learning about your weapon

Regarding kobudo weapons training, a teacher friend tells me that you haven’t really learned about the weapon until you have injured yourself with it. Given the number of weapons in our system, there are ample learning opportunities.

I had a very nice one a couple years back, trying to follow along with some others who knew a higher level nunchaku kata. It is quite a bit fancier than the one I was working on and involved many more types of swings and strikes.

This was a new kata for me. They weren’t going to slow down for me. I could/ should have stepped out to observe, but something in me can’t do that. So, going too fast through a kata I didn’t know…

Bam, the tip circled back and struck me between the lower lip and chin. That smack or my following bad word were enough to draw everyone’s attention. Again, I could/ should have stepped out, but something in me can’t do that.

So I was frantically trying to follow along while also running my tongue around inside my mouth, trying to check for any teeth that might be floating about in the blood that was seeping out.

It is a sort of multi-tasking, I suppose. Like when sparring a Thai kick boxer who blasts right through and kicks me in the mouth, just like that. (Could have should have worn a mouth piece). My jaws and teeth crashed together and I heard something fall on the dojo floor. But it was not the time to stop. Knowing immediately that I was not near his level, he was kind enough to ease up a bit, which made discovering my half-broken tooth with my tongue –while trying to continue sparring - a bit easier.

Following up last night’s excellent 3 hours of kobudo practice, I was outside this morning when another learning opportunity arose.

This time it was the sai. Everything was going smoothly and I was reworking all my motions from the ground up. Then one of the metal tines on the side of the weapon caught or snagged the pocket of my jacket. There was a beautiful instant of realizing that it had caught and adjusting the usual path of the sai to avoid ripping the pocket. (see “if I were a true master” series of posts)

That instant was followed by another in which I realized that altering the path of one hand, without altering that of the other, could have unpleasant circumstances. The beauty of the prior instant gave way to a rather different sensation, one of pain, as the end of one sai ripped across a couple of my fingers.

Then it was time for multi-tasking again. Of course stopping the motions of the kata to inspect the damage was not an option. But I was really curious as to whether or not blood was flowing. I could glance down at the hand…but that would disrupt the flow and focus of the motions. Drops of blood on the ground or jacket? Same problem.

Nothing to do but keep going. As expected, the damage was not too severe: the blood staunched quickly and the lingering sting is a good reminder.

Time to review the tekko (brass knuckles, basically) next. Surely I won’t be served up two learning opportunities in one day.

(picture from Vancouver)

Kobudo Day

I really shouldn’t do things like this.

But it’s spring, and sometimes the body and mind just can’t be controlled. I couldn’t help it. The entire day was spent on ryukyu kobudo.

My glorious days of underemployment are rapidly drawing to a close. Today may have been my last full, complete, and uninterrupted day of being a househusband / occasional part time worker. And my kobudo practice has been terribly neglected lately, despite larger amounts of free time.

It started with the nunchaku. I haven’t covered that form in a while and I needed to go through one of the kobudo forms I know well. That got to feeling pretty good pretty quickly so, just for fun, I ran through an old nunchaku form I had learned in Nebraska. Once through and that was feeling good, but better put in a few more reps to make it better than good. That led into a third form, and so it goes.

After that, well, you can imagine.

The sai came next. I have been stuck between two forms for too long now. The Shotokanized version of tsukin shita haku no sai I learned in the US, and a very different (original??) version I am learning here as part of Okinawan Ryukyu Kobudo.

I say different, yet they are fundamentally the same kata. That is the worst possible combination, because there is too much cross-over and interference between the two. My first idea was to preserve the weapons forms I had learned in Nebraska (each differs slightly from the Shotokan versions I learned here in Japan), and slowly learn the Okinawan forms.

I have not dedicated enough time to either set and have recently felt that I must go in the opposite direction – set aside the Nebraska forms for a while and get these down well, then maybe go back and re-integrate the forms I started with.

Suddenly my progress has quickened and as of that fine day, I can get through this version of tsukin haku no sai (or chikin haku no sai, in Okinawan dialect) reasonably well. Now the real work begins…

Anyway, it was a fine day all in all, working through other weapons in the curriculum and getting ready for the upcoming classes I will be able to squeeze in before the ugly thing that is work raises its head.

I have gotten over the hump, anyhow. For too long I was stuck half-knowing a couple of these forms, able to follow along with the group and maybe able to stumble through it on my own. Now I am where I need to be, able to take a decent version of the form into class and have it worked over and really benefit from that. Then all my solo work at home will be taken up a higher notch, and I will be ready to take in an even better version the next time, and so on.

Like I said, now it really begins.

(photo shows home-made version of tinbe and rochin. real ones are on order)