Aikido in japan... club aikido
I had my first aikido experience in japan last night. It was quite enjoyable and interesting. One of Larissa's friends is a 2nd year jet and fellow aikidoka. He trains at his schools club at a local high school. The main teacher is a shihan from hombu, 8th dan. I am also told he as an exstensive background in daito ryu jujitsu (for the n00bs, the martial art that aikido developed from.)
His school is about a 15 minute bus ride and he was gracious enough to show me the route, I am in hope I will be able to figure it out by myself in the near future. Anyways, his school is an agriculture focused school, like a vocational school if you will. Anyways, back to the aikido.
There are probably 30~40 students training along with a few salarymen and gaijin. The later normally train on fridays and sundays when the sessions are at a different location. Anyways, Rob introduced me to some of his student and aikidoka. This was very amusing as 99.99% of the students were scared to use there engrish (eigo-go.) After being introduced as Sensei Eric, we dressed and started warming up with the group. They spend very little time on ukemi, mainly forward and backwards rolling and some pretty amazing aerial falls. They did up to six people (six people hunched over on the ground and they jump over them.) I was told they have a demo coming up this weekend that they were practicing for.
The style is aikikai, which is what I am used to. A majority of the students, even the higher ranking students, have very little connection. The techniques we did were very flowing with lots of ukemi, breakfalls and forward rolling. I was able to hold my own. I have to remember not to grab so hard as a few people were definately shaken up. I think aikido to these kids is seen as baseball or soccer to some in the states, it is not being practiced as a martial art, but a sport. In terms of ranking, I will keep my ikkyu and hopefully test for shodan in the future. It was mentioned by the shihan that "An american shodan is a japanese nidan." I do not know if the was sarcasm or a factual statement. I know it takes about 2 years for shodan here, so that would place me easily at nidan.
The shihan is very friendly, introduced my to the whole class and looks forward to drinking with me. So I think I have found a new aikido home. I have one other school I am going to check out before I make this commitment.
I thought I was over my jet lag, but I slept for about 8 hours last night and another 4 this afternoon.
His school is about a 15 minute bus ride and he was gracious enough to show me the route, I am in hope I will be able to figure it out by myself in the near future. Anyways, his school is an agriculture focused school, like a vocational school if you will. Anyways, back to the aikido.
There are probably 30~40 students training along with a few salarymen and gaijin. The later normally train on fridays and sundays when the sessions are at a different location. Anyways, Rob introduced me to some of his student and aikidoka. This was very amusing as 99.99% of the students were scared to use there engrish (eigo-go.) After being introduced as Sensei Eric, we dressed and started warming up with the group. They spend very little time on ukemi, mainly forward and backwards rolling and some pretty amazing aerial falls. They did up to six people (six people hunched over on the ground and they jump over them.) I was told they have a demo coming up this weekend that they were practicing for.
The style is aikikai, which is what I am used to. A majority of the students, even the higher ranking students, have very little connection. The techniques we did were very flowing with lots of ukemi, breakfalls and forward rolling. I was able to hold my own. I have to remember not to grab so hard as a few people were definately shaken up. I think aikido to these kids is seen as baseball or soccer to some in the states, it is not being practiced as a martial art, but a sport. In terms of ranking, I will keep my ikkyu and hopefully test for shodan in the future. It was mentioned by the shihan that "An american shodan is a japanese nidan." I do not know if the was sarcasm or a factual statement. I know it takes about 2 years for shodan here, so that would place me easily at nidan.
The shihan is very friendly, introduced my to the whole class and looks forward to drinking with me. So I think I have found a new aikido home. I have one other school I am going to check out before I make this commitment.
I thought I was over my jet lag, but I slept for about 8 hours last night and another 4 this afternoon.