My Birthday

Yesterday was my birthday, (we're a day ahead over here) and it was a good one.  I attended two classes which were both excellent.  For the second class, I was hiding safely in the smaller beginner's training area, when suddenly Yasuhisa Shioda, the current Kancho (HNIC of Yoshinkan Aikido) strolled into the room.  Subconsciously I heard the terrifying declarative horns signifying the entrance of Darth Vader in Star Wars as I watched his black hakama skirts sailing along the mat.  The impression that I have gathered about Shioda at this point is that he would love nothing more than to break the arm of some foolish gaijin (foreigner) for not properly towing the line.  I confess it truly is the intimidation factor of such a character which I feel will serve to motivate me in the coming months to achieve excellent results.


My interpretation of what was going on when Shioda entered was that he felt the beginner's area was too crowded, and he was looking for students advanced enough to transfer over to the other class.  I decided to bite the bullet and more or less volunteer to go over there, (it was sort of a sheepish and confused sort of volunteering) where I was partnered with a humorless female black belt of about 40 and asked to perform an advanced technique (Ushiro ryote sankajo).  I did not know how to do the technique properly, and my partner was clearly frustrated by the incompetence of this lumbering, filthy gaijin with whom she had been unfortunate enough to be stuck.  Time and again I would turn the wrong way or grab her arm in the wrong place, and she would be forced to whisper, "no, no, like THIS".  Perhaps back home I would have picked up the technique more quickly, but I was a bit wrapped up in Shioda's alarming presence.  He gave me a couple of expert pointers on how I should move, although in the second instance I'm not sure I grasped what he was illustrating, and so I became even more freaked out psychologically because I did not want it to seem that I was ignoring his comment.


After this technique, I was delighted to see that he had chosen for the class to review the finer points of hijishime, the demonstration of which provides a wonderful way to "accidentally" break someone's elbow if they ignore your comments, or are big and clumsy and don't know what they're doing.  Luckily, I survived hijishime training and the rest of the class unscathed.


In the evening I went out with my new friend Bryn, who introduce me to some lovely people whom he has met in Tokyo.  (He's been here for two months, arriving prior to the announcement that the Senshusei class would be postponed due to the tsunami.)  I ate the best sushi I've ever tasted, and then this one fellow we were with produced a sanshin and began to sing traditional songs of Okinawa.  I also had a lovely present to open that my girlfriend Mindy packed away in my suitcase.  Not a bad day!