Dokko den irimi nage

 

Another thought on teaching youth bunkai (7/9/04)

 

Interesting topic. (At this time I was still working with using the concept ‘bunkai’ which I later abandoned for more accurate to me description of what was taking place. But this does not change the intent of this piece.) (But much of this reflects views as I saw them ijn 2004. Some of those views changed over time.)

 

Consider I was not teaching Isshinryu for any purpose but the practice of Isshinryu. I did not define the training for exercise, self defense or sport. Of course all of those can be accomplished from the training. But the goal was to just train and learn as the decades passed.

 

From my perspective after teaching youth for about 26 years now I don't change the curricula for youth or adult.  Essentially in my program nobody studies application of the kata until after shodan and then its a long gradual process.

 

On the other hand I'm continually demonstrating why their kata must be done in exact format, by demonstrating some of the application potential for the techniques.  I'm really starting to learn kata could have been made unchanging if the instructors of the past had really gotten into the head of their students as to why their version of Patsai was done in as specific manner. 

 

[Of course this is one of life's quandaries. Was the true lesson the path of mutability behind the kata and not unchanging structure? Beats me!]

 

There are real mixed messages as to what karate was and ought to  be from my perspective.  If the stories are anyway near correct showing beginners much about kata application potential was not the way it was studied on Okinawa. In similar light I can't in all serious use any Japanese terminology to describe the non-verbal approach of the Okinawan arts, preferring application potential to bunkai as a personal trait.

 

That a more complete understanding of any technique can yield dozens of application is true. On the other hand it isn't rational that anybody needs more than skill at a hand-full of techniques to stop any attack.

 

There's a lot of puzzlement there isn't there? 

 

Training people for a while, and trying to learn myself as time passed I think the critical piece of the puzzle is skill of the student. Not just being able to do a technique, but having the skill the presence of mind to actually accept its application potential against the pressure of the attack is not something that can be passed along in a short time, regardless of the student's age.

 

I strongly suspect in the past, from frustration of trying to teach what people weren't ready for, instructors discovered that don't press the application instead work on true skill development was a more rational way to develop an advancing student.

 

From that approach instead at beginner (non-shodan) levels of training  I stress a hand-full of parry and counter strikes, a hand-full of grab releases, a hand-full of tactical kicking applications and for the pre-shodan students a hand-full of aikido insertions and locks/projections.  More intent on their ability to fit into somebody and counter strike them, more intent on their ability to counter being grabbed, and some techniques to begin building more advanced skills.

 

Reality time, most of the youth will NOT be doing karate for life. The successful instructor loses 100% of them as they become successful young adults and move on to what their destiny holds. Giving them some sound skills they can draw on forever is the stronger answer.

 

And for those who find a different path, there's the rest of a life to  explore what karate has to offer.

 

Of course in Isshinryu we don't follow the path of the Pinan. But regardless of what you can or can't do with them, do you really think Itosu really meant them more than an initial stepping stone for students. Do you think he felt they should replace advances study for life of Chinto, Kusanku, Gojushiho or the other advanced kata?

 

I very strongly am coming to believe one kata may be the correct answer for some, but that one kata should also be a real fire breathing dragon of a kata.

 

On the other hand any one technique is unlimited isn't it.

 

I recall that Patrick McCarthy once wrote that karate might be translated as empty hand with empty being the empty infinity of space. I always liked that infinite hand.

 

An infinite number of kata with infinite variations.

 

Or an infinite number of things that fractal analysis shows is possible with any single technique.

Crossing that Bridge when you come to it

 

 ….. a remembered post from 2005

 

 

So much of our vision of karate’s origins is filtered through today’s experiences and knowledge. A current discussion on the understanding of Kusanku as a night fighting kata on ITOL perhaps make me realize why some have difficulty thinking there is even a remote possibility such is the case.

 

Just go back 100 years in Okinawan history.   Individuals who taught did so privately,  most likely they were studying karate because it was to be needed in their clan’s role in society also likely outside to boot. 

 

And lighting would have been at relative premium, I doubt electric lights were available across the Island. And even traveling to and from your instructor’s house you may well have been walking through the dark. So the intent of low level application wasn’t a theoretical possibility.

 

Was the origin of  the way to fight in the dark?  Perhaps, or perhaps the story was a way to heighten awareness and suggest some principles.  Some of the discussed applications seem quaint or impossible, but then if you haven’t been outside in rain and fog where you can’t see your hands, or in varying nighttime conditions, what is or isn’t reasonable is just opinion, not experience.  Believe it or not.

 

Couple that with nothing but physical and oral transmission of the art, and tying a story to a kata doesn’t really seem that unreasonable. That and the fact we have almost no idea as to what they actually trained in those days, just today’s reflections through time.  So the story may be true, it may just be an instructive pointer, or it may be deception. In fact the best deception may be its so true the non-trained won’t believe it….. Now that would be a true work of art wouldn’t it.

 

But this isn’t about Night fighting but a different journey across a bridge, one I’ve never left behind.

 

I’d like to take you back in time when I was a beginner, only 30 years ago. There were no applications to kata technique in my instructors training, and the stories, well perhaps they came from the Sensei, or perhaps the occasional magazine or book. I can’t say but they did enter the picture of my training.

 

I vividly recall when I was a new student the instructors were working with a brown belt in the dojo alcove by placing two bo’s on the floor on an angle, and that student was doing a kata between them.  I didn’t know what he was doing, always had enough of my own training to work on not to know what the seniors were doing. Several years later Murray Sensei took two bo and placed them on the floor of his church basement and I discovered what they were for, running Chinto between them.

 

I think Murray Sensei mentioned to me in his Church basement that Chinto Kata represented a fight on a bridge, with attackers coming from two sides. But as we didn’t do kata applications it didn’t register as much.  BTW, the kata was being done between the bo’s to test that you were staying between the sides of the bridge. 

 

Very private aside, Charles did offer one Chinto application, where when a Ninja was diving at your out of a tree you would reach up and drill them into the ground.  Interesting concept but in 30 years I’ve not had a ninja attack me that way so it may just remain such, and I realize I don’t think I’ve mentioned it to my students either. O’ well perhaps they’ll try jumping me from a tree and learn that lesson the right way.

 

But time passes quickly.  In the early years I had begun my program at the Scranton Boys Club and in the summers we held class at McDade Park which had a small bridge over a culvert.  So for those students doing Chinto, the story became a reality, doing the kata on a bridge.

 

Now in Okinawa te there are roughly three Chinto directions, with the almost same structural techniques. The Itosu Chinto’s go straight forward and back (12 to 6 o’clock) for the most part. The Tomari Chinto goes from side to side (3 to 9 o’clock). The Kyan Chinto goes from 10:30 to 4:30. Dan Smith of the Seibukan relates Kyan chose the 45 degree angle from his police work, finding that the best angle of entry to apprehend a suspect.

 

It is the Kyan no Chinto pattern which most closely represents Isshinryu’s own.

 

Running the kata on the bridge made me realize that they you work to stay in the center. There is a tactical reason for this, the stronger you’re on the center the easier to force your opponent off the bridge. Conversely the less you’re on the center, the easier for your opponent to force you off the bridge.

 

So Chinto on a bridge was teaching me a lesson of tactics. But if you do Chinto and even if you turn exactly correct you quickly discover you can’t stay over the centerline, the shape the kata is such that at times your line parallels the centerline

 

This became an advanced practice for my dan students on occasion.  Moving from Scranton in my yard I have a narrow path between a series of bushes (as well as rows between my field of blueberry bushes, and I exchanged the bridge with the narrow path but kept the same mission.  Working Chinto to stay on the centerline.

 

What I discovered is you have to make subtle stance adjustments to do so. This was not alien to what my instructors taught us.  The manner in which several kata were taught required tuning up the stance as your body awareness grew.

 

Now you may be seeing this as a quaint practice, trying to make sense of a  story, but there was a more tactical answer. At the same time my studies into technique application advanced. I grew more and more fascinated at the power in turning, and Chinto exploration became one of my tools with its continual turning techniques.  When working the applications how you have to sometimes shift a technique came into play, working with what you are presented. It seemed pure kata wasn’t necessarily the answer. But couple that with my Chinto movement studies and I began to realize how the same subtle shifts coupled with the kata movement application potential allowed you to keep the centerline of the attack you were working against, without shifting away to ‘sell’ the technique.

 

So the center line of the  bridge becomes the centerline of the attack or of the opponents body, the line to work, to  stay on the center to dominate and control.

 

A method of kata practice mirroring the reality of application.

 

Or just a small story of one strange practice of somebody who listens to old tales too hard.

 

For the record, the new Chinto student does not enter into this practice. Only after about 3 or so years into Chinto do they begin to study this concept, and that’s just an opening movement in a larger, lifetime study, IMVHO.

 

So Chinto being a fight on a bridge…. A fight to control the centerline…. A method of training to supplement reality of application…. Take your pick.

 

Gene said...

Ginchin Funakoshi and throws in his karate

 

 

Ginchin Funakoshi throws in his 1935 Karate Do Koyhan

 

The story of Wansu NO Tonfa, not a kata rather a drill.

 

Back in 1977 Charles Murray handed me he 1966 Shimabuku Tatsuo films he has borrowed from Sensei, to view them for his own studies. He gave them to me because he wanted me to teach myself the form labeled on the movie as Chiafa. Along with the film he also gave me a film editor to view the film.

 

Then after a lot of work I eventually developed something akin the the form on the movie. II viewed that movie, frame by frame with the film editor so many times I could not stand to watch it again. So how much what I worked out was like that movie kata, I can’t say. But I did it and got what I got.

 

I do know when Lewis Sensei trained in Okinawa it was not taught then. And when Charles trained in Agena in 1972 it was not done then either. Which is why Charles suggested I learn it from the film.

 

Then too soon in 1979 after I had been awarded my black belt Charles returned to the USAF. There was no Isshinryu convenient to Scranton Pa. to train with. I was on my own and my continuing efforts were my own too.

 

About 1981 my wife and I went on a camping vacation to the Grand Canyon of Pennsylvania. I spend a lot of time training at that campground. While I had no intention teaching my students the Chiafa form, the more I worked on my Chiafa, the more I realized I preferred a simpler form to teach tonfa use.

 

Back on those days most systems did not have kobudo training. Many competitors would take an empty hand kata and do that with a weapon. One of the most frequent ones to use was Wansu kata. I saw It performed with bo and with sai as well as other weapons. (this was well before the internet or YouTube of today). That gave me an idea.

 

I began to work up a drill for tonfa use, which in time I referred to as Wansu NO Tonfa. Many years later I used it as a subsidiary dan drill for use of tonfa. I still believed it was useful.

 

 

I did film that drill for my students use.  

 

 

 

I never competed with it, in time it was only for my adult students use.

 

Then in 1985 moving to Derry, NH, it remained much the same. I just soldiered on with the form.

 

When the internet became available about 1988 for me. In time I found the form on YouTube, but there were many variations of Chiafa. Some by Uzeu Angi, some by others. As I only was with my original instructors I had no reason to believe any were correct.

 

I did discover some were irritated I was doing Chia fa, and many lectures followed. Each one making me care less about what other were doing, for it made no difference to me after all. I was only interested in preserving what I was directed to learn and what I developed from there.

 

IMO the Tonfa no longer serves the purpose for which it was originally intended, The modern Police version, the PR-24, is longer by design not to permit earlier tonfa techniques to be used. Of course it still has many uses for the police, but that is not why I taught tonfa.

 

What I discovered over decades of practice, was each of the kobudo studies in my Isshinryu serves another useful purpose. Each weapon requires different handling, developing very different skills in the hands, wrists, arms and legs of those trained. Those subtle skills also transfer into one’s kata abilities when used.

 

Tonfa specifically develop the grip to control its spins, and that grip control works to develop stronger empty hand grip too.

A time for Caution

 

 

We are experiencing a period with tremendous social change the like of which we have never experienced before. No question the population had acted with great restraint to date, but as social pressures continue no one can predict what may occur.

 

That brings to mind how we may be training our students to deal with the unknown.

 

Not wanting to unduly alarm students, it also is not impossible that very strange things might occur too.

 

It might be time to suggest more strongly what they might choose to do and not do, along with continuing their training to build stronger capabilities within them.

 

I am not trying to give cheap advice, or pull up a historical quote.

 

Just suggesting careful planning what your classes will be might be a very good idea when classes begin to resume again and things may still occur.

 

The eye must see all sides, the ear must listen in all directions.

Self Training a memory

 

 

When I began my Isshinryu studies back in 1974 two classes a week were never enough. I trained outside in my yard and inside in my living room all the time. Two young friends from the dojo lived nearby and often they dropped by to train too.

 

Then one day Lewis Sensei announced that the club needed someone to clean the club each week and they would not have to pay dues in return.  That seemed a real bargain to me, so I offered to keep the dojo cleaned. I received a key and from that time forward that is what I did on Sundays and of course used the club as a place to train before I cleaned it.

 

I had to have more and began to take non class day trips to train at other IKC dojo, Princess Annne, DelMar at the state line, Dover Deleware on a regulaf basis I visited all of them and trained with those schools.

 

When I had to move for work and then had to start training in Tang  Soo Do  Moo Duk Kwan, I continued to work for the next year on my Isshinryu. I remember working out on my in-laws driveway, outside my house on the sidewalk early mornings. When it became time to take my mandatory vacation from my Bank work I returned to Salisbury camping near there, then attended class in Salisbury and Dover. Always training, allowing me to retain my Isshinryu.

 

Right after that Charles Murray moved to Providence , outside Scranton, and I began training with him in Isshinryu. However I also continued to train in Tang Soo Do as I had another year on my contract there. With Charles the training was irregular, classes were started for the youth of his church and I assisted him then after those classes was my own training. If he wanted to train he would call me at midnight and I always went over. Even in blizzards we trained even if after that training I had to dig a foot of snow off my car.

 

Mornings at the crack of dawn I would run a mile or so, then a ½ hour a kata, take a bath then walk ½ an hour into the Bank. After work I would then train evenings with Charles or in Tang Soo Do.

 

Time passed to quickly and I became a shodan. Then even quicker Charles informed me he was going back into the Air Force for his career. Before he left he taught me Shi Shi No Kon No Dai outside in his backyard where a line of thunderstorms came up, he went back inside to pack while I remained outside in driving rain working on that form. Then that line of storm passed, he saw I was still outside so he came out and taught me some more, only to have another line of storms come in, then he would go inside back to packing. I remained outside in the rain, working on the form. That repeated itself and finally I had the entire form.

 

He wished me well, I gave him my fondest hope for his life, then sadly went home.

 

Of course I worked and worked to keep the form.

No longer having an instructor I made adjustments to my training. This began in 1979.

1.        I began a youth Isshinryu program at the Scranton Boys Club.

2.        I started competing regionally at karate tournaments

a.        To push myself

b.        To compete continually against some of the best individuals in the country forcing me to improve in the process.

c.        I made regional friends among the competitors and that often provided me other schools to visit and train with.

3.        I continued my early morning running and training

4.        I began to visit those school of the instructors I met, training , learning, pushing myself  further.

5.        Then when we took vacation they became further training locations

a.        As when we traveled to the Grand Canyon of Pa. to camp, we hiked down to the canyon, in the campground I practiced outside continually working to find new things about my art.

 

The time came after another 5 years had passed that again I had to move for work. This began in 1985.

1.        I began another program for youth at the Derry Boys and Girls Club.

2.        That work meant I had less time for additional travel, so I focused more on the Youth Program.

  3.        I started an adult program at the Derry Boys and Girls Club after the youth classes. As it turned out I was teaching youth 2 days a week, then adults also on one of those days and on Saturday mornings.

4.        I continued to practice outside in my yard for personal development.

5.        Each year I would travel to Conferences around the country and at each of them would work out early mornings in the parking lot of those locations.

6.        I made trips to train in Salisbury (and often Dover too) as frequently as possible. At times driving 6 hours to train for 2 hours and then driving 6 hours back.

7.        I participated in annual Summer camps of mixed styles.

8.        I began teaching a Yang T’ai Chi group on Sunday mornings on my driveway. That continued for about 14 years.

9.        I continued to seek our new opportunities to train many places.

 

 

Then in 2011 things changed, I could no longer participate at the pace I had been doing.

 

So I cut back. The instructors I trained took over the youth program, I just supervised.

I focused on the adult program.

 

But as things progressed I could do less and less.

 

I continued to work on my new diminished abilities. After decades of work on my own t’ai chi, I was dimished and could not really do it. It took me a year but I worked out a way to do it as much as possible.

 

My ability to do kata was also diminished, but in a different way I continued to work on what I had.

 

Through all of that I would go outside to train as much as I was able.

 

Then in 2016 we moved to Arizona,   where I only have myself to work out with. I would go outside and continue to work on my t’ai chi and my karate. Limited as I was I could not stop what I have been doing for a long time.

 

Back in the 6 years when I was competing, I never had a camera to be filmed doing my kata. In fact for more than a decade I never was able to film my self.

 

Years later in Derry my program was able to buy a camera for the Boys and Girls Club. I used it mostly to film my students, not to find perfect performances, no matter how well they did. Rather to be able to analyze what they were doing more fully and their best performances ( at any level) to use a points showing where they would move through at that stage of development and to focus on where they would move forward from that stage.

 

I was able to film many of the clinics my friends gave my students, to preserve what was shared.

 

A few times I did film myself to save something for my students to eventually use, or to record where I was at that time.

 

But all of it rested on the fact I never stopped training whenever I could.

 

Training wet, training dry, training cold and in the snow and ice, training when hot.

Whatever the weather, whenever the weather,  would train and then train and then train.