The rant thread

[stephen]

I think it's called an "ice breaker."

I don't use it as an icebreaker, I ask to get a guess of who I'm training with. It's a bad proxy, but it's better than nothing.

My icebreaker is always the same. An extended hand and, "Hi, I'm Stephen."

 

[Bigshadow]

I don't use it as an icebreaker, I ask to get a guess of who I'm training with. It's a bad proxy, but it's better than nothing.

You could forgo the question and just offer to be uke first. IMO how they move and deal with the attack, tells me almost all I need to know.

My icebreaker is always the same. An extended hand and, "Hi, I'm Stephen."

Yep, that works.

 

[stephen]

You could forgo the question and just offer to be uke first. IMO how they move and deal with the attack, tells me almost all I need to know.

Ya', I do that too. I don't ask everyone I train with, I usually only ask after I've been uke if I have reason to worry that someone may be a bit new, or if they seem exceptionally good.

Clearly, you have to read the situaiton enough so that you don't come off as a jerk. That's not the point. Training is about tori and uke helping each other get better. Sometimes the answer to that question can help, don't ask in the situations where it can hurt.

Just like anything else, as one of those teachers that I'll gladly cross the globe to train with is fond of saying, "case by case."

 

[Grey Eyed Bandit]

I'm not interested in 'fair'. It's not some sort of game.

I've personally been both written off as a worthless idiot and praised as a prodigy, all depending on the environment.

I can either go to him; have him in for a seminar at my place; or just be sure to get to all of his seminars. I'll make it work.

If you'll put in that much effort to make it work you'd be different from pretty much everyone else. I tip my flexfit to you if you were to succeed, though I doubt it.

It's much harder to find the right people to train with then it is to get to them.

I think this needs to be elaborated upon...

Ok, lets pretent this hypo. teacher is in some strange black hole that I can't get to. I'll train with you then. If you've been training half as long are twice as good I'll travel to you AND buy you a beer afterward, 'cause you clearly have a more efficient way of looking at things.

Good, that's one person saved. Problem is, you seemed reasonable enough before, so I don't see what good it's really done.

 

[Grey Eyed Bandit]

You could forgo the question and just offer to be uke first. IMO how they move and deal with the attack, tells me almost all I need to know.

 

[Bigshadow]

Ya', I do that too. I don't ask everyone I train with, I usually only ask after I've been uke if I have reason to worry that someone may be a bit new, or if they seem exceptionally good.

Clearly, you have to read the situaiton enough so that you don't come off as a jerk. That's not the point. Training is about tori and uke helping each other get better. Sometimes the answer to that question can help, don't ask in the situations where it can hurt.

Just like anything else, as one of those teachers that I'll gladly cross the globe to train with is fond of saying, "case by case."

Absolutely!

It is all about helping each other. The ego is a funny thing.

 

[Grey Eyed Bandit]

Absolutely!

It is all about helping each other.

Most of the points I'm trying to get across in this thread revolve around the fact that that isn't always how it works in actuality.

 

[Bigshadow]

Most of the points I'm trying to get across in this thread revolve around the fact that that isn't always how it works in actuality.

That is true! I am sure there are folks who would do precisely what you said. Although it may be insulting when one of these people ask in that manner, but the way I see it that is a personal obstacle they will eventually have to deal with or their own personal budo will suffer. I think this is just another example of why a budoka should have a good heart!

 

[stephen]

If you'll put in that much effort to make it work you'd be different from pretty much everyone else. I tip my flexfit to you if you were to succeed, though I doubt it.

Not different than the people I train with.

I think this needs to be elaborated upon...

See above.

 

[Grey Eyed Bandit]

but the way I see it that is a personal obstacle they will eventually have to deal with or their own personal budo will suffer. I think this is just another example of why a budoka should have a good heart!

Now you're doing it again...

 

[Grey Eyed Bandit]

Not different than the people I train with.

Different from most of the Bujinkan.

 

[Kreth]

Different from most of the Bujinkan.

Yeah, we get it, you're a prodigy, or something.

 

[stephen]

Different from most of the Bujinkan.

Why does it matter what 51% of the Bujinkan does? 'The Bujinkan', in my opinion, is not really an organization - it's a person. Or, maybe to get all whoo-whoo for a second, it's a bufu.

I think this might be, sorta, what Soke means when he has said that after godan we are all his students. It doesn't mean that I go implying on my website that I've been training 2 feet away from him for the last x years. I think it means that my responsibility and loyalities should lie with this narrowly-understood definition of 'The Bujinkan'. That's a hell of a lot less people to be worried about what they're doing and what they think of what I'm doing.

That being said, I think there's a bit from Doug's blog which, I think, is right on target here:

I truly realized that Bujinkan is made up of many interesting people. Each person has strengths to bring to the table. We will all have our strengths and will all have our weakness, this is natural. However, we must be aware that things become out of control when strengths are exploited and weakness are ignored. Think about this.

( http://henka.wordpress.com/ )

 

[Grey Eyed Bandit]

Yeah, we get it, you're a prodigy, or something.

No, and I'm not about to move to Japan to train with the people I'd like to train with the most either. If stephen is serious about that kind of dedication then kudos to him.

BTW, that was uncalled for.

 

[Grey Eyed Bandit]

Why does it matter what 51% of the Bujinkan does?

It matters to me. Here's why.

I would really love to be able to at any time choose a random person in Hombu, at a seminar or anywhere else to train with, and be able to rest assured that that person won't **** me over based on his own fear- or machismo-based inadequacies, and who'll allow me to walk away from there with a smile on my face and the knowledge that I've become better than I was 90 minutes ago. I've met both great people with lousy taijutsu, and some very skilled people that at times have had me considering lying in wait for them with a scoped rifle.

I don't want to use the term "good heart", so I'm just going to say that most asshats have on thing in common - the fact that they've already made up their minds (i.e. "taijutsu needs to be complemented with kickboxing, and since no one is going to let you perform a technique on him IRL I might as well try to fight back all the time while training too").

Now you may be less of a dreamer than I and as such more accustomed to the fact that none of this is going to change anytime soon (again, kudos to you for that), but don't try to tell me that you wouldn't appreciate it as well.

 

[Grey Eyed Bandit]

BTW - I don't have anything to bring to the table. :idunno:

 

[Bigshadow]

Now you're doing it again...

What did I do? :idunno: Was I too philosophical?

 

[Grey Eyed Bandit]

On the recent Human Weapon episode, which I haven't seen yet but heard plenty about...

I honestly cannot understand why a 15th dan would say to a kyu ranked person "if you can't understand this, you're going to be headed in the wrong direction in regards to what Hatsumi sensei is teaching".

The kyu ranked person referred to in this case was me. The 15th dan (well, I'm not 100 percent sure he was 15th at the time, but whatever) person is a resident of Japan. This happened a few years ago.

The subject matter we discussed that led him to utter the above quote was the prospect of being able to throw a sword at your opponent, so that you're not fixating on the weapon you have. :wavey:

 

[Grey Eyed Bandit]

Having now looked through the Human Weapon ninjutsu episode several times, two things stuck in my memory. One was the face of Noguchi as the camera zoomed in on him, and the other was the tendency of everyone involved to lean forward with their upper bodies under stress.

Now, onto the next issue.
It's time to kill off another myth - the one that there's nothing to be gained from training with people who haven't been visiting Japan recently. No, they won't be focusing on the same things as the people in Honbu are doing at the moment. No, it's not very well looked upon. And the cost/benefit ratio may be too high for most higher-ups - assuming they have their kihon in order, of course. But a lot of the times they will very much be able to teach mere mortals like myself a whole lot of interesting stuff that we'd probably have missed out on otherwise. Things that, in the long run, will enable us to understand the things Hatsumi & co are trying to bring across these days, likely even better than those who've never experienced them. Of course I'll also freely admit that it shouldn't have to be this way.

On a related note...

We've probably all heard our instructors speak on the importance of taking responsibility for your own training. But there's another side to the coin the way I see it, and that's the idea of accepting that you may have missed out on certain things. For instance, having witnessed a pot lid being turned into an instrument of violence, and not being in the least amused or even creatively inspired by the episode, I deducted that that particular training environment didn't have very much left to keep me interested. I'm fully aware of the fact that this means a great loss on my part, but so has my decision not to become a permanent resident of Japan. For me it's simply not worth having the Japanese Bujinkan environment mess with my head constantly just so that I can be constantly up to date - I've spoken before on what I believe those Sunday morning sessions with Hatsumi can do with your perspective on the general status of the Bujinkan if you don't mix it up a bit.

Having said that, I would much rather see someone having an epileptic seizure in Honbu than I'd like to be stopped by the cops twice in Roppongi whilst looking for a nightclub that apparently doesn't exist anymore.

 

[Shicomm]

Amen to that about a million times...

As for human weapon ; it should be havin' an intro screen that says "for entertainment purposes only... "
But even so ; it sucked as a documentary ( seems that only the British can do that really good ) and it sucked as a 'show' also...

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It seems btw that some graphic designer made a little mistake...