Date: Fri, 13 Oct 2000 12:20:06 -0700
From: Julian Frost
<jfrost@ECLECTIC.SS.UCI.EDU>
Subject: 2000 Aikido-L Seminar Review (long)
This was my first Aikido-L Seminar and I really didn't know what to
expect. I had, of course, known almost everybody for years... it's just
that we had never met.
After watching several American Airlines flights get cancelled for various
reasons in Orange County, my own two flights on the way to Denver were,
thankfully, uneventful. As I exited the plane, I looked around for Jon
Strauss, who had graciously volunteered to pick me up and drive me to
Boulder, but he was nowhere to be seen. for those who have never been to
the Denver airport, it's big -- really big. I mean, you may think it's a
long way down the street to the chemists', but that's just peanuts to
Denver Airport! So I caught the train to the baggage claim area and waited
for my bag and weapons case while looking for future ukes and nages! I had
told Jon in email that if my plane crashed and burned, he could have my
weapons. And there he was, walking towards me, my weapons in hand, with a
big grin on his face, saying "I knew that if I could find these, I could
find you!". I swear, that grin never left his face the whole weekend!
The ride to the Golden Buff Hotel (did we ever find out what a Buff
is?) was wonderful. Jon and I hit it off wonderfully, and I've rarely
laughed so much in a single car journey. I found out that, horror of
horrors, Jon was from a local Ki Society Dojo!! How could this be? Aikikai
and Ki Society people getting on? Shock! :-)
Once at the hotel, Jon and I struggled to find the room. #238 would
normally be on the second floor... but they obvioulsy do things just a
little differently in Colorado as room #238 was on the ground floor. We
decided to ask a gentleman standing out by the parking lot if he knew
where the room was, but as we walked up to him, we noticed he was standing
outside room #238! This gentleman turned out to be none other than Robert
Hough, my roommate! He was fully clothed, which was good, as he had made
rumblings on the list earlier about turning up naked. I see my threats to
him worked. :-)
After introductions, Robert and I joined Mike Hacker (a true gentleman and
scholar) and John Costello. for the drive up to Estes park where we met
Chuck Gordon and Emily Dolan. We were later joined by James Baldwin, a
fellow Brit... but I didn't hold that against him... especially as he
brought a great deal of single malt. I guess you could say it was down
hill from that point on. After downing a good deal of liquid refreshment,
cooking hotdogs and toasting smores (my first ever, even though I've been
here for 11 years), we retired to the cabin and proceeded to:
- Break Chuck's glasses while performing Gorilla Aikido(tm) which
involves loud grunts, chest beating, rolling around and picking
fleas and ticks off the head of the others in the troupe,
- Drink,
- Make lots of noise,
- Drink,
- Get massaged (thanks MLE... "Oh Yeah!!"),
- Drink,
- Make so much noise that we got thrown out after "all of the
residents" made complaints.
On Saturday morning the classes started. The Gorilla Aikido continued
throughout the seminar, of course, and Chuck and I welcomed a new initiate
into the troupe on Sunday... I have since nicknamed him "Tiny Gorilla",
but he goes by the more common name of "Philip Akin" (Dog Brothers eat
your heart out!).
First up was Ikeda Sensei. I had not seen Ikeda Sensei before, so this was
a real treat for me. His Aikido was soft, fluid and beautiful to watch. He
examined finding the way to affect uke at first contact, usually by a very
subtle turn of the hand. By doing this, a connection to uke's spine is
created through his/her elbow, making uke weak while simultaneously making
nage strong. The same principles were demonstrated with three uke's
clinging onto Ikeda Sensei's wrist.
Next was Tiny... sorry, Phil Akin Sensei. I have trained with many
Yoshinkan stylists from beginners to 5th dans and was extremely pleased to
hear many of the things that Akin Sensei was stressing... relaxation,
"doing things the hard way at first so that everything else is easy",
making your body and your aikido soft, and therefore powerful... as these
did not seem to have been stressed by the other Yoshinkan people I had
trained with before. With his excellent sense of humor and deep
understanding of Yoshinkan Aikido, Akin Sensei's class was both
entertaining and informative. I found many more similarities than
differeneces between what I do and what he does. Yeah, I know, back leg
straight, 95 degrees...
I had done a few years of Jodo quite some time ago, so Peter Boylan's MSR
Jodo class was more of a refresher for me than something new. That said,
boy, did I need a refresher! As Peter and Sean Fogarty went through the
kata it brought back many fond memories of my time in England studying
Jodo at my Iaido dojo, where I met my very first Aikido teacher!
For my own class, I emphasized techniques based on Ikkyo and timing
changes. Starting with Suwariwaza Shomenuchi Ikkyo and correct timing, we
mutated it into other techniques. As the timing of our response to the
Shomenuchi changed, or uke's response to our Ikkyo changed, we went from
Ikkyo Omote (correct timing), to Ikkyo Ura (slightly later timing). Under
different timing conditions, Ude Garami (ura and sutemi waza), Kokyunage,
Shimewaza (strangles), neck locks and head-throws appear, as if by magic.
I decided not to talk a whole lot during class, allowing the students to
discover for themselves what the theme of the class was. I remember seeing
a definite light bulb going off late in the class when I showed one
partitipant that the technique she was trying to understand was the same
as the technique we had done just minutes ago... just the timing was
different.
Emiliy Dolan's massage class was a welcome event. Although people piled on
top of each other -- literally -- in an attempt to be "uke" for her, Ms.
(Chevious) Dolan already had her "uke" booked. Having already been the
recipient of MLE's work on a couple of occasions, I paired off with our
own Craig Hocker. Craig's technique requires a little more practise, I'm
afraid, so Craig, buddy, any time you feel the need to practise, just let
me know, OK? :-) BTW, Craig has quite a nice ass... just in case any
wanted to know (another long story!).
After class ended, some 35 seminar participants went to a nearby Chinese
resturant for some much needed food. My body finally rebelled against me.
Having injured my back two days before the seminar began, I tried to make
sure I did everything a little slower than normal, but by the end of
classes on Saturday I was unable to stay at the resturant due to the
unbeliveable pain in my spine. Instead, I spent a couple of hours in the
hotel room, lying on the floor with my legs supported by a chair! From all
accounts though, the Chinese food was pretty good.
Saturday evening, after the food and the lying on the floor, was something
I had been looking forward to immensely... Michael Hacker's Bad Budo
tape! This was two hours of the most outrageously funny "martial
arts" from around the globe. Demonstrations of incredibly Bad Budo
covered the whole gamut, from the Karateka wearing the Star Spangled,
red, white and blue keikogi doing the most lousy kata imaginable to the
tune of "Everybody is Kung Fu Fighting"; to Master Noshino's(?) students
throwing themselves bodily out of camera shot when he waved his hand at
them; to self-proclaimed ninja master Ronald Duncan showing us his
"Ai-iki hand throws"; to the ninja 10th dans who couldn't get out of the
way of a nerf baseball bat; to Ninpo Taijutsu's Grandmaster Hatsumi's
horribly contrived and muscled techniques; to the ninja 10th dan who could
barely lift, let alone control the wooden weapon he was using; to Ronald
Duncan's student's Ninja Scream and Ninja Stare; and of course, the
totally humiliating Shintaido demonstration.
The saving grace was what Michael called the "Palate cleanser": A stunning
video of Mifune Kyuzo at aged 73 showing perfect judo against people twice
his size and strength and half his age.I *need* a copy of that tape.
Michael, are you listening [Ninja Stare]? I left the party at 1AM. Some
stayed, and drank, until at least 3AM.
Sunday morning's "Hang Over Class" was admirably taught by Alan Drysdale
Sensei. To my surprise, he taught the same theme as I did: timing! Alan
Drysdale Sensei's class concentrated on timing changes resulting in
Iriminage and Shihonage (to name a few) and was a delight to watch. Due to
my back injury, I could not train during Drysdale sensei's class,
something I very much regret. Alan comes from a dojo that was one of, if
not the very first Aikido dojo in England, "The Hut". It is the root of
much of the Aikido in England and is still a successful dojo to this day.
A mini-class followed Drysdale Sensei's class. This was taught by my good
friend Jon Strauss, his teacher, Don Rojas and our very own Craig Hocker.
Still watching from the sidelines, I heard more than one person say "This
is Ki Society? I didn't know they took highfalls!" More misconceptions put
to rest! Taigi is not competition as many understand it. It is two people
harmoniously demonstrating as perfect Aikido as possible infront of
judges. They demonstrate specific, preset techniques, trying to do
everything perfectly. It is not one person trying to beat the other in
combat! And Taigi #19... lots of atemi. :-)
Another mini-class followed right after the first. This time it was Peter
Boylan's second opportunity to demonstrate another of his favorite
arts: Judo, specifically Newaza, or ground techniques. A hakama is not
standard judo attire, but Peter managed to do what he wanted with no
problems. I got to roll around with Jun (our first practise together),
Peter and another local student (whose name escapes me) for a fun 45
minutes or so. As a one-time competitive Judoka myself, Newaza is, as
Peter very appropriately put it, very relaxing. It freed-up my back
wonderfully, at least until I stopped, whereby it completely froze up
again!
The final class of the seminar was taught by Gorilla buddy, Chuck Gordon
Sensei. Using Tessen (iron battle fans), octagonal short sticks and bare
hands, Gordon Sensei confused us all with Techniques of Exquisite Pain. I
was lucky enough to train with Jun and Ikeda Sensei at the same time
during this class, so I had a great time. Chuck Gordon Sensei showed a
neat way of getting uke to concentrate on one hand, while nage applied
what most of us would call Nikyo on the other hand. "Softly, softly,
softly. Gentle, like a feather here -- strong as iron here". No pain, no
gain is one of my other mottos. The Prince of Darkness enjoyed Chuck's
class. :-) Even my back played nice for a while, allowing me to at least
let Jun have a go at taking me to the ground ("don't hurt me Jun!!"). Jun
seemed to like these painful techniques. Every now and then he would grunt
something that sounded vaguely Japanese in nature, that I took to mean
that I wasn't doing it quite hard enough. He never came right out and said
it, of course, he's way too polite for that.
The seminar came to an end with each of the instructors receiving superb
parting gifts from both Ikeda Sensei and Peter Boylan. Domo arigato
gozaimashita.
Many people left for home right after the seminar, which was a great
shame. Lots of good friendships had been made over the two days of the
Aikido-L Seminar, it is was with sadness that I said goodbye to many of my
training partners.
However, it wasn't all over just yet! Thirteen of us remained, so we went
out to a Brew Pub for dinner. Mike "Man-Mountain" Bartman got his "real
food". I finally got to eat something (fish and chips... hey, I'm English,
give me a break!), and a good time was had by all. Again, farewells were
said to those who couldn't stay around any longer. Others went back to the
hotel and looked up at Saturn and the stars through Robert's Wyatt's
telescope. I understand Jun went back to the dojo and did some more Jo
with the assembled crew there.
Me? Well, James was good enough to drive me back to Denver airport, where,
after American Airlines cancelled my flight 30 minutes after boarding the
plane, I waited a further seven hours before getting another flight out of
Colorado! My bags arived at midnight, California time, on another plane.
It was a great seminar, populated by lots of genuinely nice people. I got
to meet a good number of the people on the list that I've wanted to meet
since joining the list a day or two after it began. I got to practise with
some of them too... but meeting, eating, drinking and talking, and in some
cases, picking ticks from their shiny coats, was priceless.
A tremendous amount of thanks goes out to Ikeda Sensei for allowing us to
take over his dojo for the two days of the seminar. I tried to talk him
into moving to Orange County, CA, but I don't think he bought it. He is a
superb Aikidoka and gentleman. When I grow up, I want to be like him. Jun
was definitely the worker-bee of the seminar. He did an excellent job and
deserves more credit than I could possibly give him. Way to go Jun.
To all the instructors at the seminar, thanks for teaching me so much and
giving up your time. To Robert Bishop (not on the list), thanks for taking
such great ukemi. Next time, let's actually train together, ok?
To all the locals, thanks for letting the list seminar invade your space
and for training with us. You are a credit to your dojo, Ikeda Sensei and
Aikido as a whole.
And to all the seminar participants in general... Wow! How cool you all
are. Keep it up. Next year we'll train again, ok?
Julian
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