Basic Black

初稽古 First Training in ninjutsu

I was really curious about Hatsumi sensei's ninjutsu. What are we going to do this year?

This week's schedule allowed for three training sessions. Monday, the day before school opened, I went to the immigration centre over at the port to get a visa endorsed, so I arranged my day around Tokyo shopping chores - book stores, import shops and the like.

Tuesday's opening ceremony at the school where I work was short, and I spent some time cleaning up my desk and preparing lessons. The evening training was out of the question - Hombu had been switched for Ayase, and of course starts later and ends later. If I were to go, I would get home by 11pm. No time for bento box lunch fixing, little time for sleep. Oh well.

Wednesday and Thursday I joined Shiraishi sensei's training. Great stuff! Shiraishi sensei introduced us to 遁走型　 tonsokata. The kanji I saw in The Way of the Ninja is the same as I wrote here, but as it displays on my machine, it looks weird. Maybe it looks right in your browser. This ryuha is totally fresh for me. I've never seen Togakure Ryu taught as a discreet set of techniques.

Friday, I thought I'd have to work late, so I didn't take my gi with me to work. At the end of the work day, I was off the hook, not having to work late, so I went to Ayase and watched the training. This coming Tuesday, I'll be there with keiko gi on.　

Meri Kurisumasu in black

Today, Christmas Day, I'm doing what everybody in the neighbourhood is doing - 大掃除 - osoji, the big year-end cleaning effort which originally was a purification rite in preparation for New Year festivities, the most important of the year. This morning, my neighbours were vacuuming loudly below me, and I got into the spirit of the day by laundering everything and scrubbing windows, floors, bath and kitchen.

While I'm working, I'm listening to CBC Radio over the 'Net to remember the day as celebrated on the other side of the ocean.

And I'm thinking about this year's events, lows and highs, mostly highs. This year, I'm grateful for friends from here and abroad, for their good wishes, encouragement, insight and enthusiasm. In the summer, The Phoenix and I visited Osaka to see Maren, then Kyoto, Himeiji, Hiroshima and Matsuyama to see what the rest (real) Japan looks and feels like. This autumn, the Bujinkan presented at the Togakushi festival, and amazing experience. Later, Shiraishi Dojo reprised the performance at the Gyoda City festival. Last Saturday was Shiraishi Dojo Bonenkai, a year-end party to say thank you to sensei and our members, and honour the two new wonderful students.

I'm happy to put 2007 behind me. A friend and inspiration to Vancouver's artists left us this year. On this side, The Phoenix, though a bright light in my world, flew home for what I thought was only a few months, but later thought better of returning to me and Japan. Curiously, despite that spargoing out, he left a little glow - a Japan-resident friend of his brings a lot of happiness into my life.

Next year holds a lot of promise - my new work, which will start in April, promises to change my whole scope of teaching and learning. In May, I hope to be well into my academic studies in the evenings, too.

And Soke's taking us on another trip into darkness, black on black, with the next training theme. Sometimes, yes, I lose heart in my training. What the hell am I doing here, in Japan, doing this? I know so little. Am I getting any better at this stuff? And then I think, 我慢, gaman meaning endurance, and　忍, nin meaning patience and concealment, are my helpers in this endeavour. I will never be the world's most amazing martial artist. But I might, with perseverance and patience, figure out what budo is and why I want to do it with body, mind and spirit. Most of all, spirit.

'Net and missing Daikomyosai

Civilization has come to my Armory-cum-bedroom in funky Kashiwa City - I have a 'Net connection at home! The first attempt left me bewildered, and with a whiff of surreality. A little man came to my door, armed with official looking name tag, clip board, and mysterious gadgets, looked my apartment up and down, whilstled through his teeth and said No, can't do it. The flex ducts wouldn't accommodate such a thing, he claimed. Besides, your air con unit is in the way of the one inlet for ducts, he said.

Well, this week, Harry Tuttle times two arrived at my door, a young fellow who wouldn't look me in the eye, and a terribly friendly older, wiser fellow who talked my ear off. It took them about 15 minutes with tea break to snake a line from what looked like an oscilloscope to find the portal and fire the proton pack to collect incorporate Sumerian deities...Wait, wrong movie. Well, they plugged me in and installed a cable modem ( and now I've got 'Net 24/7). At home, anyway.

This is my consolation for a week of being so tortuously close to Daikomyosai, but obligated to be at work and write stuff for school projects. The only chance I'll get anywhere near training is tomorrow night, if Shiraishi sensei is on for a post-game review.

Many wonderful moments with people happened in the last few days. we took pictures of visiting ninjas under gorgeous flaming maple trees at Kamakura; fortuitous timing put me on a train with two slightly lost kunoichi who I helped navigate the spaghetti that is the JR East rail system, then joined them on a shopping expedition (fabric and stationery!); some kind train passengers on the Joban Line consoled me when I dropped my mobile phone which exploded on hitting the deck; a slightly tipsy salaryman on his way home wished me a happy life before tottering off the train at Matsudo Station; the noodle guy on the Shinagawa Station platform slipped me an onigiri in thanks for my patronage (I hit him every week on the way to Ayase training); the Kashiwa Information ladies treated me to yuzu citrus marmalade and got me up to date on Kashiwa events so I can inform visiting ninjas; my sempai came over for dinner and spoiled me with a belated birthday present despite the fact that his isn't finished yet (gomen, ne!).

See? I can't complain.

Too much going on

Gah, I've got too much going on right now, and it all has to happen at the same time. I've got a new project at work which I'm scrambling to make sense of, a new coworker who will need some hand holding for a bit, a term project for the ESL writing course I'm in at the uni, and just my luck, all the critical dates happen during Daikomyosai. I can't go. So, tonight I'll go to Hombu to get my taijutsu fix for next week.

There are lots of sempais who will get something good out of the training and bring it back to our training. So no worries. Good luck, all!

Going into darkness

Last night, trying to get a  better view of Soke's movement, I ducked under other folks' line of sight and crouched under a tree of a shihan. When Soke told us to go try the technique, before I could bow and spring up to go find my aite, a tree branch swept down and I got stabbed in the neck with his knife. His action reflected how I felt. Lost.

I got so much meaning from Tuesday night's training, I couldn't keep up with actually moving through all those techniques and ideas. I cognitively hit my limit, I guess. Woah. Likely tonight, The Smiling Assassin will show us some things he gleaned from last night's training. Things that were "put on" him, that likely were in the shadows of Soke's movements.

It's very dark in here. If I can keep playing in the dark and surviving, then I can play in the light when it finally comes on.

Budoka reality in the heart of budo

In a recent email message, a budoka abroad, when asking about training in Japan remarked, I'm sure you understand how it is for us visitors...Well, actually, no.

When I first came to Hombu Dojo in the summer of 1999, I had intended only to connect with the dojo, and had anticipated that, much like anything else in Japan, connections and procedures take time. To my surprise, I was welcomed onto the mat that first visit. This was in contrast to the very traditional, staid atmosphere of the Aikido dojo in Ehime I had only just become a part of after a year of training.

I didn't make it back to Hombu Dojo until the spring of 2003. I packed up my Canadian life - my job, books, mementos, even the accordion - and came here to live. As a result, I have never been a visitor. As a local living the Japanese lifestyle, I work long days, so I can't make it out to the dojos that are farther afield, or as often as I would like. I travel 40 to 80 kilometers one way to go to work every day, so commuting eats into my time.

Choices are made and routines are built. I'm at Soke's training once a week, and with two other teachers a few times a week. As it is, I do more training here than I ever did at home, but I can't do the all-you-can-eat taijutsu that you visitors do.

You visitors get a bird's eye view of Bujinkan when you're here, training at different dojos and taking advantage of the different perspectives the various Shihan have. That's cool.

***

A European visitor asked me, Can you tell me which female Shihan gives training in Japan? There isn't one, sorry.

***

Often, I think about how lucky I am to be here. I don't miss stuff from Canada, but boy, do I miss people. And I miss people abroad, too, as I've met some great friends who travel here for training.

See you on the mat in Japan.

気楽流 Kiraku Adventure

Saturday began with a 5:30 wakeup so that I could make it to the Kasukabe Station to meet H Sensei, Duke and Punisher for 7 am. It's too bad the Punisher slept in. Our destination was the head dojo of Kiraku Ryu, presided over by Iijima Sensei.

Between Kasukabe and our destination in Maebashi, Gunma Prefecture, we ran into heavy traffic and were delayed. H sensei being the patient person he is, stopped at a highway rest station, and our first cultural experience of the day  was the impromptu bike show at Takasaka. November is fine weather to go riding, and people travel in convoy to get up into the mountains of Gunma and Saitama Prefectures. Riders mix it up. I saw a Ducati amongst some Harleys and Japanese touring bikes.

We were considerably delayed, and a little lost, by the time we got to Maebashi. H sensei and Duke are intensely curious and knowledgable about koryu budo, and I was there to support our M san whose bojutsu mania brought her to Iijima Sensei and to our Bujinkan training.

We were so late, the visitors and participants were already saying their goodbyes! Oh, well. We tried.

We were welcomed into the spacious dojo where we were plied with tea and sweets, and Iijima sensei proceeded to pull out treasure after treasure as he talked (he himself a trove of budo lore and knowledge) as we looked at Edo Period makimono from iaijutsu schools including Kiraku and Toda Ryu. Amongst the bound material he also had some works on strategy, war tactics, more things than I can describe here. I tried to read over H sensei's shoulder and got little meaning, but he said it was very hard for a Japanese to make out the kanji amongst the flowing script in some of the volumes.

Iijima sensei showed us his collection of weapons including kusarigama, various kinds of flail and pole combinations, and some expertly balanced bokken. Although he didn't show us technique, he gave us insight into the kinds of kamae done in this kind of sword work, showin us some of the drills and postures that he puts his students through.

He pulled out one book of a Japanese compendium of martial arts in many volumes and showed us a picture of the last Soke of Kiraku Ryu. What a magnificent, powerful, scary man caught by an expert photographer. I was really impressed by the explosive power, fine control and fierce presence this man embodied.

It was a long way to go to support M san but it was worth it for the adventure and the chance to meet such a knowledgeable martial artist and historian.

感じ Feeling

昨日の夜東京武道館の稽古は最高の経験だった。私が先生に感じさせた。自分の腕で先生が裏逆の技をやって、ものすごい抑えない感じの抑え方をみせました。 間もなく野口先生も先に見せた技で私を投げました。

Last night at Tokyo Budokan training, I had a fantastic experience. Sensei made me feel something. On my own arm Sensei used this controlling-without-controlling way of doing omotegyaku movement. A short time after, Noguchi sensei threw me from the same waza that we had seen earlier. His movement was so light, but every moment it felt like he had enough control to break my arm if he chose to.

I can't really describe what I felt in words, and now I understand why the other guys, like Sensei's favorite ukes and visiting shihan, have such trouble articulating the intangible and trying to explain when　in fact there is a nebulous distiction between form and freedom, all the while in the moment of this feeling.

Y sempai teased me last week when I was looking puzzled on the mat, asking me "Do you need a candle?" Huh? Ah! Cheeky! I put my hands together in prayer. I know I'm dead if I can't move with a free mind. There are little candles on the Hombu altar for us and for the gods. Fire purifies and lights the dead and the living home.

I was asked to demo, amongst many others, but oh, did I mess up, losing grip on the waza we'd been shown and doing something freeform. I lived but I was emarassed. My dear training partner was patient and made her way through the waza alright. That little candle lit our way through the training.

On another note, I'm getting better at interpreting sensei almost simultaneously, but the topics he brings up in his talk leave me in the dust. I'm fast, but I don't have the massive vocabularies that the other guys have.　We are lucky to have these senior people who've collected words and catch the nuances of sensei's talk.

火曜日宗家のtraining

昨日の夜綾瀬武道館の稽古に参加しました。稽古をやる前に宗家はアメリカのテレビの撮影?とインタビューをしました。いつもの召そう?の後に初見先生は「アメリカ人がいれば、手を上げて、ね」と言いました。笑顔で「俳優になるかも」言いました。

私はアメリカ人ではなくて芸能人なりたくないと思った。アメリカ人の相手が同じ考えてwe turned our backs to the camera.

我々は宗家の近くに立ったので、技がよく見て宗家の話しが聞こえました。けど、我々はカメラの目に見えないと思いました。


宗家のよく言うわれる言葉は「自由に・やわらかくに・感覚・空間」です。感覚を理解してさせる (He wants us to understand the feeling).

The other day at Ayase, I participated in training. Before training Soke had an interview with an American television crew. Before we bowed in Soke said, Any Americans here raise your hands. With a big smile he said, You could become a celebrity!

I'm not American, and I don't want to be a star, I thought. My American aite had the same thought, so we turned our backs to the camera.

We were standing close to Soke, so we could clearly hear Soke's talk. I think we were not visible to the camera.

Soke says certain words a lot - freedom, softly, feeling, space. It's the feeling he wants us to understand.

Teachers Part One

I've had a chance to connect with so many senseis in my world. Last week, I wrote a response journal entry regarding two readings from the course I'm taking, Issues and Practices in Teaching EFL Writing, and my professor Dr. CC, responded to my writing with a number of critical and insightful comments. You can read my journal here.

This week, I had a brief talk with F sensei at work. It seems I piqued her interest when I mentioned to another staff member that one of my projects involves preparing junior high school students for the TOEIC Bridge test, a little brother to the more advanced TOEIC test. These siblings are bullies in my estimation. I don't believe they are appropriate for testing children and teens, as I suspect the students do not have the background knowledge to handle the types of questions that appear on the test, namely, about business or work topics, or the kinds of language in the grammar section. These exercises present sentences full of noun clauses that are hard for the students to decipher. F sensei confirms that no, students for the most part do not know the kanji for the words that appear in categories such as marketing and business. Preparation materials that present Japanese-English vocabulary matching exercises are a bust. Like F sensei and her colleagues, I concentrate on teaching the soft parts of the test - basic grammar, the vocabulary associated with places, daily life and active verbs.

She also tells me that recent graduates from elementary schools do not receive instruction in the grammar of Japanese. As a result, students confront Japanese grammar terms  - 名詞 meishi - noun, 形容詞　keiyoshi - adjective, 過去分詞 kakobunshi - past tense - for the first time in their junior high English classroom. In efffect, Japanese teachers of English must teach the students to examine grammar and lexis and describe the forms of another language before they have fully understood how to examine their mother tongue. Many students receive grammar at cram school either through the examination of Japanese or learning English, but not all students have this advantage. The Japanese English teacher starts at the beginning, essentially teaching two subjects, grammar and a foreign language. I remember grammar lessons in grade five and six in elementary school, which prepared me well for French language. I wonder if this is still done in British Columbia...