This 14-day break from kendo is probably the longest in the past 14 months. Still not very much recovered from a heavy flu last week and also a painful right wrist (injured again last monday... someone please tell me not to run in the rain and fall over...), I was swing my shinai again at the dojo with the rest of the class tonight.
About every other day I did my 1000-times rope-jumps, and if not a couple hundreds of sit-ups alternating with katate-suburi. So fitness-wise I can catch up with no problemo. Just that the level of my kendo isn't going anywhere due to the very irregular practices I've been to in recent weeks. I haven't been to either a Tues/ Sun squad for 2 months, got to think about it.
Everyone is rather attentive tonight as Tanaka-sensei announced (as we did the kihon without bogu) that this is the last practice with him and his wife. My 3-step/1-step kihon went alright, until it gets to the rensoku waza series. My right wrist does not allow me to cut dou on either kote-men-dou or kote-men-do-men. Recalling what Eda-sensei said about "No one is at their 100% in every shiai, so find a way to adapt to your whatever condition as quick as you can", I just happened to temporary cheat a bit by not rotating my right wrist. Since the shinai handle isn't oval-shaped like a katana, it looks alright. Just maybe not scoring in a real shinai.
It wasn't a busy night at all with only 8 people (!?) in the rotation, so comparatively kendo gets slightly more intense. Very rarely that we stayed for paired bogu practice for 45 mins non-stop. And we actually did some waza here. Like men-kaeshi-dou which kills my wrist again. Also other alternative renzoku waza combinations: kote-kote-men, kote-men-men, men(blocked)-dou, etc.
The ending 15 min of jikeiko time was pretty enough for the few who were in armour. I had a good bash with Mrs Tanaka. Eda-sensei at the side comment on my men-uchi being too small. At this kind of keiko with a significant level gap, just expect a couple of ending men-uchi. I was very tired and confused when I heard Mrs Tanaka said, "___...migi___... hidari___..." I always assume this is one of those "too much right hand" expression so I had to completely use my left hand and forget about the right. Only the last 2 men-uchi scored me a "very good" comment, and then we sunk in sonkyo, and finished the keiko.
After class Mrs Tanaka further explained about what she was about to tell me, in action. It turned out to be that I was literally running to the right after cutting (and not what I thought about too much right hand...) I should be going straight and slamming into the opponent. "Nikeja Dame" - don't run away. That's some Japanese I know, and the idea finally came across quite well.
I tried queuing for Tanaka-sensei but obviously we ran out of time. Little Utsunomiya Takumi-kun got the "special farewell treatment", you know, that kind of uchikomi that last forever ever ever ever ever ever... got told that it would be the last ippon, got pushed and fell over, got up and the rest of the people just kept on shouting "GANBATTE"... Oh what a scene. The 9-year-old was 200% exhausted when we gave him the round of applause (probably because we'll never last that long). His eyes were still in tears when we waited for the seiza call. I just turned around and gave him my 2 thumbs up.
Tanaka-sensei gave his 10-min farewell speech while we were in seiza (awww). Basically it's about how he enjoys teaching in a dojo that worked a lot on kihon, correctness of posture and such. And he went on and said the importance of listening, lasting a practice, and always get one more ippon. "It's that "one last Ippon" that build you up little by little every single time you go for it. If you give that one up then you'll never improve. Japan is a militaristic (?) society in which everyone has to discipline themselves. For those who just hang around not pushing themselves, their sensei had already given up on them... Hope you can make use of this concept both in and outside of the dojo." That was translated by David and he did his job well. For some reason, I found the last few lines apply to my current situation really well (...wonder why all the sensei is picking on me yeah?)
"Take care, Sensei." My last line to Mr Tanaka.
Friday, September 30, 2005
Thursday, September 15, 2005
Last This Hour
Today - after rushing home from the centre of town (new version of Photoshop + Illustrator + InDesign seminar... Great!) and going back to the opposite side of the harbour - adding to the heavy traffic jam 2 bus stops away from where I should get off and walk to the dojo, by the time I entered the dojo, people were already putting on their men and I completely missed the suburi/kihon parts.
[I also happened to left my shirt and trousers in the changing room one floor below the gym for 1 hour. Some adviced me to play the lottery because I managed to find it after the class - with my $$ all still there...!!]
Anyway, the bogu session started off with a line of people in bogu as motodachi, and standing opposite, the intermediates who got to hit the targets with suri-ashi. There's one odd person out, so I took that time and did some warming up. Was pretty stiff there - I haven't touched my shinai for a week.
Moving on to bogu-ed people only, we went thru the usual kirikaeshi, kihon - with suriashi and then fumikomi... The more exhausting one will be kote-men-do-men. Seem to find myself more balanced, but not fast enough (god, how the hell can I catch up with the Hokkaido boys...)
Tanaka-sensei had a sudden "surprise" for this session, and before moving on to jikeiko, we had about 6 rounds of 5-times-ai-men. We were told that it will let us understand more about our -utsu-maai. Also we'll use more of our waist-power to turn 180-degree, and run through much faster.
I told myself not to take a break today. It was only an hour for me already, and if I can't even last that, it means I am not enjoying kendo (and not just the situation). Now I know I didn't really dropped out, but I am just as borderline dangerous as the rest of the losers. Especially yesterday I had the worst 1000-rope-jumps in ages. I haven't done even once 100-non-stop, and I felt tired before reaching the 500th. I was so out of practice, and pretty much out of shape recently...
My first keiko partner was Takumi-kun (who is 9 and ...half my height...). Tanaka-sensei came over and wacked him over the head because he missed a couple of really good opportunities, and was dodging too much. But I also got nagged about "Jenny you should beat him up" in Japanese - or something similar. Well, Takumi really did a few sharp do-uchi which I was really impressed. I was trying to work on more of my kote-men and kote-dou, but still these waza weren't working as good in jikeiko. uHmm
...And then I had Mimura-san who is a teenager-beginner. I haven't had a keiko with people at that level for quite a while now, so it's been a refreshing feeling. (Since I am no longer responsible to teach beginners here, and loads of people were still at the non-bogu stage - only this month "Iris" bought her bogu, and she started at the beginning of the year...!!) As usual I wanted to be more encouraging, and I hoped the boy appreciates it.
The ending few minutes I had a short one with David, our dojo Japanese-Cantonese interpretor. He is a fresh nidan. Somehow I found the same problem of mine in him. Like, after hitting kote (and missed), both of us just stood there like idiots. That happened twice and I started to be more aware of my left foot and did a couple of spot-on kote-men. But seemingly my kote-men only worked on people who has no intention to go forward. Thats definately something I should investigate into more...
It's just a strange day today anyway. When I packed my bogu I pulled out my current shiai tenugui from Matsuoka senpai "Possiblity is endless (not sure how to translate)" in London. And then at the end of the class Eda-sensei, who came back from Singapore last weekend, told me that "Miss Matsuda said hello to you". When I bin my keikogi into the laundry basket, my name flashes into my eyes on the keikogi those Iaido people at Wakaba gave me as farewell present. They just all of a sudden gave me little warm treats, and reminds me I should try harder and enjoy the practice more. Thanks for all that, whoever is reading.
[I also happened to left my shirt and trousers in the changing room one floor below the gym for 1 hour. Some adviced me to play the lottery because I managed to find it after the class - with my $$ all still there...!!]
Anyway, the bogu session started off with a line of people in bogu as motodachi, and standing opposite, the intermediates who got to hit the targets with suri-ashi. There's one odd person out, so I took that time and did some warming up. Was pretty stiff there - I haven't touched my shinai for a week.
Moving on to bogu-ed people only, we went thru the usual kirikaeshi, kihon - with suriashi and then fumikomi... The more exhausting one will be kote-men-do-men. Seem to find myself more balanced, but not fast enough (god, how the hell can I catch up with the Hokkaido boys...)
Tanaka-sensei had a sudden "surprise" for this session, and before moving on to jikeiko, we had about 6 rounds of 5-times-ai-men. We were told that it will let us understand more about our -utsu-maai. Also we'll use more of our waist-power to turn 180-degree, and run through much faster.
I told myself not to take a break today. It was only an hour for me already, and if I can't even last that, it means I am not enjoying kendo (and not just the situation). Now I know I didn't really dropped out, but I am just as borderline dangerous as the rest of the losers. Especially yesterday I had the worst 1000-rope-jumps in ages. I haven't done even once 100-non-stop, and I felt tired before reaching the 500th. I was so out of practice, and pretty much out of shape recently...
My first keiko partner was Takumi-kun (who is 9 and ...half my height...). Tanaka-sensei came over and wacked him over the head because he missed a couple of really good opportunities, and was dodging too much. But I also got nagged about "Jenny you should beat him up" in Japanese - or something similar. Well, Takumi really did a few sharp do-uchi which I was really impressed. I was trying to work on more of my kote-men and kote-dou, but still these waza weren't working as good in jikeiko. uHmm
...And then I had Mimura-san who is a teenager-beginner. I haven't had a keiko with people at that level for quite a while now, so it's been a refreshing feeling. (Since I am no longer responsible to teach beginners here, and loads of people were still at the non-bogu stage - only this month "Iris" bought her bogu, and she started at the beginning of the year...!!) As usual I wanted to be more encouraging, and I hoped the boy appreciates it.
The ending few minutes I had a short one with David, our dojo Japanese-Cantonese interpretor. He is a fresh nidan. Somehow I found the same problem of mine in him. Like, after hitting kote (and missed), both of us just stood there like idiots. That happened twice and I started to be more aware of my left foot and did a couple of spot-on kote-men. But seemingly my kote-men only worked on people who has no intention to go forward. Thats definately something I should investigate into more...
It's just a strange day today anyway. When I packed my bogu I pulled out my current shiai tenugui from Matsuoka senpai "Possiblity is endless (not sure how to translate)" in London. And then at the end of the class Eda-sensei, who came back from Singapore last weekend, told me that "Miss Matsuda said hello to you". When I bin my keikogi into the laundry basket, my name flashes into my eyes on the keikogi those Iaido people at Wakaba gave me as farewell present. They just all of a sudden gave me little warm treats, and reminds me I should try harder and enjoy the practice more. Thanks for all that, whoever is reading.
Tuesday, September 13, 2005
...Can't
Tonight at 8pm I switched off my laptop, stood up, grabbed my bogu from near the window... and immediately decided to put them down. Instead, I went into the dining room, sat down and had dinner.
**********
Last Thursday saw the visit from Inoue-sensei (3rd time this year!) who was going to accompany a HK team and visit Singapore. He came with 2 other men around his age, Yamane-sensei of Osaka, and Nozaki-sensei from Nara.
We jumped straight into free practice, which means 30+ people queuing for the 3 of them. I was second on the queue for Yamane.
The keiko was okay with me smashing 3-4 de-gote and got bored of this waza, but I couldn't really switch to other waza. Apart from the lack of practice, his timing was so different... It was just quite weird, but in the end we found out Yamane-sensei started kendo at the age of 40. Still, having 30+ years of experience, I won't have any other comments.
Nozaki-sensei is the tough-to-deal-with type. He did that "running in from to-maai and cut men" thing which was pretty impressive (age-wise). At one point I was like a beginner backing out so much that I stepped into people queuing at the side. They were shouting things like, "check your breathing. Kiai! kiai--!" which only pressured me more. I have no idea why I was so afraid at that time. After that, The keiko evolved into the usual uchikomi, and the advice was about using too much right hand. Guess it's the wirst injury that got me overcompensating for it.
Later on, more local sensei got to stand as motodachi, and so, the queue at Inoue-sensei was slightly shorter. But there is nothing special about that keiko. Basically I stood up from sonkyu, held for 5 seconds, cut men, got battered, and did a few rounds of men-uchi. Finished in 30 seconds in total. Not too enjoyable.
So yeah, that's last Thursday with 3 jikeiko and nothing else.
I think I'll go this Thursday. But from next week on to late Nov the practice hours will clash with my short course at the Art School (Illustration for Advertising). Need to re-schedule everything if I am going to continue to have regular kendo.
****************
I said that because I was thinking of dropping kendo and pick up something else closer instead. Last Monday at the St John's First Aid course, I was quite attracted to volunteer for their brigade. Since I can't go for the Police anymore, St John might have been an option just for fun. Then I don't have to struggle on a Sunday morning to see if I'll get tortured in the dojo - and then do something that contribute to the society a little bit.
**********
Last Thursday saw the visit from Inoue-sensei (3rd time this year!) who was going to accompany a HK team and visit Singapore. He came with 2 other men around his age, Yamane-sensei of Osaka, and Nozaki-sensei from Nara.
We jumped straight into free practice, which means 30+ people queuing for the 3 of them. I was second on the queue for Yamane.
The keiko was okay with me smashing 3-4 de-gote and got bored of this waza, but I couldn't really switch to other waza. Apart from the lack of practice, his timing was so different... It was just quite weird, but in the end we found out Yamane-sensei started kendo at the age of 40. Still, having 30+ years of experience, I won't have any other comments.
Nozaki-sensei is the tough-to-deal-with type. He did that "running in from to-maai and cut men" thing which was pretty impressive (age-wise). At one point I was like a beginner backing out so much that I stepped into people queuing at the side. They were shouting things like, "check your breathing. Kiai! kiai--!" which only pressured me more. I have no idea why I was so afraid at that time. After that, The keiko evolved into the usual uchikomi, and the advice was about using too much right hand. Guess it's the wirst injury that got me overcompensating for it.
Later on, more local sensei got to stand as motodachi, and so, the queue at Inoue-sensei was slightly shorter. But there is nothing special about that keiko. Basically I stood up from sonkyu, held for 5 seconds, cut men, got battered, and did a few rounds of men-uchi. Finished in 30 seconds in total. Not too enjoyable.
So yeah, that's last Thursday with 3 jikeiko and nothing else.
I think I'll go this Thursday. But from next week on to late Nov the practice hours will clash with my short course at the Art School (Illustration for Advertising). Need to re-schedule everything if I am going to continue to have regular kendo.
****************
I said that because I was thinking of dropping kendo and pick up something else closer instead. Last Monday at the St John's First Aid course, I was quite attracted to volunteer for their brigade. Since I can't go for the Police anymore, St John might have been an option just for fun. Then I don't have to struggle on a Sunday morning to see if I'll get tortured in the dojo - and then do something that contribute to the society a little bit.
Tuesday, September 06, 2005
Far Far Away...
Sitting here for too long without any exercise at all hurts my a$$. My only entertainment in recent hours is this:-
Distribution of Dojo in Relation to Where I Live
Hong Kong (QEII is the place for my dojo and squad training)
London
Well... Location/ transportation-wise my current dojo isn't *that* far... I dunno why mentally I am feeling this way.
Distribution of Dojo in Relation to Where I Live
Hong Kong (QEII is the place for my dojo and squad training)
London
Well... Location/ transportation-wise my current dojo isn't *that* far... I dunno why mentally I am feeling this way.
Monday, September 05, 2005
Ki.mo.chi.
[I wrote a longer entry but it came back with a system error. Oh what the heck...]
Although encouraging, it is also a rather disturbing idea... Now that Tanaka-sensei has spoken during the round-the-table-comments-to-everyone session at the farewell dinner last Sat.
I should fight with a relaxed body and a strong spirit - not tensing up and displaying my thinking-too-much mentality on my face during keiko.
My state of mind should be like a big but calm, quiet lake without ripples.
I have got the timings, opportunities, speed and stamina right, which much qualifies me as a national team member in international championships. What I need to work on, is how I should approach each fight. The Kimochi, so to speak.
... Slowly and steadily I am being pressured to train for the world championships. It's more than a year away and I am not sure why everyone is so serious about it already. It takes away a lot of the fun and enjoyment I can have, sucking up a huge chunk of my energy and time (while not having a decent income) ... Maybe I just can't handle that kind of pressure and responsiblity. I wish I can just play and enjoy.
My wrist is 99.9% recovered, but I am not sure about the squad training tomorrow. I get quite scared about going 250+ hayasuburi this month, being out of practice for so long...
Although encouraging, it is also a rather disturbing idea... Now that Tanaka-sensei has spoken during the round-the-table-comments-to-everyone session at the farewell dinner last Sat.
I should fight with a relaxed body and a strong spirit - not tensing up and displaying my thinking-too-much mentality on my face during keiko.
My state of mind should be like a big but calm, quiet lake without ripples.
I have got the timings, opportunities, speed and stamina right, which much qualifies me as a national team member in international championships. What I need to work on, is how I should approach each fight. The Kimochi, so to speak.
... Slowly and steadily I am being pressured to train for the world championships. It's more than a year away and I am not sure why everyone is so serious about it already. It takes away a lot of the fun and enjoyment I can have, sucking up a huge chunk of my energy and time (while not having a decent income) ... Maybe I just can't handle that kind of pressure and responsiblity. I wish I can just play and enjoy.
My wrist is 99.9% recovered, but I am not sure about the squad training tomorrow. I get quite scared about going 250+ hayasuburi this month, being out of practice for so long...
Tuesday, August 30, 2005
How Long Can I Last Like This??
My right wrist is probably 99% recovered. Went to the hospital yesterday, but 100 people were in the queue so in the end I didn't see the doc. Oddly enough, there is this bottle of home-made (and with a strong smell) Chinese medicine sent to my father from his doc/pal at Wisconsin. Work wonders just the second day rubbing it on.
I did tell my mom I was going to kendo tonight. But at 8pm I sat down at the dining table instead. Obviously, I don't feel like going to the squad. Missed 3 times already, which means I am really behind. It will kill me if they are doing 250 hayasuburi the next time I go...
******************
The main excuse for tonight's absence, is this email I received today:-
Hi Jenny,
[snip] ... I browsed your website of portfolio and found your work to be very similar to one another in style. I very much would like to speak to you to see if you have any experience or interest in the Coroprate Identity , graphics, branding work for more traditional corporate clients...such as banks. The design they need are generally more conservative with nice photos and layouts but not extreme creative artistry.
When is it a good time to have a coffee for a chat? I am sure you will have extra stuff to show me. Is Central a good place to meet?
cheers,
Milton
ps. I would like to know if you are currently engaged in any full time job.
*************************
At the moment I am re-working on my portfolio, but I have zero confidence in the kind of work this person need, because essentially, I have no experience into that.
"Found your work to be very similar in style..."
"The design they need are generally more conservative... but not extreme creative artistry..."
This. Hits. Me. On. The. Head. Real. Hard...
I did tell my mom I was going to kendo tonight. But at 8pm I sat down at the dining table instead. Obviously, I don't feel like going to the squad. Missed 3 times already, which means I am really behind. It will kill me if they are doing 250 hayasuburi the next time I go...
******************
The main excuse for tonight's absence, is this email I received today:-
Hi Jenny,
[snip] ... I browsed your website of portfolio and found your work to be very similar to one another in style. I very much would like to speak to you to see if you have any experience or interest in the Coroprate Identity , graphics, branding work for more traditional corporate clients...such as banks. The design they need are generally more conservative with nice photos and layouts but not extreme creative artistry.
When is it a good time to have a coffee for a chat? I am sure you will have extra stuff to show me. Is Central a good place to meet?
cheers,
Milton
ps. I would like to know if you are currently engaged in any full time job.
*************************
At the moment I am re-working on my portfolio, but I have zero confidence in the kind of work this person need, because essentially, I have no experience into that.
"Found your work to be very similar in style..."
"The design they need are generally more conservative... but not extreme creative artistry..."
This. Hits. Me. On. The. Head. Real. Hard...
Friday, August 26, 2005
Ouch--!
"Your friend from London said hi" The first thing Eda-sensei came up with when I walked into the changing room was that... She's probably very lucky to get into the seminar weekend where people from all parts of the UK were also there with Sumi-sensei last week.
Anyway tonight had a good turn-up with 15+ people in bogu. 10 days without kendo for me is a long break. My right wrist felt okay, if not 90% recovered.
... But I wasn't too sure about the 20 push-ups at the beginning of the warm-ups.
... And then with the shinai they did the single-handed butterfly swing-around wrist exercise (like how you do kaeshi waza). It just soooooooo killed my wrist again.
I thought if there is no kaeshi waza I can survive this Thursday kihon class. Tanaka-sensei leaded the sanhyoushi/ichihyoushi men/kote-uchi. Also added in today was Furukawa-sensei's kote-men-do-men combo. I can't kiai on the Do cut as my wrist hurt soooooooo much...
At 8pm we practice kihon with Men on. But surprisingly, kirikaeshi worked ok for my wrist.
Also I found myself I'm leaning a bit forward today - I guess bad habit shows without regular practice hmmmmmm
It's kinda strange that Eda-sensei reduce the times we do for kihon to twice/three times each and then change sides, as comparing to the 5 times I normally did in London. "You should give your best Ippon. There's only 2 opportunities for you to show. So do it perfectly." Yeah that's a thought.
It was just men, kote and then ai-kote-men. My wrist didn't hurt on cutting/receiving so I thought this wasn't my problem - so probably it has something to do with the do-uchi or kaeshi-waza I did the other week at Furukawa's seminar.
The final 30 mins we had time for jikeiko and I grabbed Lo for a while. I did a few ok-ish hiki-men, but it's my de-kote that's hurting my wrist. Anyway, that's the last thing I had with my men on. I got shoved to the non-bogu side and did some kirikaeshi with a cute kohai named Iris.
While the other side of the class was having mock-shinsa for this Sunday (no squad, yay), we did some renzoku-men-uchi with people lining up with shinai held horizontally (yeah thats beginners stuff) And then Mrs Tanaka told me that my left foot wasn't following when I hit... damn, I definitely wasn't paying attention!!!
Argh. When am I going to recover?!!???!
Just got an email about Tanaka-sensei (and also Mrs Tanaka) is going to leave Hong Kong mid-Sept. That's shocking news..!! (... and the rest of the email is about giving presents and party..[???])
Anyway tonight had a good turn-up with 15+ people in bogu. 10 days without kendo for me is a long break. My right wrist felt okay, if not 90% recovered.
... But I wasn't too sure about the 20 push-ups at the beginning of the warm-ups.
... And then with the shinai they did the single-handed butterfly swing-around wrist exercise (like how you do kaeshi waza). It just soooooooo killed my wrist again.
I thought if there is no kaeshi waza I can survive this Thursday kihon class. Tanaka-sensei leaded the sanhyoushi/ichihyoushi men/kote-uchi. Also added in today was Furukawa-sensei's kote-men-do-men combo. I can't kiai on the Do cut as my wrist hurt soooooooo much...
At 8pm we practice kihon with Men on. But surprisingly, kirikaeshi worked ok for my wrist.
Also I found myself I'm leaning a bit forward today - I guess bad habit shows without regular practice hmmmmmm
It's kinda strange that Eda-sensei reduce the times we do for kihon to twice/three times each and then change sides, as comparing to the 5 times I normally did in London. "You should give your best Ippon. There's only 2 opportunities for you to show. So do it perfectly." Yeah that's a thought.
It was just men, kote and then ai-kote-men. My wrist didn't hurt on cutting/receiving so I thought this wasn't my problem - so probably it has something to do with the do-uchi or kaeshi-waza I did the other week at Furukawa's seminar.
The final 30 mins we had time for jikeiko and I grabbed Lo for a while. I did a few ok-ish hiki-men, but it's my de-kote that's hurting my wrist. Anyway, that's the last thing I had with my men on. I got shoved to the non-bogu side and did some kirikaeshi with a cute kohai named Iris.
While the other side of the class was having mock-shinsa for this Sunday (no squad, yay), we did some renzoku-men-uchi with people lining up with shinai held horizontally (yeah thats beginners stuff) And then Mrs Tanaka told me that my left foot wasn't following when I hit... damn, I definitely wasn't paying attention!!!
Argh. When am I going to recover?!!???!
Just got an email about Tanaka-sensei (and also Mrs Tanaka) is going to leave Hong Kong mid-Sept. That's shocking news..!! (... and the rest of the email is about giving presents and party..[???])
Sunday, August 21, 2005
Injury Rant
The scenery outside my bedroom window has been looking like this for the past few days. It had been raining heavily non-stop for 48 hours, until last night.
However, since last keiko (5 days ago) my right wrist had not recovered... It hurts whenever I want to turn the door knob or pick food up with chopsticks... Basically I can't hold my right arm straight, palm up, and bend my hand down more than 30 degrees.
To illustrate my point further - my right wrist can't even hold in chudan!!! I am still not sure whether this was due to some bad kaeshi waza I made or was it because some heavy-hitting dudes hit on the wrong part of my kote. When people here ask me, "are the Europeans really physical?", next time I'm going to say: "pretty much the same". I do think my theory about "those who begins from adult-hood hits hard", with is not limited to foreigners at all!! ... Anyway, I'd have to give it a rest.
This weekend seems to be a grading weekend for a couple of places around the world. Next week they'd have one in HK, so there will be no Sunday squad... I'll try my best to make the Tuesday one tho. Had already missed out their "Eiga-Naoki-signed tenugui" from Furukawa-sensei...
I apologize for the last few lengthy entries. (I went back today and thought, "Gee, who the hell is going to read that?!") With the insomnia my brain didn't really function before I type!!
[edit]
... Has anyone watched the 1997 WKC Kyoto videos as posted on KWF yet? I spot Kishikawa-sensei in one of them (R Kishikawa vs M Asaoka- http://kummisa.cafe24.com/10/10-7.wmv) Brazil came join-3rd after beating Canada... God, he was sharp 8 years ago!!
Did I just become a stalker of my sensei!?!
Wednesday, August 17, 2005
Hokkaido Weekend (3/3)
...On my last entry I completely forgot to put up the few snaps I have last Sunday. Sorry I don't have any other chance to pick out my camera...
Here we go:-
[ Inside view of my dojo - while we are waiting for the shiai to start... ]
[ Tokai4 boys doing some kirikaeshi for warm ups. ]
[ Furukawa-sensei and Kishikawa-sensei at the opposite side checking out their students ]
*************************************
So, on to Day 3. I was very lucky to escape from another heavy rain 10 seconds before hiding myself under the bus stop...
Tuesday 7.30-10.30pm
All of the 3 Tokai4 boys - Kaneda, Kamide and Kamimura-kun, were in bogu!
For the first hour or so, it's the same kihon practice with everyone in rotation (about 25-30 people there - but from my spot I can only get Kaneda-kun out of the 3, and plenty other hard-hitting dudes...). First with suri-ashi (Men, kote, kote-men, kotemendomen) then with Fumikomi.
Kishikawa sensei was at the side also giving out pointers to people. I got the "head-sinking-while-cutting" and "leaning forward after cut - not enough koshi" comments... (uhmmm)
Furukawa-sensei enjoys joking a little bit while teaching. Like he said now we should move onto Kirikaeshi, as everyone's kote is getting painful.
Agnes asked an interesting question about how solid should the block of the motodachi be during kirikaeshi. F-sensei explained that it should be adjusted according to the level of the kakari-te. Say, for a beginner you have to be soft and inviting them to cut. But for more advance people who hit more solid, you have to be solid enough to block, or even cut back.
There went a Tokai4 demo of ai-kirikaeshi, two sets each at the full length (about 15 meters).
F-sensei said their Hokkaido dojo is twice the size, and they do it for 40 mins every day. (!!)
We all tried once. The key is to coordinate with your partner and not about speed. I happened to get Kaneda-kun at this rotation. He was only at 75% of himself, but that already shows how not-solid my sayu-men is...
**********************
We now move to waza keiko. Wong-san shouted that only 3Dan and above should be participating. I was already moving to the side with the other half of the class, thinking about "d'oh"... Until Kishikawa-sensei pushed me back to the dojo (!!!) - and told me to stick with the ladies (Mrs Tanaka, Agnes, Fifi). I wasn't sure about whether this is due to making 2 pairs for the ladies, or whether I am good enough to be in the 3Dan+ waza keiko. There were more than 2 guys who are nidan and don't get to keiko...
BUT somehow the keiko started mixed...!!
We did kote-suriage-men, kote-kaeshi-men, de-kote and debana-men.
My suriage is completely too slow.
Kaeshi waza was explained to us as "shinai is coming too close". And for the block the shinai should be held horizontally - if it's at an angle you'll expose your kote. Also the right-hand grip has to be really soft to make a smooth movement.
I was bending to the left when I cut de-kote, and keep hitting my aite's tsuba. F-sensei said I should be more upright and start moving my head out and invite for a cut, and then move my whole body out when my aite reacts. I did that much better - but have a strange feeling about the "move head first" action...
General keypoint was to make Ippon even when you are not the person doing waza, thus making the whole practice like a real shiai. We did the squad this way too, the same point K-sensei stressed.
At the end of the waza keiko, F-sensei called his boys out and did some demos of what their regular training is like. Which involves the following:-
Oikomi - chasing the motodachi for the full length of the dojo
Oikomi men (the first cut is men, then taiatari, then menmenmen all the way to the end)
Oikomi kotemen (1st cut kote-men, taiatari, then kotemenkotemen...)
Oikomi kotemendomen (kotemendomen, taiatari, then kotemendomen kotemendomen)
3 times each
"Onaji no Waza uchikomi keiko"- pre-arranged sets of waza, done on both sides
Demonstrated was (if I remembered correctly):
ai-men, ai-kotemen, kote-suriage-men, men-kaeshi-do, debana-men, Ippon
Each of the above is repeated twice before swapping sides. The last ippon follows immediately.
Hard to describe but really, YOU HAVE TO BE THERE TO SEE IT. OMG they can go so fast and precise, and it seems like the can go on-and-on. My thoughts are along the lines of "I can never do that in my life" and "Please please don't ask us to do it"...
While the boys were pretty out of breath afterwards, F-sensei said, "Hong Kong has got too much delicious food. They are going to need a lot of keiko."
Considering they'll be doing all these for 1.5 hours everyday, maybe these 4 days in HK is really a luxury for them.
_________________
Then it's time for Shiai keiko. I forgot who fought, but probably Angus, Yip and someone.
Must have been a male-only team thing, I thought...
Fast forward to after keiko, while Kishikawa-sensei was briefing those participated in the shiai.
Kishikawa: "Jenny..."
Mingshi: "?"
Kishikawa: "I called you to the shiai - why did you just sit down???"
Me: "What? You did??"
K: "Yes, I called you. You should have been fighting in the shiai!"
Me: "Argh.. I thought you want me to look at the clock!!"
Baka me. Seriously.
_____________________
After the shiai, F-sensei gave some advice to those seniors who are going for grading soon. I was quite surprised that so many people are going to shinsa... (Agnes, Derek, Fifi for 5 dan; Yu and Ngan-sensei for 7 Dan)
They had a few mock jitsugi... Quite interesting comments to the individuals - most of them were about a particular cut they made, whether they are in good posture, opportunity or zahshin doing it, and whether they had enough seme.
_____________________
Finally jikeiko time. Wong-san, again, commanded that priority goes to those who helped the running of this seminar, and squad members. Woohoo!
I was the first to jump in front of Kamide-kun. The keiko was uhmm not too good. I don't seem to be able to do any waza but tobikomi men or kote, and can't handle his slightly-gedan-seme kamae... Following the 3rd time he got kotemen like raindrops, he called for Ippon, and I lost debana-men fairly quickly...
The next person I queued for is Kamihide-kun, who is a Jodan player. While waiting, at the next queue saw F-sensei vs K-sensei again. Somehow they went into a tsuki competition, and kept firing tsuki at each other... For a few minutes, they've probably tried everything like morote-tsuki, katate-tsuki, mune-tsuki, tsuki-men, not counting the missed ones (since most of the time both sides were doing something, missing was inevitable)... And whenever someone got it, it was followed by some evil laughter... That keiko finished with some men-uchi and a set of kirikaeshi, with a few of us cheering for K-sensei while he bowed off.
I was queuing this Jodan guy, but got distracted by F-sensei next challenger - Yu sensei. Because he suddenly raised up his shinai and went into Jodan. (I did see him before, but he wasn't anywhere near "strong") For a period of time Yu was just posing there without any chance of moving, and F-sensei just fired tsuki on him. F-sensei walked back and said rather loudly: "Tsuki Senpon!"
My own against-jodan fight wasn't any better. For the first 2 mins or so I tried numerious katate-tsuki and hidari-kote, but none really hit with the right sound. Kaeshi-dou went in too much slower than his men-uchi. The low point was getting hit tobikomi-men 5 consecutive times while standing there worrying about how to block... But in the end (I think he gave it out of boredom) I popped 2 kote on both side. The last Ippon I made a *brilliant* tsuki-men. It was so satisfying that I though of 3 flags raising up for me when I turned back..!!
Towards the finishing time, I had a short one with Kaneda-kun. But yeah it's rather normally un-interesting. I think he got a few juniors in a roll, and got bored of it.
________________
So after Kishikawa-sensei telling me about he wanted me at the shiai...
Kishikawa: "But did you practice with them in jikeiko."
Me: "Yeah. All three of them."
K: "Good. Did you learn something?"
Me: "Hmm... I know they are going easy on me. I think they hit very solid and accurate."
K: "Yes. You see, they are very stable."
[Switching back to the semi-hellish squad training from now on, I am not sure if I'll enjoy kendo as much...]
Here we go:-
[ Inside view of my dojo - while we are waiting for the shiai to start... ]
[ Tokai4 boys doing some kirikaeshi for warm ups. ]
[ Furukawa-sensei and Kishikawa-sensei at the opposite side checking out their students ]
*************************************
So, on to Day 3. I was very lucky to escape from another heavy rain 10 seconds before hiding myself under the bus stop...
Tuesday 7.30-10.30pm
All of the 3 Tokai4 boys - Kaneda, Kamide and Kamimura-kun, were in bogu!
For the first hour or so, it's the same kihon practice with everyone in rotation (about 25-30 people there - but from my spot I can only get Kaneda-kun out of the 3, and plenty other hard-hitting dudes...). First with suri-ashi (Men, kote, kote-men, kotemendomen) then with Fumikomi.
Kishikawa sensei was at the side also giving out pointers to people. I got the "head-sinking-while-cutting" and "leaning forward after cut - not enough koshi" comments... (uhmmm)
Furukawa-sensei enjoys joking a little bit while teaching. Like he said now we should move onto Kirikaeshi, as everyone's kote is getting painful.
Agnes asked an interesting question about how solid should the block of the motodachi be during kirikaeshi. F-sensei explained that it should be adjusted according to the level of the kakari-te. Say, for a beginner you have to be soft and inviting them to cut. But for more advance people who hit more solid, you have to be solid enough to block, or even cut back.
There went a Tokai4 demo of ai-kirikaeshi, two sets each at the full length (about 15 meters).
F-sensei said their Hokkaido dojo is twice the size, and they do it for 40 mins every day. (!!)
We all tried once. The key is to coordinate with your partner and not about speed. I happened to get Kaneda-kun at this rotation. He was only at 75% of himself, but that already shows how not-solid my sayu-men is...
**********************
We now move to waza keiko. Wong-san shouted that only 3Dan and above should be participating. I was already moving to the side with the other half of the class, thinking about "d'oh"... Until Kishikawa-sensei pushed me back to the dojo (!!!) - and told me to stick with the ladies (Mrs Tanaka, Agnes, Fifi). I wasn't sure about whether this is due to making 2 pairs for the ladies, or whether I am good enough to be in the 3Dan+ waza keiko. There were more than 2 guys who are nidan and don't get to keiko...
BUT somehow the keiko started mixed...!!
We did kote-suriage-men, kote-kaeshi-men, de-kote and debana-men.
My suriage is completely too slow.
Kaeshi waza was explained to us as "shinai is coming too close". And for the block the shinai should be held horizontally - if it's at an angle you'll expose your kote. Also the right-hand grip has to be really soft to make a smooth movement.
I was bending to the left when I cut de-kote, and keep hitting my aite's tsuba. F-sensei said I should be more upright and start moving my head out and invite for a cut, and then move my whole body out when my aite reacts. I did that much better - but have a strange feeling about the "move head first" action...
General keypoint was to make Ippon even when you are not the person doing waza, thus making the whole practice like a real shiai. We did the squad this way too, the same point K-sensei stressed.
At the end of the waza keiko, F-sensei called his boys out and did some demos of what their regular training is like. Which involves the following:-
Oikomi - chasing the motodachi for the full length of the dojo
Oikomi men (the first cut is men, then taiatari, then menmenmen all the way to the end)
Oikomi kotemen (1st cut kote-men, taiatari, then kotemenkotemen...)
Oikomi kotemendomen (kotemendomen, taiatari, then kotemendomen kotemendomen)
3 times each
"Onaji no Waza uchikomi keiko"- pre-arranged sets of waza, done on both sides
Demonstrated was (if I remembered correctly):
ai-men, ai-kotemen, kote-suriage-men, men-kaeshi-do, debana-men, Ippon
Each of the above is repeated twice before swapping sides. The last ippon follows immediately.
Hard to describe but really, YOU HAVE TO BE THERE TO SEE IT. OMG they can go so fast and precise, and it seems like the can go on-and-on. My thoughts are along the lines of "I can never do that in my life" and "Please please don't ask us to do it"...
While the boys were pretty out of breath afterwards, F-sensei said, "Hong Kong has got too much delicious food. They are going to need a lot of keiko."
Considering they'll be doing all these for 1.5 hours everyday, maybe these 4 days in HK is really a luxury for them.
_________________
Then it's time for Shiai keiko. I forgot who fought, but probably Angus, Yip and someone.
Must have been a male-only team thing, I thought...
Fast forward to after keiko, while Kishikawa-sensei was briefing those participated in the shiai.
Kishikawa: "Jenny..."
Mingshi: "?"
Kishikawa: "I called you to the shiai - why did you just sit down???"
Me: "What? You did??"
K: "Yes, I called you. You should have been fighting in the shiai!"
Me: "Argh.. I thought you want me to look at the clock!!"
Baka me. Seriously.
_____________________
After the shiai, F-sensei gave some advice to those seniors who are going for grading soon. I was quite surprised that so many people are going to shinsa... (Agnes, Derek, Fifi for 5 dan; Yu and Ngan-sensei for 7 Dan)
They had a few mock jitsugi... Quite interesting comments to the individuals - most of them were about a particular cut they made, whether they are in good posture, opportunity or zahshin doing it, and whether they had enough seme.
_____________________
Finally jikeiko time. Wong-san, again, commanded that priority goes to those who helped the running of this seminar, and squad members. Woohoo!
I was the first to jump in front of Kamide-kun. The keiko was uhmm not too good. I don't seem to be able to do any waza but tobikomi men or kote, and can't handle his slightly-gedan-seme kamae... Following the 3rd time he got kotemen like raindrops, he called for Ippon, and I lost debana-men fairly quickly...
The next person I queued for is Kamihide-kun, who is a Jodan player. While waiting, at the next queue saw F-sensei vs K-sensei again. Somehow they went into a tsuki competition, and kept firing tsuki at each other... For a few minutes, they've probably tried everything like morote-tsuki, katate-tsuki, mune-tsuki, tsuki-men, not counting the missed ones (since most of the time both sides were doing something, missing was inevitable)... And whenever someone got it, it was followed by some evil laughter... That keiko finished with some men-uchi and a set of kirikaeshi, with a few of us cheering for K-sensei while he bowed off.
I was queuing this Jodan guy, but got distracted by F-sensei next challenger - Yu sensei. Because he suddenly raised up his shinai and went into Jodan. (I did see him before, but he wasn't anywhere near "strong") For a period of time Yu was just posing there without any chance of moving, and F-sensei just fired tsuki on him. F-sensei walked back and said rather loudly: "Tsuki Senpon!"
My own against-jodan fight wasn't any better. For the first 2 mins or so I tried numerious katate-tsuki and hidari-kote, but none really hit with the right sound. Kaeshi-dou went in too much slower than his men-uchi. The low point was getting hit tobikomi-men 5 consecutive times while standing there worrying about how to block... But in the end (I think he gave it out of boredom) I popped 2 kote on both side. The last Ippon I made a *brilliant* tsuki-men. It was so satisfying that I though of 3 flags raising up for me when I turned back..!!
Towards the finishing time, I had a short one with Kaneda-kun. But yeah it's rather normally un-interesting. I think he got a few juniors in a roll, and got bored of it.
________________
So after Kishikawa-sensei telling me about he wanted me at the shiai...
Kishikawa: "But did you practice with them in jikeiko."
Me: "Yeah. All three of them."
K: "Good. Did you learn something?"
Me: "Hmm... I know they are going easy on me. I think they hit very solid and accurate."
K: "Yes. You see, they are very stable."
[Switching back to the semi-hellish squad training from now on, I am not sure if I'll enjoy kendo as much...]
Hokkaido Weekend (2/3)
Sunday 8.30am - 12.30pm
By the time I got changed and walked into the dojo, it was 8.35am according to the wall clock.
...Wasn't panicking at all as there were about 10-12 people there only. Usually at that hour some people will be doing kata, and so they were doing it. Leo came up and complained about getting in at 8.30am exactly and having no one in the gym. But he also informed me that he heard it's kata today. Oops, I haven't got my bokuto with me (typical)!!
Our 4 visitors arrived at 8.50am. We were asked to take of our Dou. Yes, it was kata...
Though I was rather suprised that Kamimura-kun (the injured HS boy) pulled out a bokuto from his shinai bag (even though the 3 of them didn't practice the kata in pairs like the rest of us do).
It was your typical kata seminar. Going through some keypoints in each kata set, switching sides for uchidachi/ shidachi sides.
There are many reasons why I don't really enjoy kendo kata. [*sip] Especially I can't pay my full attention and falling asleep at the same time.
Amy was my partner for the day, who has not been very entertaining. Anyhow she's going to take Nidan in 2 weeks, so I tried being my best. Sometimes I struggled whether to point out small things like "you must begin and finish at the centre". Well I pointed that one out, but there are other sensei at the side watching, so I felt I wasn't in the place to comment (and just kept on going)...
A new point for me is about #6 where the suriage action is sharper with bokuto than with a shinai. With the "physics" of shinai, it's a sliding action. But with bokuto (a dense material) the waza has one smaller surface for impact.
It was around 11.00am (!!!) already when we've progressed to kodachi 1-3. I still have 1.5 years at least to sit for Sandan, but I tried listening and observing how Furukawa-sensei does it.
While the rest of the lower grades chatting at the side, not being able to practice kodachi, there was a rather long (fun but took up too much time uhmmm) Q&A session with some local sensei. I just stood there and listen... Nobody really realized there weren't much time left...!!
On to bogu, it was demo shiai keiko with 2 of the Tokai4 boys vs 4 from the squad (Derek, Yip, Johnny, Leo). Some of us scored but in total we only won 1 match out of 8. My impression is that, they are very stable and their posture is very upright, although they don't have many stylish waza. Furukawa-sensei pointed out about the danger of staying in between tsuba-zeriai and chika-maai, as that's the distance for hikiwaza. More than half of the points where hiki-men, actually.
One interesting personal point for me is that exactly a year ago Kyushu Gakuin was in London. So I kind of met the strongest High School teams from the very North and South of Japan. Kyushu Gakuin won this year's Gyokuryugi and was Joint-3rd at Interhigh, Best 8 at Kaiseki. Kaneda-kun from Tokai4 came joint-3rd at this year's Interhigh indivduals. According to my sources, Tokai4 is one of the top 4 HS in Hokkaido, and of course, including Eiga Naoki as their alumni.
There's something wrong with my queueing technique, as I seem to be too polite - and didn't get anything apart from about 10 swings with Ngan-sensei at the last 30-sec of the whole 25-min jikeiko time!!!
Well, I spent some time watching Kishikawa-sensei fighting Furukawa-sensei. Not many people can make Kishikawa-sensei ran out of breath (to the point that he needs some breathing time before the next keiko with other students)...
Also there are scenes of Yung-sensei being pushed to the far-end of the wall, Derek get pushed to the queuing side, and both Lai-sensei Yamada-sensei (the real-time translator of the day) got pushed onto the floor.
All these happened while I was in another long queue for Ou/Wong from Yamaguchi, as on her zekken. Initially I didn't know who she was. But I asked Agnes and she said Irene Wong was a Sandan when she started - with a Shanghai-nese father, she is now living in Japan. I *knew* that she's quite senior as Eda-sensei give Wong the shomen-side to start with. Wong is now Rokudan, and her kendo is quite sharp too. Shame that there's no time for keiko.
[On to next Tuesday...]
By the time I got changed and walked into the dojo, it was 8.35am according to the wall clock.
...Wasn't panicking at all as there were about 10-12 people there only. Usually at that hour some people will be doing kata, and so they were doing it. Leo came up and complained about getting in at 8.30am exactly and having no one in the gym. But he also informed me that he heard it's kata today. Oops, I haven't got my bokuto with me (typical)!!
Our 4 visitors arrived at 8.50am. We were asked to take of our Dou. Yes, it was kata...
Though I was rather suprised that Kamimura-kun (the injured HS boy) pulled out a bokuto from his shinai bag (even though the 3 of them didn't practice the kata in pairs like the rest of us do).
It was your typical kata seminar. Going through some keypoints in each kata set, switching sides for uchidachi/ shidachi sides.
There are many reasons why I don't really enjoy kendo kata. [*sip] Especially I can't pay my full attention and falling asleep at the same time.
Amy was my partner for the day, who has not been very entertaining. Anyhow she's going to take Nidan in 2 weeks, so I tried being my best. Sometimes I struggled whether to point out small things like "you must begin and finish at the centre". Well I pointed that one out, but there are other sensei at the side watching, so I felt I wasn't in the place to comment (and just kept on going)...
A new point for me is about #6 where the suriage action is sharper with bokuto than with a shinai. With the "physics" of shinai, it's a sliding action. But with bokuto (a dense material) the waza has one smaller surface for impact.
It was around 11.00am (!!!) already when we've progressed to kodachi 1-3. I still have 1.5 years at least to sit for Sandan, but I tried listening and observing how Furukawa-sensei does it.
While the rest of the lower grades chatting at the side, not being able to practice kodachi, there was a rather long (fun but took up too much time uhmmm) Q&A session with some local sensei. I just stood there and listen... Nobody really realized there weren't much time left...!!
On to bogu, it was demo shiai keiko with 2 of the Tokai4 boys vs 4 from the squad (Derek, Yip, Johnny, Leo). Some of us scored but in total we only won 1 match out of 8. My impression is that, they are very stable and their posture is very upright, although they don't have many stylish waza. Furukawa-sensei pointed out about the danger of staying in between tsuba-zeriai and chika-maai, as that's the distance for hikiwaza. More than half of the points where hiki-men, actually.
One interesting personal point for me is that exactly a year ago Kyushu Gakuin was in London. So I kind of met the strongest High School teams from the very North and South of Japan. Kyushu Gakuin won this year's Gyokuryugi and was Joint-3rd at Interhigh, Best 8 at Kaiseki. Kaneda-kun from Tokai4 came joint-3rd at this year's Interhigh indivduals. According to my sources, Tokai4 is one of the top 4 HS in Hokkaido, and of course, including Eiga Naoki as their alumni.
There's something wrong with my queueing technique, as I seem to be too polite - and didn't get anything apart from about 10 swings with Ngan-sensei at the last 30-sec of the whole 25-min jikeiko time!!!
Well, I spent some time watching Kishikawa-sensei fighting Furukawa-sensei. Not many people can make Kishikawa-sensei ran out of breath (to the point that he needs some breathing time before the next keiko with other students)...
Also there are scenes of Yung-sensei being pushed to the far-end of the wall, Derek get pushed to the queuing side, and both Lai-sensei Yamada-sensei (the real-time translator of the day) got pushed onto the floor.
All these happened while I was in another long queue for Ou/Wong from Yamaguchi, as on her zekken. Initially I didn't know who she was. But I asked Agnes and she said Irene Wong was a Sandan when she started - with a Shanghai-nese father, she is now living in Japan. I *knew* that she's quite senior as Eda-sensei give Wong the shomen-side to start with. Wong is now Rokudan, and her kendo is quite sharp too. Shame that there's no time for keiko.
[On to next Tuesday...]
Sunday, August 14, 2005
Hokkaido Weekend (1/3)
Furukawa Kazuo Sensei (8Dan Kyoshi) with 3 students of Tokai University 4th High School from Hokkaido
Sat 4.30-7.30pm
This is a rather typical seminar-style day with loads of kihon and a 1/2 hour of jikeiko towards the end.
With around 30+ and mostly 3Dan and below people in the room, we started off with some warm-ups and "normal" suburi (as comparing to the squad ones!!), leaded by Yung-sensei.
Furukawa-sensei walked around during the suburi and observed. Apparently people here are using too much shoulders, not enough koshi, and their action aren't ichihyoushi (one beat) with acceleration on the downward swing. Also the left wrist should not go beyond 180-degree (and the grip should be "in")- which is an indication of you not holding the shinai.
I was on the middle of the 3rd row back and tried peeking on the HS boys at the far end, trying to copy their movement from behind. Somehow I, as always, feel that Japanese boys always swing their shinai so effortlessly. Seems to me that, something so basic and simple as suburi, it's not really a matter of strength or how-many-can-you-do. Maybe because they've been swinging it for more than 10 years in their lives, and while their joints are pretty flexible - making them looking so relaxed doing it.
On to bogu - we had a short briefing of what will we be doing today, and demonstrated by the HS boys. What made it interesting was their ashi-sabaki, in combination with the crispy pop-sound when the hits landed. Did I mention this part of keiko was done using suri-ashi only?
This was like bokuto-kihon kind of men-uchi, step back, and repeat for 5 times. Some with kote, do and kote-men. We made 4 lines (one rotation every 2 lines) and got different opponents. Having NOT practiced with a lot of males lately, and by the time we did kote, my right forearm felt injured. F-sensei obviously commented on "hitting too hard" in various occations, including men cuts...
The HS boys were truly impressive when we moved on to kote-men-do-men (going forward in 4 steps, suri-ashi). Our footwork, in comparison, lacked fluidity and stableness, not to mention the obvious delayed speed we all have. The HS boys all have the same "yeyeyeye" kiai, and every cut they made clearly pops. Nothing like us struggling to utter "KoTe-Men-Dou-Men"...
By the time we got to use fumikomi instead of suri-ashi, we were stuck with the same partner. Which was a lovely thing as my partner happened to be Agnes (we were like, "thank god, no more hard-hitting big fellas!!"). All the basics were repeated again, and we were expected to keep the keypoints in mind. I focused on not moving my left foot while launching forward, and am quite surprised that the suri-ashi clicked so well...
The Kirikaeshi was explained to us as a fundamental of kendo waza. By getting the timing and actions right, your waza will flow like you do or receive sayu-men.
We only had time to practice a bit of Suriage-waza, but it went alright.
At the end of the seminar, we were shown one way of how they train in Hokkaido... 8 in a group lining up in 4s, and then one person stays in the center to do their waza, while the rest of the line come up one-by-one cutting men. The motodachi in the center has to turn 180-degree sharp, facing the next opponent for 7 times, non-stop. Wait, I've done that before- in London!!! It's just a demonstration this time (and plenty of people messed up the fluidity) - but hopefully we will do it again some day.
The ending 1/2 hour of jikeiko is a bit of a nightmare. One of the HS boys was injured (not in HK), leaving only 2 others, and they happened to engaged into long keiko with some sensei, leaving massive queues for the rest of us. Towards the last 5 mins I finally got Kishikawa-sensei. But apart from one sneeky kote-men, I wasn't too focused and K-sensei finished the keiko rather short. (must be my fault)
That was the 3-hour seminar on the first day. I was starving and changed rather quickly. But Kishikawa-sensei said to me, "Jenny, you coming tomorrow morning eh?"
I was like, "uhm, yeah..."
He went, "See you 8.30 then. You're a squad member eh!"
8.30am... D'oh!
Sat 4.30-7.30pm
This is a rather typical seminar-style day with loads of kihon and a 1/2 hour of jikeiko towards the end.
With around 30+ and mostly 3Dan and below people in the room, we started off with some warm-ups and "normal" suburi (as comparing to the squad ones!!), leaded by Yung-sensei.
Furukawa-sensei walked around during the suburi and observed. Apparently people here are using too much shoulders, not enough koshi, and their action aren't ichihyoushi (one beat) with acceleration on the downward swing. Also the left wrist should not go beyond 180-degree (and the grip should be "in")- which is an indication of you not holding the shinai.
I was on the middle of the 3rd row back and tried peeking on the HS boys at the far end, trying to copy their movement from behind. Somehow I, as always, feel that Japanese boys always swing their shinai so effortlessly. Seems to me that, something so basic and simple as suburi, it's not really a matter of strength or how-many-can-you-do. Maybe because they've been swinging it for more than 10 years in their lives, and while their joints are pretty flexible - making them looking so relaxed doing it.
On to bogu - we had a short briefing of what will we be doing today, and demonstrated by the HS boys. What made it interesting was their ashi-sabaki, in combination with the crispy pop-sound when the hits landed. Did I mention this part of keiko was done using suri-ashi only?
This was like bokuto-kihon kind of men-uchi, step back, and repeat for 5 times. Some with kote, do and kote-men. We made 4 lines (one rotation every 2 lines) and got different opponents. Having NOT practiced with a lot of males lately, and by the time we did kote, my right forearm felt injured. F-sensei obviously commented on "hitting too hard" in various occations, including men cuts...
The HS boys were truly impressive when we moved on to kote-men-do-men (going forward in 4 steps, suri-ashi). Our footwork, in comparison, lacked fluidity and stableness, not to mention the obvious delayed speed we all have. The HS boys all have the same "yeyeyeye" kiai, and every cut they made clearly pops. Nothing like us struggling to utter "KoTe-Men-Dou-Men"...
By the time we got to use fumikomi instead of suri-ashi, we were stuck with the same partner. Which was a lovely thing as my partner happened to be Agnes (we were like, "thank god, no more hard-hitting big fellas!!"). All the basics were repeated again, and we were expected to keep the keypoints in mind. I focused on not moving my left foot while launching forward, and am quite surprised that the suri-ashi clicked so well...
The Kirikaeshi was explained to us as a fundamental of kendo waza. By getting the timing and actions right, your waza will flow like you do or receive sayu-men.
We only had time to practice a bit of Suriage-waza, but it went alright.
At the end of the seminar, we were shown one way of how they train in Hokkaido... 8 in a group lining up in 4s, and then one person stays in the center to do their waza, while the rest of the line come up one-by-one cutting men. The motodachi in the center has to turn 180-degree sharp, facing the next opponent for 7 times, non-stop. Wait, I've done that before- in London!!! It's just a demonstration this time (and plenty of people messed up the fluidity) - but hopefully we will do it again some day.
The ending 1/2 hour of jikeiko is a bit of a nightmare. One of the HS boys was injured (not in HK), leaving only 2 others, and they happened to engaged into long keiko with some sensei, leaving massive queues for the rest of us. Towards the last 5 mins I finally got Kishikawa-sensei. But apart from one sneeky kote-men, I wasn't too focused and K-sensei finished the keiko rather short. (must be my fault)
That was the 3-hour seminar on the first day. I was starving and changed rather quickly. But Kishikawa-sensei said to me, "Jenny, you coming tomorrow morning eh?"
I was like, "uhm, yeah..."
He went, "See you 8.30 then. You're a squad member eh!"
8.30am... D'oh!
Friday, August 12, 2005
Yonkyu
There was this funny internal email:-
Subject: Furukawa sensei
Just to remind you, on Sun and Tue there will be mainly shiai keiko for squad members. We met the 3 young 15/ 17/ 18- year-old big high school boys last night at the airport. One of them is doing the jodan. I think it will be very interesting if we can beat them all as a pre-wkc warm up shiai. They practice 3 hrs everyday including sundays.
Sat is also good training for 3-dan and below.
See you then
Eda
-------------------------
Heh.
I should have gone but today is reserved for 4Dan and above (!?)... Should have sat there and watch but it has been a tiring day (and super rainy too)...
BTW they published the article Eda-sensei wrote, 6th Dan Examination Experience ...in English, for Kendo Nippon (Aug 2005)
--------------------------
I was trying to make an interesting photo-journal around town this afternoon. Happened to walk up to a Nihongo school...
... and checked their Japanese courses. Just one of those things I should do during my spare time (seems to have loads of it recently...)
I asked if I can skipped the really basic "A, I, U, E, O" - and they gave me a piece of assessment test (A4, single page).
I scored 16/16...
And so I asked for one more...
...Scored 12/16...
Multiple-choice answers, but it was quite a struggle. If I revised a little bit more, maybe I'll skip the Phrase 3 class too. (There are 5 phrases before 4th Kyu JLPT.) I claimed to be "not too confident for another test"...
Since I can apply for "Continung Education Fund" from the government (anyone can apply to fund a number of short courses provided by various institutions - Japanese being one of those) - in any case Phrase 1-5 of Yonkyu now costs around $1,500 (or GBP 100). Before getting funded, I'd have to pay the full $7,000 (or GBP 500) But what I saved is 50 hours of A,I,U,E,O... I just have to go back and register on Phrase 3 in 2 week's time.
The "tests" costed me 20 bucks - but check out my registration fee exemption, and direct entry to Phrase 3 for Yonkyu!! :D
Last but not least, this is a really cool self-portrait I took on the bus... Sorry for the non-kendo entries recently. But this weekend I'm going to have quite a lot of it!!!
Subject: Furukawa sensei
Just to remind you, on Sun and Tue there will be mainly shiai keiko for squad members. We met the 3 young 15/ 17/ 18- year-old big high school boys last night at the airport. One of them is doing the jodan. I think it will be very interesting if we can beat them all as a pre-wkc warm up shiai. They practice 3 hrs everyday including sundays.
Sat is also good training for 3-dan and below.
See you then
Eda
-------------------------
Heh.
I should have gone but today is reserved for 4Dan and above (!?)... Should have sat there and watch but it has been a tiring day (and super rainy too)...
BTW they published the article Eda-sensei wrote, 6th Dan Examination Experience ...in English, for Kendo Nippon (Aug 2005)
--------------------------
I was trying to make an interesting photo-journal around town this afternoon. Happened to walk up to a Nihongo school...
... and checked their Japanese courses. Just one of those things I should do during my spare time (seems to have loads of it recently...)
I asked if I can skipped the really basic "A, I, U, E, O" - and they gave me a piece of assessment test (A4, single page).
I scored 16/16...
And so I asked for one more...
...Scored 12/16...
Multiple-choice answers, but it was quite a struggle. If I revised a little bit more, maybe I'll skip the Phrase 3 class too. (There are 5 phrases before 4th Kyu JLPT.) I claimed to be "not too confident for another test"...
Since I can apply for "Continung Education Fund" from the government (anyone can apply to fund a number of short courses provided by various institutions - Japanese being one of those) - in any case Phrase 1-5 of Yonkyu now costs around $1,500 (or GBP 100). Before getting funded, I'd have to pay the full $7,000 (or GBP 500) But what I saved is 50 hours of A,I,U,E,O... I just have to go back and register on Phrase 3 in 2 week's time.
The "tests" costed me 20 bucks - but check out my registration fee exemption, and direct entry to Phrase 3 for Yonkyu!! :D
Last but not least, this is a really cool self-portrait I took on the bus... Sorry for the non-kendo entries recently. But this weekend I'm going to have quite a lot of it!!!
Ullambana Photoblog
Tonight Tanaka-sensei lead the session as Eda-sensei was away (probably at the airport picking visitors up). It was a loooong session on Kihon. From a little bit of footwork, to men/kote/do/kote-men/kote-men-do-uchi at sanhyoushi/ichihyoushi (3 / 1 steps/beats)... and then rounds of kirikaeshi, debana waza, suriage waza... To the ending 10 mins of mawari-keiko...
I was so focus today. Apart from the slight hiccups of getting hit by just standing there after a cut, I cut pretty precise with my back straight. My 3-month-old shinai got some splinters finally... But I am not sure if my power control is getting better or worst (or was it just because of the lack of maintaince.?)...
__________________
And, something completely kendo unrelated... (but I thought some foreigners will be interested to know a bit of my local customs...)
It's Ullambana Festival this week, something like a ..."Ghost fest". Today while having nothing in particular to do (waiting for some response from an interview...) - My grandma grabbed me to go to a few bows....
1) ...My late-grandfather's urn is kept at Yuenyuen Temple, a big, typical HK temple (yet not too traditional) that ran in a amalgamation of Buddhism, Taoism and Confucism)
2) Overlooking the district of Tseun Wan with the view of a ...kitcsh idol set...
3) First of all, we need to contribute some insent sticks to all the free spirits (who happened to got out of hell at this period of time....uhmm...)
4) Posh people get better decorations around their ancestor's name.
5) My grandma here searching for grandfather's name at one of the stalls, set up especially for this event (it's numbered, don't worry :D)... Yeah, bow to the name and off we go...
6) Obviously because of safety concern, the paper-money-burning task is now located outside the stalls, and we have to do it directly at the incinerator.
7) I have no idea why I snapped this pic, but I think some people are over-doing... I think some people suddenly find out it's too hard to set that red box (of paper-clothings, assorted paper items, etc) in fire, they just trash the whole thing into the deep, hot, smoky and smelling incinerator.
8) Yeah that's it - quite entertaining as I haven't had this sort of activity for 5 year, since I weren't home. Not everybody practise this, but probably because there's someone dear passed away recently, we are just following the usual procedures to go.
It super-rained on our way back (hence it didn't rain when I go for kendo!). The above pic is taken on the bus before going in to a tunnel.
[end]
I was so focus today. Apart from the slight hiccups of getting hit by just standing there after a cut, I cut pretty precise with my back straight. My 3-month-old shinai got some splinters finally... But I am not sure if my power control is getting better or worst (or was it just because of the lack of maintaince.?)...
__________________
And, something completely kendo unrelated... (but I thought some foreigners will be interested to know a bit of my local customs...)
It's Ullambana Festival this week, something like a ..."Ghost fest". Today while having nothing in particular to do (waiting for some response from an interview...) - My grandma grabbed me to go to a few bows....
1) ...My late-grandfather's urn is kept at Yuenyuen Temple, a big, typical HK temple (yet not too traditional) that ran in a amalgamation of Buddhism, Taoism and Confucism)
2) Overlooking the district of Tseun Wan with the view of a ...kitcsh idol set...
3) First of all, we need to contribute some insent sticks to all the free spirits (who happened to got out of hell at this period of time....uhmm...)
4) Posh people get better decorations around their ancestor's name.
5) My grandma here searching for grandfather's name at one of the stalls, set up especially for this event (it's numbered, don't worry :D)... Yeah, bow to the name and off we go...
6) Obviously because of safety concern, the paper-money-burning task is now located outside the stalls, and we have to do it directly at the incinerator.
7) I have no idea why I snapped this pic, but I think some people are over-doing... I think some people suddenly find out it's too hard to set that red box (of paper-clothings, assorted paper items, etc) in fire, they just trash the whole thing into the deep, hot, smoky and smelling incinerator.
8) Yeah that's it - quite entertaining as I haven't had this sort of activity for 5 year, since I weren't home. Not everybody practise this, but probably because there's someone dear passed away recently, we are just following the usual procedures to go.
It super-rained on our way back (hence it didn't rain when I go for kendo!). The above pic is taken on the bus before going in to a tunnel.
[end]
Tuesday, August 09, 2005
Absent Rant
1) Heavy rain
2) Diarrhoea
3) Severe abdominal pain from period
A combination of the above is the excuse of why I didn't go tonight, despite the fact that I am absolutely free to go.
-----------------
A Rather Exciting Email from the Mailing List:-
Subject : 1st Regional Kendo Championships
Dear squad members,
We have been confirmed by the local government officials to host the 1st Regional Kendo Championships on the 26th and 27th of Nov this year at Lei Yue Mun Sports Centre.
We will invite teams from Macau, Beijing, Shanghai, Yanbian University, and dojos in Guangzhou and Chongqing to join.
Each area will send maximum of 2 teams (5 members team).
Please get yourself prepared to fight in this event.
More details will be announced in due course.
eda
--------------------
???
Whoa, I didn't know they have kendo in so many places in China - I haven't even made myself to Chongqing and Yanbian (in Jilin Provence, NE China - neighbouring Russia and N. Korea) ...
Not sure if they'll fit a Ladies division, but I definitely need to brush up my Mandarin skill!! (Had been watching some Taiwanese TV shows, but Mainland Chinese is a different story...)
2) Diarrhoea
3) Severe abdominal pain from period
A combination of the above is the excuse of why I didn't go tonight, despite the fact that I am absolutely free to go.
-----------------
A Rather Exciting Email from the Mailing List:-
Subject : 1st Regional Kendo Championships
Dear squad members,
We have been confirmed by the local government officials to host the 1st Regional Kendo Championships on the 26th and 27th of Nov this year at Lei Yue Mun Sports Centre.
We will invite teams from Macau, Beijing, Shanghai, Yanbian University, and dojos in Guangzhou and Chongqing to join.
Each area will send maximum of 2 teams (5 members team).
Please get yourself prepared to fight in this event.
More details will be announced in due course.
eda
--------------------
???
Whoa, I didn't know they have kendo in so many places in China - I haven't even made myself to Chongqing and Yanbian (in Jilin Provence, NE China - neighbouring Russia and N. Korea) ...
Not sure if they'll fit a Ladies division, but I definitely need to brush up my Mandarin skill!! (Had been watching some Taiwanese TV shows, but Mainland Chinese is a different story...)
Sunday, August 07, 2005
Shodachi Ippon
Welcome to August.
For the past 5 weeks I've been escaping from the 2-hour Sunday squad, i.e. the whole of July! Nothing to be proud of, but I did spend more time on other more important matters of life.
Just this last week I haven't been to kendo for 9 days - suffering from a flu and then a severe stomach ache, which stopped me going to the dojo with the weekend visit of Inoue-sensei (Inoue Shigeaki/ Nara/ 8Dan Hanshi)...This morning I found myself in insomina mode, but managed to arrive at 9.30am. And to my surprise, Inoue-sensei was standing next to a white board with 25 of us in the audience, giving a kendo lecture..!
Sitting there was the Sunday morning keiko group - I counted only 3 of us were 2Dan and below... with 1/3 Japanese and half of us understand the jokes in Japanese...
What I remember without taking notes:-
1) Ken no Riho
That 1 hour of Q&A session was referred to as the "reasoning/ Ri" part of our training, as to go along with the usual "practice/method/ Ho".
2) Hold the shinai like an umbrella, with power distribution on the fingers as 3,2,1,2,1 (bottom to top)
3) Practice tenouchi at kirikaeshi, where all the cuts should be 100% tenouchi, and the rest of the time, 0%. Therefore sayu-men should be performed with "Hyaku-zero-hyaku-zero..." in mind.
4) Shitei Dougyou
Both the teacher and the student share the same experience. Beware of posture, footwork, distance, etc. points as a motodachi
5) Short of breath is mainly due to bad posture
Inoue-sensei told us about asking for advice from his sensei when he was young.
"So... how can I survive longer during practice? Can sensei give one advice please?"
"Inoue-kun, correct your posture."
"What does that mean? Can you give one mroe advice please?"
"Well, it's like riding a horse."
Eh?! - Jokes aside. That's how the older generation explained things... The point is that, when riding a horse (!), the shoulders, the arms, the hands, the feet should all be relaxed.
6) How to demonstrate the correct "Kimochi"?
Shodachi Ippon = Senhon
The first ippon of a practice is the most obvious state of your mind, and the most important cut. It's like combining the thousand cuts after that first one.
Shodachi Ippon = Ichigo Ichie
So base on this attitude [since Shodachi Ippon is a once in a lifetime opportunity], if you encounter all the cuts you made like a once in a lifetime opportunity, then all the Ippon you made will be another Shodachi, and you should be cutting at 100%
********
Somehow I found the last point very refreshing - it never came across me like that, verbally.
The next 2 hours [squad got cancelled..! yay \(^o^)/] was a series of kihon in bogu.
Inoue-sensei didn't explicitly say it, but basically we spent the first 1 hour running though various waza from the Bokuto ni yoru Kendo Kihon... I haven't seen or done it since I left the UK - and no one is practicing this here (!). My movements were rather rusty cutting men using suri-ashi...
One good thing is, my comrade Fanny showed up for the squad since last week. Maybe I should try harder to get to the Sunday one too... That'll depend on my job-hunting performance in the coming weeks...
We then progress to a few rounds of kirikaeshi. It was cut down to one-string only because the whole group (from 1-7dan!) all squeezed into the line on the same rotation. But the last cut was emphasized, "as if it is a debana-men cut". I happened to get Tomikawa-sensei, Sasahara-sensei and Kishikawa-sensei as my partner. No idea why these high-grades cut soooo hard at kirikaeshi (both the sayu-men and men-uchi...)
********
Half an hour left for keiko.
Obviously Inoue-sensei got the longest line (even though this is already the 3rd day he's here)...
Narita-san (5Dan) grabbed me for a keiko first.
My greatest achievement of the day is that de-kote I got as Shodachi!!!!!!! Besides learning his timing and how to counter his hiki-waza (he cuts really close + hard...) - a got some more debane-men and 2 high-quality de-kote from him. This keiko went on for more than 5 mins (sorry I did check the clock), and my form died off towards the end.
Spent a long time queuing for my next keiko - against Yung-sensei. It's been 1/2 year doing keiko with him, and the first time at his 6Dan. I can feel that he is timing me, and picking me off by creating the chances himself (!). Like the first 2 men-kaeshi-do I lost was just like that. Also, he is quite manipulative at distance by pulling his kamae off straight before his cut, or by picking off openings at chika-maai. There were 2 de-kote I popped, but the other stuff I lost bothers me much more.
The rest of the time was spent watching the Hachidan. You have to be there to see it. Adding to that, seeing the other sensei got pushed around is pure pleasure!!
Cost: $100
********
Up next weekend: Visit of Hokkaido high school students + Furukawa-sensei [Eiga's sensei] I heard his kote-men is amazing!! Must get there (with enough cash)... hmmm
For the past 5 weeks I've been escaping from the 2-hour Sunday squad, i.e. the whole of July! Nothing to be proud of, but I did spend more time on other more important matters of life.
Just this last week I haven't been to kendo for 9 days - suffering from a flu and then a severe stomach ache, which stopped me going to the dojo with the weekend visit of Inoue-sensei (Inoue Shigeaki/ Nara/ 8Dan Hanshi)...This morning I found myself in insomina mode, but managed to arrive at 9.30am. And to my surprise, Inoue-sensei was standing next to a white board with 25 of us in the audience, giving a kendo lecture..!
Sitting there was the Sunday morning keiko group - I counted only 3 of us were 2Dan and below... with 1/3 Japanese and half of us understand the jokes in Japanese...
What I remember without taking notes:-
1) Ken no Riho
That 1 hour of Q&A session was referred to as the "reasoning/ Ri" part of our training, as to go along with the usual "practice/method/ Ho".
2) Hold the shinai like an umbrella, with power distribution on the fingers as 3,2,1,2,1 (bottom to top)
3) Practice tenouchi at kirikaeshi, where all the cuts should be 100% tenouchi, and the rest of the time, 0%. Therefore sayu-men should be performed with "Hyaku-zero-hyaku-zero..." in mind.
4) Shitei Dougyou
Both the teacher and the student share the same experience. Beware of posture, footwork, distance, etc. points as a motodachi
5) Short of breath is mainly due to bad posture
Inoue-sensei told us about asking for advice from his sensei when he was young.
"So... how can I survive longer during practice? Can sensei give one advice please?"
"Inoue-kun, correct your posture."
"What does that mean? Can you give one mroe advice please?"
"Well, it's like riding a horse."
Eh?! - Jokes aside. That's how the older generation explained things... The point is that, when riding a horse (!), the shoulders, the arms, the hands, the feet should all be relaxed.
6) How to demonstrate the correct "Kimochi"?
Shodachi Ippon = Senhon
The first ippon of a practice is the most obvious state of your mind, and the most important cut. It's like combining the thousand cuts after that first one.
Shodachi Ippon = Ichigo Ichie
So base on this attitude [since Shodachi Ippon is a once in a lifetime opportunity], if you encounter all the cuts you made like a once in a lifetime opportunity, then all the Ippon you made will be another Shodachi, and you should be cutting at 100%
********
Somehow I found the last point very refreshing - it never came across me like that, verbally.
The next 2 hours [squad got cancelled..! yay \(^o^)/] was a series of kihon in bogu.
Inoue-sensei didn't explicitly say it, but basically we spent the first 1 hour running though various waza from the Bokuto ni yoru Kendo Kihon... I haven't seen or done it since I left the UK - and no one is practicing this here (!). My movements were rather rusty cutting men using suri-ashi...
One good thing is, my comrade Fanny showed up for the squad since last week. Maybe I should try harder to get to the Sunday one too... That'll depend on my job-hunting performance in the coming weeks...
We then progress to a few rounds of kirikaeshi. It was cut down to one-string only because the whole group (from 1-7dan!) all squeezed into the line on the same rotation. But the last cut was emphasized, "as if it is a debana-men cut". I happened to get Tomikawa-sensei, Sasahara-sensei and Kishikawa-sensei as my partner. No idea why these high-grades cut soooo hard at kirikaeshi (both the sayu-men and men-uchi...)
********
Half an hour left for keiko.
Obviously Inoue-sensei got the longest line (even though this is already the 3rd day he's here)...
Narita-san (5Dan) grabbed me for a keiko first.
My greatest achievement of the day is that de-kote I got as Shodachi!!!!!!! Besides learning his timing and how to counter his hiki-waza (he cuts really close + hard...) - a got some more debane-men and 2 high-quality de-kote from him. This keiko went on for more than 5 mins (sorry I did check the clock), and my form died off towards the end.
Spent a long time queuing for my next keiko - against Yung-sensei. It's been 1/2 year doing keiko with him, and the first time at his 6Dan. I can feel that he is timing me, and picking me off by creating the chances himself (!). Like the first 2 men-kaeshi-do I lost was just like that. Also, he is quite manipulative at distance by pulling his kamae off straight before his cut, or by picking off openings at chika-maai. There were 2 de-kote I popped, but the other stuff I lost bothers me much more.
The rest of the time was spent watching the Hachidan. You have to be there to see it. Adding to that, seeing the other sensei got pushed around is pure pleasure!!
Cost: $100
********
Up next weekend: Visit of Hokkaido high school students + Furukawa-sensei [Eiga's sensei] I heard his kote-men is amazing!! Must get there (with enough cash)... hmmm
Sunday, July 31, 2005
Review
Nope, I didn't go to the Sunday Squad today. Reason: having a fever and too heavy rain. Stayed home all day.
Below is the review schedule for the past 2 months. Had only been in the dojo 16 times out of 2 months, fitting only 1-2 times of kendo a week... Obviously not as bright as I should have been, due to various matters in life. I really need to sort myself out.
Below is the review schedule for the past 2 months. Had only been in the dojo 16 times out of 2 months, fitting only 1-2 times of kendo a week... Obviously not as bright as I should have been, due to various matters in life. I really need to sort myself out.
Friday, July 29, 2005
Back in there
Thursday afternoon I went to an interview for an overqualifying (not to mention, underpaying) job. It came like a joke to myself, but in the end I felt I did something meaningful. At least I found out I shouldn't be going to ANY place for a design job... Anyway, I went to kendo at my dojo in the evening.
I came in late and as was Eda-sensei. The first things she said in the changing room was about her upcoming weekend business trip to LONDON next month (!)... So I spent sometime explaining where she should go to. Unfortunately that's the same week as the Sumi-sensei's seminar (a.k.a. SSS), so she will miss out the high-grades. Oh well never mind...
When we got into the dojo, people were doing the 3-step men-ute (up, cut, back) exercise with Tanaka-sensei. After that we had a few rounds of kirikaeshi, katate-men, and "kirikaeshi + katate-men + do-kirikaeshi + kirikaeshi" kind of uchikomi without men ... ending with 20+20 hayasuburi. It really feels like nothing (apart from the heat) when Eda-sensei called for a 3-min break.
Putting on our Men on we were then asked to do "one side attack, the other side keep blocking" kind of thing. I thought it was kakari-keiko, but my performance was completely awful (like, messy distance, accuracy and ki-ken-tai-icchi). It has been aaaaages since I did (or see) kakari-keiko so maybe that's one of the problem. Also I got to blame part of my motodachi not really doing their job... uhm
Then Eda-sensei said something like, go for an Ippon. Everything you do should be an Ippon. If you get an Ippon, you don't need the rest, so just finish there.
So for the next 2 rounds I had (against Lo and Amy) I just finished mine with my tokui tobikomi-kote waza.
...That's a bit too boring so I thought I should change to something else. So the other 2 rounds I did Nuki-do and kote-do... Which worked equally well, as I just stood there and wait for the other pairs to finish...
That's not too enjoyable to be honest. Besides popping Ippon straight away on Shodachi, I did't really get enough kakari-keiko...
Over to some Ai-men rounds, I felt I was having some improvement too, after those Shuttle Run rounds the day before. One problem I had with Amy was that, she is faster - but she turned right after the cut without running through (like when people go for hiki-waza...)... Though I wasn't too sure if I am correct, I did tell her to go further.
That come 5 rounds of mawari-keiko. Were all good. Osae-men worked brilliantly.
After that I queued for Tanaka-sensei. It felt like I haven't had him for an enitre month (it probably is!!). He's an Ai-men-maniac, but recently I managed to land my men on him too (previously my shinai didn't even touch his men)... And I actually had him TWICE on kote-men - only that he touched his head in a swiping motion afterwards... My men cuts at kote-men is definitely not solid enough!! Uhmm, I need to work on my grip after the kote cut (quote T-sensei).
It was finally raining today so I can't go for a run. (Also I have a bit of sore throat...symtoms of having a flu... not again, please!) I stayed home and watch some kendo DVDs - actually these are the videos from Last month's UK competition. Only half-way through at the moment but some of the things are quite exciting. It's nice to see the familiar faces in the UK in action again.
:)
I came in late and as was Eda-sensei. The first things she said in the changing room was about her upcoming weekend business trip to LONDON next month (!)... So I spent sometime explaining where she should go to. Unfortunately that's the same week as the Sumi-sensei's seminar (a.k.a. SSS), so she will miss out the high-grades. Oh well never mind...
When we got into the dojo, people were doing the 3-step men-ute (up, cut, back) exercise with Tanaka-sensei. After that we had a few rounds of kirikaeshi, katate-men, and "kirikaeshi + katate-men + do-kirikaeshi + kirikaeshi" kind of uchikomi without men ... ending with 20+20 hayasuburi. It really feels like nothing (apart from the heat) when Eda-sensei called for a 3-min break.
Putting on our Men on we were then asked to do "one side attack, the other side keep blocking" kind of thing. I thought it was kakari-keiko, but my performance was completely awful (like, messy distance, accuracy and ki-ken-tai-icchi). It has been aaaaages since I did (or see) kakari-keiko so maybe that's one of the problem. Also I got to blame part of my motodachi not really doing their job... uhm
Then Eda-sensei said something like, go for an Ippon. Everything you do should be an Ippon. If you get an Ippon, you don't need the rest, so just finish there.
So for the next 2 rounds I had (against Lo and Amy) I just finished mine with my tokui tobikomi-kote waza.
...That's a bit too boring so I thought I should change to something else. So the other 2 rounds I did Nuki-do and kote-do... Which worked equally well, as I just stood there and wait for the other pairs to finish...
That's not too enjoyable to be honest. Besides popping Ippon straight away on Shodachi, I did't really get enough kakari-keiko...
Over to some Ai-men rounds, I felt I was having some improvement too, after those Shuttle Run rounds the day before. One problem I had with Amy was that, she is faster - but she turned right after the cut without running through (like when people go for hiki-waza...)... Though I wasn't too sure if I am correct, I did tell her to go further.
That come 5 rounds of mawari-keiko. Were all good. Osae-men worked brilliantly.
After that I queued for Tanaka-sensei. It felt like I haven't had him for an enitre month (it probably is!!). He's an Ai-men-maniac, but recently I managed to land my men on him too (previously my shinai didn't even touch his men)... And I actually had him TWICE on kote-men - only that he touched his head in a swiping motion afterwards... My men cuts at kote-men is definitely not solid enough!! Uhmm, I need to work on my grip after the kote cut (quote T-sensei).
It was finally raining today so I can't go for a run. (Also I have a bit of sore throat...symtoms of having a flu... not again, please!) I stayed home and watch some kendo DVDs - actually these are the videos from Last month's UK competition. Only half-way through at the moment but some of the things are quite exciting. It's nice to see the familiar faces in the UK in action again.
:)
Wednesday, July 27, 2005
Squad #17
Struggling to drag my bogu out at 7.45pm last night, I went to the squad after a week's break. I sent out some letters and told myself, "Yosh! Time to show up!"
On the way I was thinking what excuse I should make for my absence last Sunday... But upon arrival chatting with Chu and Ng (fellow training kohai at the squad) - I found out that no one actually went!! One word, "Lazy". Agnes our captain complained about the low atendance for the men's team - having only one of them last Sunday, as comparing to the 5 at the Ladies' team (but I wasn't there either...).
We were expecting that 250 suburi with 2 shinai and 200 non-stop hayasuburi last night. But maybe because Kishikawa-sensei wasn't the one counting, we all managed to cheat...!!! We did this round in pairs, and I had Agnes facing me, but she shouted "last 20" when it was at 150, and we finished the earliest at 170! I heard last Sunday when K-sensei did the counting, it was like, "...70...80...80...80..."!!
No more cramping this time, apart from the tiredness and heavy breathing, we moved onto waza-keiko with men on. I got Agnes as partner again. Ladies are usually at the far end of the dojo, making me standing right next to K-sensei, and I can't slack off any second...
We did a few rounds of Ai-men from To-maai (from the walls and run into the centre, cutting Ai-men). I began to translate the movement of turn-around into the shuttle-run I did in the previous week. It is *definitely* the case of how sharp I can turn 180-degree - how stable I was, and ready to run to the centre again. I did cut Agnes quite a number of times really spot-on.
After that it was the usual pattern of men/de-kote, kote/de-kote-men (and then moved from issoku-itto to to-ma, etc.) I was still having this problem of not going forward after kote-men, but overall I think I saw more opportunity and was able to cut at the same time, which is a good improvement (and not feel like passing out).
The happiest moment on Earth came with "Yame" being called at 9.45pm!! Then went the unexpected shiai-keiko (ippon shobu). The guys had a few matches, and also I had 2, one against Agnes and the other against Eda-sensei (only 3 of us at the Ladies side this night...) Both fight last quite long (at least 3 mins... I think). I SCORED at debana-men against Agnes's kote, but lost to Eda's hiki-kote. It has been 2 months since I find myself in shiai, and I was quite happy about my performance even after the warm-up suburi at the beginning of the practice.
Afterwards K-sensei said something about how we had improved by attenting the squad over the days. Training pays off. I am not sure tho, especially I lost count of how many times I missed in this few months...
As usual the ending 30mins was for jikeiko. Agnes grabbed me for a long, good one. Sometimes it did feel like we were still at waza-keiko (as we had been partners earlier)... Her advice was that I was cutting from too far (again!?)... I was too used to the ai-men maai, and expecting my opponent moving in while I am cutting (hmm excuses...)
After that I queued for Yu-sensei, who was in a not-too-sharp Jodan fighting Angus... Then Yamada-sensei jumped my queue(!)... It was already the last keiko when I got my chance. Applying the "Get the man while he is down" strategy, I bloody got my Shodachi (tobikomi-men!!! on someone that tall!!!!) Obviously when a sensei is tired, I got my share of uchikomi kinda cut. Comment was that I was still using my right hand to cut (!) - but the men-uchi were quite nice. Ha..
*************
Walked out of the stadium with K-sensei and Yip (a senpai who probably has the highest attendance in the squad). I was about to escape from him (I thought he wanted to scold me..) but ended up having a nice chat about the shiai.
K-sensei: "So what do you think about your shiai today?"
Mingshi: "Err... I wasn't quite sure about the Ippon I made. Agnes hits my kote but it didn't pop on the futon. I cut her men-gane but her head is a bit up... So when I hit the Men I didn't really go through. I don't know why it got scored."
K: "You shouldn't worry about your Ippon. Every cut should be made with full intention. It is shinpan's job to judge whether that is an Ippon or not. You are the player - your job is to play your game!!"
M: ".... hai..."
K: "You made some good attempts before that Ippon. Do you remember that?"
M: "...Yeah. I think my fumikomi was really strong at those, and also the opportunity is good. But the shinai kinda slided off..."
K: "You still practice at Eda's dojo?"
M: "Yeah. Thursdays.."
K: "You should do a lot of kihon. Work on the Men and kote. Get more explosion, and stronger cuts."
M: "Hai."
********************
Today's Shuttle Run records (now with the Mizuno trainers. Mizuno is the official sponsor of the Japanese Volleyball Ladies Team. :D)
10x 10-metres:
Trial #1: 28.52
Trial #2: 28.62
Trial #3: 28.55
Trial #4: 28.33
Trial #5: 28.77
[Note: Police Inspector Standard - Women: 29sec/ Men: 26s; Police Constable - Women: 28.1s/ Men: 24.8s]
So I am still half a second beind... although that's a good improvement.
I did keep in mind about the turning (which helps my ai-men). Also I am getting more used to when to accelerate (explosion) and deccelerate (touching the 10-metre line and turning 180-degree).
Why is it every time I thought I am at the edge of the "quit kendo" abyss, the next keiko was so much more enjoyable...??????
On the way I was thinking what excuse I should make for my absence last Sunday... But upon arrival chatting with Chu and Ng (fellow training kohai at the squad) - I found out that no one actually went!! One word, "Lazy". Agnes our captain complained about the low atendance for the men's team - having only one of them last Sunday, as comparing to the 5 at the Ladies' team (but I wasn't there either...).
We were expecting that 250 suburi with 2 shinai and 200 non-stop hayasuburi last night. But maybe because Kishikawa-sensei wasn't the one counting, we all managed to cheat...!!! We did this round in pairs, and I had Agnes facing me, but she shouted "last 20" when it was at 150, and we finished the earliest at 170! I heard last Sunday when K-sensei did the counting, it was like, "...70...80...80...80..."!!
No more cramping this time, apart from the tiredness and heavy breathing, we moved onto waza-keiko with men on. I got Agnes as partner again. Ladies are usually at the far end of the dojo, making me standing right next to K-sensei, and I can't slack off any second...
We did a few rounds of Ai-men from To-maai (from the walls and run into the centre, cutting Ai-men). I began to translate the movement of turn-around into the shuttle-run I did in the previous week. It is *definitely* the case of how sharp I can turn 180-degree - how stable I was, and ready to run to the centre again. I did cut Agnes quite a number of times really spot-on.
After that it was the usual pattern of men/de-kote, kote/de-kote-men (and then moved from issoku-itto to to-ma, etc.) I was still having this problem of not going forward after kote-men, but overall I think I saw more opportunity and was able to cut at the same time, which is a good improvement (and not feel like passing out).
The happiest moment on Earth came with "Yame" being called at 9.45pm!! Then went the unexpected shiai-keiko (ippon shobu). The guys had a few matches, and also I had 2, one against Agnes and the other against Eda-sensei (only 3 of us at the Ladies side this night...) Both fight last quite long (at least 3 mins... I think). I SCORED at debana-men against Agnes's kote, but lost to Eda's hiki-kote. It has been 2 months since I find myself in shiai, and I was quite happy about my performance even after the warm-up suburi at the beginning of the practice.
Afterwards K-sensei said something about how we had improved by attenting the squad over the days. Training pays off. I am not sure tho, especially I lost count of how many times I missed in this few months...
As usual the ending 30mins was for jikeiko. Agnes grabbed me for a long, good one. Sometimes it did feel like we were still at waza-keiko (as we had been partners earlier)... Her advice was that I was cutting from too far (again!?)... I was too used to the ai-men maai, and expecting my opponent moving in while I am cutting (hmm excuses...)
After that I queued for Yu-sensei, who was in a not-too-sharp Jodan fighting Angus... Then Yamada-sensei jumped my queue(!)... It was already the last keiko when I got my chance. Applying the "Get the man while he is down" strategy, I bloody got my Shodachi (tobikomi-men!!! on someone that tall!!!!) Obviously when a sensei is tired, I got my share of uchikomi kinda cut. Comment was that I was still using my right hand to cut (!) - but the men-uchi were quite nice. Ha..
*************
Walked out of the stadium with K-sensei and Yip (a senpai who probably has the highest attendance in the squad). I was about to escape from him (I thought he wanted to scold me..) but ended up having a nice chat about the shiai.
K-sensei: "So what do you think about your shiai today?"
Mingshi: "Err... I wasn't quite sure about the Ippon I made. Agnes hits my kote but it didn't pop on the futon. I cut her men-gane but her head is a bit up... So when I hit the Men I didn't really go through. I don't know why it got scored."
K: "You shouldn't worry about your Ippon. Every cut should be made with full intention. It is shinpan's job to judge whether that is an Ippon or not. You are the player - your job is to play your game!!"
M: ".... hai..."
K: "You made some good attempts before that Ippon. Do you remember that?"
M: "...Yeah. I think my fumikomi was really strong at those, and also the opportunity is good. But the shinai kinda slided off..."
K: "You still practice at Eda's dojo?"
M: "Yeah. Thursdays.."
K: "You should do a lot of kihon. Work on the Men and kote. Get more explosion, and stronger cuts."
M: "Hai."
********************
Today's Shuttle Run records (now with the Mizuno trainers. Mizuno is the official sponsor of the Japanese Volleyball Ladies Team. :D)
10x 10-metres:
Trial #1: 28.52
Trial #2: 28.62
Trial #3: 28.55
Trial #4: 28.33
Trial #5: 28.77
[Note: Police Inspector Standard - Women: 29sec/ Men: 26s; Police Constable - Women: 28.1s/ Men: 24.8s]
So I am still half a second beind... although that's a good improvement.
I did keep in mind about the turning (which helps my ai-men). Also I am getting more used to when to accelerate (explosion) and deccelerate (touching the 10-metre line and turning 180-degree).
Why is it every time I thought I am at the edge of the "quit kendo" abyss, the next keiko was so much more enjoyable...??????
Sunday, July 24, 2005
I Wanna Run Away...
After packing up nicely my bogu bag last night, this morning I woke up at 6am, 7am and 8.30am (probably due to some stages of insomina)... I washed my face, came back to my room and decided not going to the squad today. For a simple reason: I don't want to go.
The moment I walked out from my bed I can feel the muscle pain from my left leg. It's still hurting, and only this afternoon I can walk with a less limping movement. If that's what kendo is doing to me, without the feeling of improvement or success, why is it my responsibility to do the suffering? More importantly, the tiring feeling is very discouraging for my normal life. Say, I can't even walk properly for days, and constantly feeling tired without doing much work.
So I am considering dropping out of the squad. In fact I have been doing that for the last couple of Sundays. I used to think that I'll enjoy the challenge - but when the training is turning to be a chore, drag and torture to my normal life, I can't enjoy any minute of it.
Two more weeks and there will be some visitors from Hokkaido - including Eiga Naoki's Sensei, Furukawa sensei. Maybe I'll just go and watch, take a few snaps... and practice with the high-school students...
I seem to have lost my passion - but where is it?
BTW Today I have been back from London for exactly half a year...
**********
The b-day "funding" I got from my grandma was used to buy a decent pair of Mizuno trainers and a pair of Reebok sport shorts. Here's what I made out of 800-metre run this evening:-
1st trial= 3'25"03
2nd trial= 3'36" 83
!!!
I can't believe the equipments had made such a difference...! Even though I admit I went too fast at the starting 100m on the first trial (the shoes are too good and hard to control...) Still, that's more than 30 seconds faster than my previous records...!!!
3'25" is the standard for Men's fitness test for Police Inspector, and I am starting to touch it. Since there are 7 testing subjects (Vertical-jump, Pull-up, Shuttle-run (10x10M), Sit-up, Burpee, Threading, 800m Run) on the same day, I'd have to make sure I can last every single one of them... Even though the minimal standard for some of the subjects are pretty easy. (like sit-up 12 times in 30 sec, WTH?!)
The moment I walked out from my bed I can feel the muscle pain from my left leg. It's still hurting, and only this afternoon I can walk with a less limping movement. If that's what kendo is doing to me, without the feeling of improvement or success, why is it my responsibility to do the suffering? More importantly, the tiring feeling is very discouraging for my normal life. Say, I can't even walk properly for days, and constantly feeling tired without doing much work.
So I am considering dropping out of the squad. In fact I have been doing that for the last couple of Sundays. I used to think that I'll enjoy the challenge - but when the training is turning to be a chore, drag and torture to my normal life, I can't enjoy any minute of it.
Two more weeks and there will be some visitors from Hokkaido - including Eiga Naoki's Sensei, Furukawa sensei. Maybe I'll just go and watch, take a few snaps... and practice with the high-school students...
I seem to have lost my passion - but where is it?
BTW Today I have been back from London for exactly half a year...
**********
The b-day "funding" I got from my grandma was used to buy a decent pair of Mizuno trainers and a pair of Reebok sport shorts. Here's what I made out of 800-metre run this evening:-
1st trial= 3'25"03
2nd trial= 3'36" 83
!!!
I can't believe the equipments had made such a difference...! Even though I admit I went too fast at the starting 100m on the first trial (the shoes are too good and hard to control...) Still, that's more than 30 seconds faster than my previous records...!!!
3'25" is the standard for Men's fitness test for Police Inspector, and I am starting to touch it. Since there are 7 testing subjects (Vertical-jump, Pull-up, Shuttle-run (10x10M), Sit-up, Burpee, Threading, 800m Run) on the same day, I'd have to make sure I can last every single one of them... Even though the minimal standard for some of the subjects are pretty easy. (like sit-up 12 times in 30 sec, WTH?!)
Thursday, July 21, 2005
Not Today... Or Now...
I am not talking about I skipped kendo tonight for a birthday dinner (mine!)...
Just that the first thing I know after stepping into my flat - London is exploding here and there!!!
8 hours before walking into the Police HQ - there's always incidents that aid my insomnia.
Is this what is called as "life as an 23-year-old adult"???
_____________
[edit]
With the noise from the overnight thunderstorm, I managed about 3 hours of sleep, and arrived the Police HQ at 8.00am.
I filled out another form which allows me to apply for Police Constable if in case I failed the Inspector application. And then in the "Other Skills" section, I ticked the boxes for "Fluent Mandarin" and "Computer Skills", while adding "Kendo 2nd Dan" to the provided blank space.
All went smoothly when the recruitment officer checked my online application form - until when he asked for my academic records...
Officer Soo: "We will need the original transcript from your university."
Mingshi: "... These are all I got from them." (showing off my undergrad and postgrad certs)
Soo: "You need to get the transcript from your UK uni. I'll give you 6 weeks. Just pop in and tell the officer on duty that you've filled in the forms but just have to show the transcripts."
Mingshi: "Okay.."
Soo: "You can leave now."
Maybe I shouldn't have worried about the eyesight test too much, because... I didn't even managed to get into the rooms....!!!! When people say no employer will ask for university records, they obviously lied!!!
I'll have to make IDD calls now. God knows how fast the British works... Argh...
Just that the first thing I know after stepping into my flat - London is exploding here and there!!!
8 hours before walking into the Police HQ - there's always incidents that aid my insomnia.
Is this what is called as "life as an 23-year-old adult"???
_____________
[edit]
With the noise from the overnight thunderstorm, I managed about 3 hours of sleep, and arrived the Police HQ at 8.00am.
I filled out another form which allows me to apply for Police Constable if in case I failed the Inspector application. And then in the "Other Skills" section, I ticked the boxes for "Fluent Mandarin" and "Computer Skills", while adding "Kendo 2nd Dan" to the provided blank space.
All went smoothly when the recruitment officer checked my online application form - until when he asked for my academic records...
Officer Soo: "We will need the original transcript from your university."
Mingshi: "... These are all I got from them." (showing off my undergrad and postgrad certs)
Soo: "You need to get the transcript from your UK uni. I'll give you 6 weeks. Just pop in and tell the officer on duty that you've filled in the forms but just have to show the transcripts."
Mingshi: "Okay.."
Soo: "You can leave now."
Maybe I shouldn't have worried about the eyesight test too much, because... I didn't even managed to get into the rooms....!!!! When people say no employer will ask for university records, they obviously lied!!!
I'll have to make IDD calls now. God knows how fast the British works... Argh...
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