adjusting to your environment (4)

Factory floor

It has been over a week now since the earthquake struck and the tsunami followed. Small aftershocks continue throughout the day but everyone’s attention remains focused on the danger of nuclear meltdown / fallout.

I was teaching in a beer company’s factory in Yokohama when it struck. I had been out two days earlier and joked about it feeling like a small earthquake each time one of the heavily loaded beer trucks passed by.

It was immediately clear last Friday that the shaking was much more than that caused by a beer truck. It didn’t stop and didn’t stop, just kept on shaking. We took cover under a sturdy table and listened to the voices outside.

When it finally subsided, I packed my gear in a flash (computer etc.) and we went to the main office, donned helmets, watched the news a moment…and then it all started again. Under the desks this time for another long rumbling and shaking.

Once it stopped, we all went outside, several hundred employees, everything amazingly neat and orderly, lining up by work unit. I watched the weird clouds in the sky and waited until the all-clear.

We went inside, found out that all the trains were stopped, no way to get home that night. All the hotels filled very quickly. Streams of employees from the three large companies based near that train station began long walks home (those who lived in the Yokohama area). We Tokyo people settled in for the night. At that point, we knew nothing about the nuclear reactor situation. True, another quake might come at any moment, but that is everyday life in Japan for 16 years for me.

First things first. No email of course (I don’t have wireless on my laptop and couldn’t use company computers for security reasons). After an hour or so, there was very sporadic text messaging available on my mobile phone, but no phone calls were possible.

By lucky chance, there had been a PTA meeting that day and most of the moms were at school with the kids when it happened. So my wife and daughter (and all her friends) made it home quickly and safely, and we exchanged text messages intermittently.

Next important things. I went out to the local convenience store which, though busy, was not in a panic. After withdrawing cash in small bills from an ATM machine, I leisurely walked about and picked out snacks, beer, instant noodles, and more beer. Like many people, I naively thought “what the hell, let’s make the best of a bad situation”.

I got back to the factory with two bags full of food and beer. I was quickly told the bad news. “Um Bryan we are very sorry but we cannot drink tonight.”
“Oh, sorry to hear that. I’ll drink quietly by myself in this room”
“Um, very sorry but ‘we’ includes you. We have to think of safety and be able to evacuate safely if there is another big quake”.

I was quite disappointed but had to admit their point. Moreover, I was a guest in their premises and presumably they would have legal liability for anything that went wrong. So I underwent a quick attitude adjustment and settled in to eat instant noodles and drink alcohol-free beer-like substances.

Let me be very clear: I have no complaints whatsoever toward the company. In fact, I have nothing but praise for them. They took excellent care of me and let me --- a non-company person -- stay overnight on their premises. I shall be forever grateful for that.

Also, once I got all Buddha-like and threw away my earthly desires for beer, I felt liberation (as opposed to libation). No alcohol. Several hours of free time. My teacher’s tang lang quan (mantis fist) book in hand. You know what happened next. And seeing as we had recently run through the sixth of the seven forms in Liu He Tang Lang Quan, what a perfect opportunity.

Many of the TLQ routines are quite short and can be done in a small space, and the longer ones (duan chui, shuang feng) can be easily adjusted.

Also, as it turned out, my student happened to teach a style of karate there in the factory so we got to talking and comparing a few notes on my old Shotokan karate kata. Further distraction came when I found buried treasure – a giant tome on “research into Okinawan karate kata” by old guys at Todai. The section on Gankaku took me back several years and good memories. But the focus for me was TLQ.

Anyway, next morning we decided to continue the previously-scheduled 8-hour training (language and communication skills, not MA) there in the factory since no trains were running and we could not get to the intended location in Tokyo.

By the time we finished in the late afternoon, there was limited train service and I made my way slowly back to Tokyo and home, glad to be with family. We watched the news and learned more and more about the increasingly bad situation. It was the beginning of a very long week here in Japan.

essential training equipment (7)

Oh yes, the chopstick swords.

These can be found after many kendo practices have dissolved into drink and further into drunk. Great secrets of swordsmanship derived from centuries of practice and actual combat, amazing pearls of wisdom, bestowed upon young neophytes....and too often forgotten the next day.

Once in a while the chopstick swords come out at gatherings of Chinese martial artists as well.

after a tough demo....

Yes, after a tough day at the gongfu demo / exhibition, what better way to relax than reading Japanese manga!

November and December passed in a blur of demos, then a couple in January....February has been quiet, time to focus on regular practice. one more demo coming in March....

worst technique (3)

Continuing the series…here is another motion that I just can’t seem to nail.

It should be simple, really. This is a chest-level block, swinging into the center line from the outside. The forearm is kept vertical and the block is against an opponent’s weapon – probably a bo staff – thrusting in at your own body.

I do it well in solo forms. But in the sai vs. bo set, where some amount of real pressure comes on, I get hurried and the metal of the sai separates from my arm, a definite no-no. The problem is even worse when blocking from the centerline outward…

the fruits of practice

My daughter's school had open school for a few days. I was lucky enough to be able to go and observe for a short period each day. Mostly I was interested in how she interacted with other kids, whether or not she would raise her hand and volunteer answers, and so on.

Then I noticed something that made me very happy. Not only was she raising her hand on occasion (she used to be too shy); but the shape of her raised hand was just right.

All the other kids were raising their hands with the fingers slightly spread. Her four fingers were together and the thumb was bent in slightly -- if the thumb were bent in a bit more, it would be a perfect open hand from chang quan or long fist. We have recently been running through a section or two of one of her chang quan forms every morning before school - a very short amount of time, but the daily rhythm is now established.

And the results are not just showing in the practice hall!

grasp the sparrow's tail

Here is a motion who is an old friend: grasp the sparrow's tail, or 揽雀尾, lan que wei. But it can also be four component motions: our old friends peng - lu - ji - an.

I was going through the tai ji quan 24 motion form. My instructor's comment was that I was doing the motion in the style of Yang tai ji (from which 24 is largely derived, though there are differences). In particular, the precursor to the ji motion was much too small for the 24 form; the hand which will be reinforcing should be drawn much further back to the rear on the side before folding in to make contact with the other hand and pushing forward.

It was quite unconscious on my part - it has been years since I had contact with any "pure" Yang style forms, and even that was tai ji dao or broadsword. So where could this interference have come from ? Probably not cross-over or interference in this case, just getting loose, forgetting details.

Or discovering details for the first time. I asked him about the 42 form - the motion appears twice in the form and should be smaller (like Yang) the first time and larger (like 24) the second. Still later, I thought about the 48 form. In my books it looks large (like 24), but my homework list continues to lengthen.

Over 20 years with some of these forms and still not doing everything with full consciousness....

ping pong goes xing yi quan

Everyone in Japan loves Ai-Chan, or Fukuhara Ai. Groomed to be a world ping pong champion since childhood, everyone was moved by TV footage of the hard-driving ping-pong practices that drove a 6-year-old girl to tears....and how she kept swinging that paddle, never giving up, shining example of Japanese perseverance.

Not much of a ping-pong fan myself, I know her better for her part in an NHK Chinese language learning program. Many Chinese say she has the dreaded northeastern accent to her Chinese (she was living and training pingpong there), but I love her voice.

In this poster, we see that she has apparently taken up a new discipline. What a fine example of zuan quan, the drilling fist rising up the center line, about to come out in front of the chin or mouth. Yes, it seems she is now practicing xing yi quan.

(no relation, of course, to the anti-drug stance being promoted on the poster)