moves will be highlighted, with translations as well as the moves’ martial arts foundations:

Fireball Attack “Hadoken” – From Japanese Ha Dou (Wave or Surge) and Ken (Fist,Technique, or Attack); a blastwave or fireball formed from a martial artist’s life energy (or ki/ch’i). The hands are brought together, heels of the palms touching, and moved to beside the fighter’s waist (which is as close as one can get to the center of the body, where the most ch’i gathers). The energy is then focused into the hands, and when both arms are thrown forward, palms outward, the energy wave is fired in the same direction as the double palm punch.

Flying Uppercut “Shoryuken” – A Japanese phrase that literally translates to “rising dragon punch”, used to describe one of the most powerful strikes utilized in the martial art discipline of Shotokan Karate.

Hurricane Kick “Tatsumaki Senpuukyaku” – Literal meaning, Tornado Whirlwind Foot. This attack is performed by focusing one’s ki/ch’i beneath himself or herself into a small tornado, which lifts the practitioner off the ground and spins him or her around in a circle while propelling them towards their opponent. Usually the user will outstretch one leg while using this in order to hit the enemy with it multiple times, hence the name “Tornado Whirlwind Foot”.