I got my fourth tattoo on Saturday, October 22, 2005. It's actually a cover-up of my very first tattoo, which is kinda sad. Still, as you can see from the "before" photo, it was definitely fading and not looking so good these days (and it was only six years old!). I had always wanted to get a monkey since that's the year I was born in, but I was afraid it'd look silly. In the end, I settled on an Aztec monkey, which I think looks pretty cool. (Plus, I'm into ancient Mexican cultures so it kinda works.) I like to think of him as Ozomatli. Also, quite coincidentally, the body posture for the monkey that my tattooist came up with (basically the only way she could cover the existing dragon but still fit around the Chinese character of my name) looks a lot like the signature move of Bassai Dai, which was my Black Belt kata.

It took two hours and 33 minutes and didn't hurt nearly as much as the ankle tat.

And yes, that is my buttcrack showing in the "after" photo.