kendo – Page 2 – kenshi 24/7

Published on 04 February

Learning jodan through teaching it 教うるは学ぶの半ば

By George , In kendo

About 10 years ago a student of mine – a tall 15 year old girl who had only started kendo seven months earlier) – approached me in the dojo and suddenly said “please teach me jodan.” Not having thought too deeply about it before but knowing that I wanted to learn myself at some point I replied: “Um, ok. Let’s work something out.” The inspiration behind her sudden request had been the wining of the All Japan Championships (mens) by a young jodan-wielding policeman from Kanagawa prefecture a few days earlier (this was early Nov. 2008). It had been the …

Published on 05 January

Osaka Kangeiko 2019 寒稽古

By George , In kendo

Happy new year! As is the norm here in Japan, the year-end/year-start season is a busy kendo one. Amazingly I actually did end up having a handful of non-kendo days over the period (family time), but I managed to make up for the missed keiko days by cramming multiple sessions in a very short time – five in the last two days alone! This year, as normal, I attended both days of the Osaka kendo associations kangeiko (usually it is a three day event). On the first day I participated as a motodachi for pretty much all of it, but …

Published on 20 December

The end of one era, the start of another 明治・大正・昭和・平成の代表的な剣士とエベント

By George , In history, kendo

With the scheduled abdication of the current Japanese Emperor on April the 30th 2019, a new era will begin. Well, not a really a new world-changing epoch or anything so exciting, but a change in the Japanese calendar name that happens along with the succession of a new head to the imperial family. For people outside of Japan the name change has zero impact and, to tell you the truth, apart from filling in forms (which, admittedly, is a favourite pastime of people in this country!) the impact is almost non-existent in Japan as well.

Published on 28 November

The knack of acquiring kendo in three charts 技術の習得コツ

By George , In books, kendo, theory

A couple of years ago I rolled in to the dojo on a Saturday morning only to have one of my sempai give me a stack of old kendo books. After lugging them all back home I sat down and went through them. Some were not so interesting, others were books I’d seen online but never managed to to read. One especially piqued my interested. Although probably the newest book of the pile (from 1986) it was perhaps one of the rarest (because only a finite number of the book were printed and it never went on sale): a copy …

Published on 13 November

Eikenkai (Nov. 2018) 英剣会

By George , In eikenkai, kendo

Last Saturday (10th of November), I held an Eikenkai session at my workplace. 17 kenshi got together for some keiko: about 40 mins of kihon, one hour of jigeiko, and about three hours (or four… I can’t remember!) in the second dojo. Seven countries were represented: Scotland, England, America, Australia, Brazil, Italy, and Japan.