Friday, June 30, 2017

The Road Beckons

Derry NH to Buckeye AZ
 
 

 


Thursday, June 29, 2017

Using my time to work on a new idea.

Using my time to work on a new idea.
 
To start with I am using a variation of a multiple striking drill I developed.
 
These drills are not intended to be realistic fighting combinations, rather training tools to allow us to understand how one movement can turn into a double of a triple strike.  Each strike is done as  real strike with power, but another strike flows from the original. Originally I learned this which I believe may have been an Indonesian principle applied to Shotokan training.
 
Then after several decades of practice (and application use) I began to develop an Isshinryu version and others. But there are always other potentials,
 
I have been fooling with these for a while.  More possibilities and the training to realize their use. This is the basic series I developed.
 
 
Taking the open hand multiple striking drill I developed and thinking about variations on the drill.
 
            1. Right spear hand strike to the solar plexus.
            2. Right back hand strike to the point between the eyes.
            3. Right descending knife hand strike on the inside of a striking arm.
            4. Right ascending base of thumb strike into the right side of the opponents neck.
            5. Right knife hand strike circles over the attacker’s head and strikes the knife hand into left side of the opponents neck.
 
Or
1. Right spear hand strike to the solar plexus.
            2. Right back hand strike to the point between the eyes.
            3. Right descending knife hand strike on the inside of a striking arm.
            4. Right ascending base of thumb strike into the right side of the opponents neck.
            5. Right ridge hand strike circles in front of the attacker’s head and strikes the thumb side of the ridge hand into left side of the opponents neck.
 
Or
1. Right spear hand strike to the solar plexus.
            2. Right back hand strike to the point between the eyes.
            3. Right descending knife hand strike on the inside of a striking arm.
            4. Right ascending knife hand strike into the right side of the opponents neck.
            5. Right ridge hand strike circles in front of the attacker’s head and strikes the thumb side of the ridge hand into left side of the opponents neck.
 
Or
1. Right spear hand strike to the solar plexus.
            2. Right back hand strike to the point between the eyes.
            3. Right descending knife hand strike on the inside of a striking arm.
            4. Right ascending knife hand strike into the right side of the opponents neck.
5. Right knife hand strike circles over the attacker’s head and strikes the knife hand into left side of the opponents neck.
 
There are so many other variations. One strike might do what is necessary. This just offers the possibility that one strike can be two strikes, etc.
 
Multiple Striking, layered striking amd other possibilities.
 

Tuesday, June 27, 2017

An ending, a beginning, everything changes.



 
In several days I will be moving to Buckeye, Arizona. New home, new life options. For a brief while the blog will be dormant, but like the Phoenix (pun intended) I shall arise again. Allow me to offer a transient thought.

 

There is much thought put into the arts being classified, Internal or Externa. Or whether they are Hard or Soft.

 

Having practiced Karate and Yang Tai Chi for many years, I would like to offer an observation.

 

I don’t see internal or external, just a totality most do not attempt to find.   Neither Hard or Soft, totality. The internal should drive the external without distinction to distract our action.

 

Whether the weather be fine,
Or whether the weather be not,
Whether the weather be cold,
Or whether the weather be hot,
We'll weather the weather
Whatever the weather,
Whether we like it or not!

Saturday, June 24, 2017

Moving, Disability and Right-Sizing my Kobudo Practice




The pod with our belongings moves out today. We will be following in a week. It will have to be a quick trip, 4 of 4 ½ days at most, covering several thousand miles over the trip.

 

That and accepting the disabilities I am dealing with makes decisions necessary.

 

1. Most of the Kobudo I have studied and practice is beyond my capabilities.
2. I will no longer be instructing others.

3, There are limits to the amount of things I can drag along with me.

4. The majority of my personal kobudo gear had been bequeathed to Mike Cassidy to use with the program as he sees fit.  Other students have been given other of my weapons. Hardest to put down were my bo’s and sai. Sai being where my studies began with Charles Murray.

5. I have retained a few things.

          a. My knife collection goes with me. This also includes my hand made Tecchu/Teko group. A single Tecchu/Teko will travel with me as well as several small pocket knives.

          b. My Tai Chi straight sword goes with me. Perhaps the most difficult practice, with the many turns involved, but still I try.
 

 

          c. The Mangi Sai Charles brought back from Okinawa is with me.

          d. The patterned rattan staff Cindy Robinson brought me from Seattle.

          e. A single wooden kama, created by a friend.
 

 

The Sai to hang on the wall, my strength precludes any sai practice. The other weapons to use as I am able.

 

My studies continue as will whatever practice I can do. An example is I can see how to modify the kama practice I created to a single kama and stick form.  Something new.  Various knife drills and several kata done with tecchu/teko.
 


 


 

Wednesday, June 21, 2017

Aikido's Arm Lock







 
Journal of the Asian Martial Arts 1999

Sunday, June 18, 2017

Once upon a time.

Back in the 1980s I studied many things
One of which was Nunchaku
 
However in time I put it aside,
Was not part of my Isshinryu.
And on the whole I did not care for the exercise.
 


Bunnies Don't Do Karate







Friday, June 16, 2017

When you only have one hand free

A favorite technique using only one arm for its execution.
I am being assisted by the late John Dinger.
 








Wednesday, June 14, 2017

Kusakichi Noborigama (Branch Trimming Sickle)

Another Okinawan Tool that would be wicked.

Begining to End

It was 1985 when I began the program in Derry, NH.
 

 
 
I ceased teaching last year. The program is now run by Mike Cassidy and Young Lee.
But the last year I attended most classes helping when I could.
 
But all good things do come to an end,
Last night was my last night to attend class.
I am moving to Arizona come July.
 
It was way to hot and humid last night.
I was literally melting.
But here are a few photos of that night with students and fellow karate-ka.
 






 

 
So all good things come to an end.
And of course there is a new beginning.
 




Tuesday, June 13, 2017

Kasumi-uchi The blinding attack

 
This was shared on Facebook on the site Motobu Ryu August 16, 2014
It is most useful to share further.
霞打ち(背手打ち)は本部御殿手でも使います。上原先生はよく「まず相手の目を狙え」と言っていました。霞打ちは取手とも親和性のある技ですね。
Kasumi-uchi (Haishu-uchi) is also used in Motobu Udundi. Uehara sensei often used to say, "Attack your opponent's eyes at first." Kasumi-uchi is a waza that has an affinity for tuiti.
is also used in the main palace of the headquarters. Dr. Uehara used to say " aim for the opponent first. It is also a skill of 親和 and 取手.

Kasumi-uchi (Haishu-uchi) is also used in Motobu Udundi. Uehara sensei often used to say, "Attack your opponent's eyes at first." Kasumi-uchi is a waza that has an affinity for tuiti
. Bottom of Form 1
 

Monday, June 12, 2017

Other Okinawan Traditions


When I have thought of Okinawa as the home of Karate and Kobudo tradition, I have always relegated the Okinawan people as not being part of the story. Karate did develop in the aristocracy of the island for their own defense and as a class group practice.

 

Kobudo was found as various village traditions, but the real weight of Okinawan existence was not part of my thinking.
 

Recent photos I have found suggest something else.


The Okinawan people really did not have to go far to find individuals skilled in a variety of practices, which would lend themselves for defense.

 
First were the variety of local sumo (wrestling) traditions. They would have some use in self defense. The other competitions between villages, boat races, rope pulling, etc. all maintained traditions of keeping individuals fit and used to working together.
 
 
 

Then each home had kama, the local tool for home gardening and readily available.
Where there were fishers, they were skilled at getting fish by spear. Personally I would think twice at facing such individuals.
Likewise there were a variety of tools used in agriculture which could also be used for self defense.

 

And not forget the bo, which seems was universally used for a variety of purposes.
  Addition 2-7-2022
Chilly Wright
and the native predator the Habu snake in all it's variations . . . any critter having it's own museum on the island must have influenced the native powers of observation, the footwork, and the mindset over time. . . . . not to mention the tradition of powered habu venom - good for "push push"


Something to think about.