Kendo
Ok so this past Saturday we had grading in Kendo and I passed. Who’d have thought? So I have a 6th Kyu in Kendo. I’m actually surprised I passed since I didn’t know grading was happening until the morning of and hadn’t practiced during the week because I’d been studying like crazy for my psych exam.
Saturday was also my first time in bogu. See what happened was after grading there was practice, and being the last practice of the term, the seniors decided to play a game with us recently ranked beginners...
We got split up into two teams and no one really told us what was going on, we were under the impression that we were going to be cheering for our team. No one could have guessed that a guy and a girl from each team of beginners were going to get suited up in a seniors’ bogu and used as puppets against each other for the seniors’ entertainment.
I was one of the lucky people who had no idea what was going on when I was dragged off to the side by two of the girls and in a few minutes I was staring out from the men feeling at least ten pounds heavier than normal and slightly disoriented due to the extreme narrowing of my peripheral vision - that and I couldn’t hear very well, sounds get kind of muffled, especially when everyone is talking at once, or cheering as the case may be.
How it worked was that the senior was holding our arms from behind and lifting and pushing us forward and tugging us back like if we were life sized dolls or something trying to win against the other and calling out either men, kote or do as they moved us as an indication to where they wanted us to strike. It was a rather awkward feeling and after the match I felt a bit out of sorts when released and allowed to move freely.
I had tons of fun and got a point off the other girl but I can’t really say how, it was a bit of a blur. Anyway it just made me all the more hyped to get up to my 4th Kyu so I can get bogu and spar again (it was exhilarating) next time though, I’d like to try my hand at it without someone using me as a puppet.
Sensei had a good laugh though, so did just about everyone else. I guess it would have been funny to be a bystander and see this happening.
There’s a tournament coming up sometime in January and we’re all supposed to be practicing for it. The sequence of events is easy but it’s a bit troublesome practicing without an actual target since everything has to do with proper execution of hits on an opponent.
The club is having a Christmas party on the 18th and then that’s it until we come back after the new years.