From Kabutoshimen by Toryu

Times up for this time, 20 trainings in 10 days and my head is full of ideas for training back home. I’m doing the laundry and will start packing after this message. There is not much I can say about the trainings except that they are very good, it is like when Soke asked me to explain the feeling efter taking me down to the floor (without pinning me down). All I could say was that he was soft and not using any muscle power at all, he took my balance completely, the timing and everything was perfectly executed.

He did the same thing to another uke until he was on the floor and then soke was pinning him down. He tried to escape the pain, move to a place where the pain would be less and he almost broke his fingers. Another uke said the pain was terrible (my words), and Soke said that the pain should not be so that the opponent tries to jerk out and try to escape, but it should be in such a way that the uke is too scared to move at all. I strongly belive to achieve that is beyond physical techniques, anyone can inflict pain (so please don’t think inflicting more pain in a technique will cause this effect!). Soke also said that you should lock the person and make him feel secure, like you take care of him (like holding a pet and stroking it).

Well I won’t go into more details here. When I get home I will try to upload some pictures to the kaigozan photo album. Next weekend I will be teaching a seminar in Istanbul, I hope you can be there… http://www.bujinkanturkey.com…

From Kabutoshimen by Toryu

Today the weather was good, so the trainings was sweaty and good. There is still a lot of people, most people I have spoken to will leave on Monday. So if you are coming here you might be lucky, but I don’t think so, there will probably come more people this weekend .…

From Kabutoshimen by Toryu

It never cease to amaze me how some people don’t pay attention to what the teachers is showing. I just realized that I’m now starting to understand Shiraishi sensei’s movements and can use them more freely without thinking to much. I think this is because I have paid attention to what, and how he is doing things and most importantly trying to copy his movements. My training partner on the other hand was doing his own stuff

The second class with Nagato sensei was simple movements in to good positions taking the balance and have a strong kamae to make the final technique strong. Not because you use power but because you put the opponent into a weak position and yourself into a strong position (same as Shiraishi sensei!). Then lightly apply the technique. The important point I think is to get into the technique so that you don’t have to use so much power. My training partner this session was very stiff and rigid, he took my balance pretty good but when applying the technique there was no “koppo”, no technique, just muscles against my stronger points and not the weak points, as if he didn’t know how to do a gyaku. Very far away from what was being taught I think.

The third class was with Noguchi sensei. His classes is all about feeling and henka, he show the class something and get the training going and immediately show people henka of what he was just teaching, then he break the class and show something new. You have time to do the techniques two times each if you do it quickly. These training’s is very intense and a lot of fun. This training my partner was pretty good and we had a lot of fun.

By being so critical I wondered if I should post this or not, but then it is my blog and why shouldn’t I write what I feel. I hope there was some kind of insight.

Oh, yesterday I saw a few pages from the new book by Hatsumi Soke. It was just as I expected, text describing the techniques and not pictures describing the techniques as far as I could see. But there was many pictures, some I never seen before of Hatsumi Soke and also pictures of Takamatsu sensei I never seen before. The book was just a sample, and it will probably be ready in June.…

From Kabutoshimen by Toryu

Today was a relaxed day, only one training (with Soke in Ayase). I went to Ueno looking for Engrish t-shirt’s (found one) and some green tea. Then I went to Akihabara to see if there was something new spectacular, it wasn’t. Then it was time for training, I trained with T-san, one of Noguchi sensei’s oldest students, that was very good. Dean called me (among four others) up to demonstrate, it was ok, but not so good.

Noguchi sensei showed the techniques in the beginning and Soke played along with variations. There was not much feeling I could pick up, no techniques I could relate to, so I don’t know what to say about the training really. So I leave it there. The theme now is no theme at all, only feeling, how do you describe that?

Sorry this post serves no purpose at all, I just wanted to use band width .…