Dai kyo soku kei

101 things

2007-06-18T09:12:00.000+02:00

I've been keeping a 101 things in 1001 days list for quite some time now, but since MadDog asked me to post it in English as well (Swedish version is found here) I thought I'd translate it. I'll bold the ones I've already completed.

Grade nidan in iaido.
Grade shodan in kendo. [still only 3kyu]
Get picked for the national iaido team.
Sew a juban.
Mend my torn clothes instead of piling them up.
Go to Japan.
Get into my favourite pair of jeans again.
Get a driver's license
Get a decent piece of furniture to put the TV on and rearrange the living room.
Get a membership card at the local gym and exercise there regularly as long as it's valid. [failed once]
Take all my failed exams again, and not fail them.
Not fail any more exams.
Start studying Japanese again.
Get my bad knee checked.
Keep track of all my expenses for two months to see what I do with my money.
Actually sew the things that I've bought fabric for.
Eat lunch at (local sushi restaurant) Nori.
Sew curtains and get them up.
See at least 10 films by Akira Kurosawa. [4 seen so far]
Run at least once a week for a month.
Use dental floss every day for a week.
Read all fictional books in my shelves that I haven't read, 46 total. [11 read so far]
Try marine kayaking (is that what it's called? I couldn't find it in a dictionary).
Get a VISA.
Go to Karesuando and visit my friend Marika there.
Go see a concert with a good band.
Watch at least one obscure film that Kalle tells me that I just "have to see".
Watch the 10 most popular anime series at Animenfo.com (as of March 9th, 2006).
Finish watching the anime series that I've started (total of 7).
Not watch TV for a week.
Donate blood.
Swim naked (outside, bath tub doesn't count).
Get a new (better) camera.
See Eddie Izzard perform live.
Get a new bike.
Try doing yoga.
Publish this list on the website and along with comments on every finished thing.
Buy a Disney film on DVD.
Re-read the New Testament.
Read the Koran.
Keep at least 1500 registered minutes each month at Funbeat. [failed!]
Sleep at least 8 hours a night for a month.
Write a poem.
Attend NaNoWriMo and win.
Throw out all the old floppies and put the interesting files on CD or DVD instead. (The problem here is that my new computer doesn't even have a floppy drive. ;)
Learn the lyrics to a new song.
Visit Mölndals museum.
Finish summer course in Faunistics and floristics.
Bring a lunch box to school every day for a week.
Learn to make nice-looking yukiwa-maki (sushi rolls with the rice on the outside).
Buy a CD by an artist that I've discovered through Pandora.
Stop getting Sverox (a magazine that I wasn't prescribing for anymore).
Sing karaoke.
Learn a new style of calligraphy and practise it until it looks good.
Go on another over-night hike on horse-back.
Get all the tiny wounds on my arms to really heal.
Attend a massaging class.
Do 100 suburi a day for a month (outside regular practice).
Go to church in Linköping at least once.
Make a cake from scratch and get it to look good.
Watch the news every day for two weeks.
Get to know at least 3 new people who are not member of the budo club (yet ;).
Read a book about meditational techniques and try them.
Learn at least 50 kanji outside of school.
-
Get a penpal (e-mail counts, but it can't be anyone that I know on beforehand).
Be the "peer student" of an exchange student coming here.
Key 10 different plants in a weekend.
Play through Sid Meyer's Pirates to the end.
Stop using Hannes' computer all the time and use my own instead.
Do something fun with my sister.
Get all Christmas presents before Lucia day (Dec 13th).
See a musical.
Read two fictional books by Japanese authors. [1 so far]
Get a new cell phone.
Come up with and get a really good birthday present for my mom.
Travel somewhere for vacation and nothing else.
Look through the entire website (kendoka.se) and at least update the link page.
Grade sandan in iaido.
Learn all 10 of the kendo no kata. [so far I know five of them, more or less]
Get dance mats. (This one is not probable that I will finish, I don't have room for them.)
Get a black iPod nano.
Get a smaller stereo.
Get someone else to also write a list like this one.
Finish editing the grading footage.
Wear out my kendo clothes and get new ones. [failed as I got new ones without wearing out the old ones]
Raise my grades at at least two exams (yes, we can do this).
Learn five new constellations and the (proper) names of those stars.
Vote.
Get a new iaito (preferrably under the same conditions as #86).
Be able to do 100 push-ups on my toes.
Turn "updates" back into a blog.
See what I kind do to make the image gallery more effective.
Go see the dentist.
Get a medal at the iaido nationals.
Win a kendo match (on points).
Get a new bed.
Get a new (good) board game.
Learn all 12 of the MSR shodan kata.
Find a decent alternative to shaving my legs.
Make a new list when this one finishes.

Yet another back to kendo post

2007-06-14T21:29:00.000+02:00

Yup, after another all-too-long break I've made my return to kendo practice. Again. I have this list of 101 things that I want to do in 1001 days (in Swedish though - sorry) and one of the things on the list is to grade shodan in kendo. Since the 1001 days will be over in December 2008, I really need to get a grip if I'm going to have a chance.

Of course I want to do kendo because it's fun and not just because of the list, but I'm hoping it will keep me motivated enough for a long enough time. Apart from more kendo practice, I will also need more stamina to get anywhere. I'm considering taking up running.

Silver

2007-05-20T10:36:00.000+02:00

Here I felt almost embarrassed going to the nationals because I had been practising so much less than what I planned. And then, this. I'm...well, surprised to say the least.

Lousy!

2007-05-15T16:10:00.000+02:00

I might very well be the lousiest blogger of all time! In my defense, I do have a lot to do right now. The nationals are next Saturday, so some planning have gone into that and there was also a mix-up with our zekken that caused a certain amount of stress. We've been promised that they will get here in time though, so hopefully there's nothing to fret about.

I have four Japanese exams coming up in May/June and I have to do a lot of studying to get the kind of results I want. So far I haven't spent nearly enough time. There are also things like a high school graduation and a wedding to plan for (what to wear, what to buy for presents...you know the deal).

What I have been doing, is sewing clothes. Yes, I am crazy and should be doing other things, but it turns out to be a great way to relax. :)

I'm back!

2007-05-01T22:01:00.000+02:00

Sorry about the temporary lack of activity here. I went to Australia with my fiancé and his family at the end of March and got back in the middle of April. Since then we've both been more or less ill (him more, me less) with an evil airport cold (what else is new). Last week's iaido was not worth mentioning because of that, I was only there to help the others and did not do much myself.

Today I still have a sore throat, but I didn't feel like caring anymore. All these colds are really getting on my nerves! Of course, the fact that there is less than three weeks left until the Nationals doesn't really help. So when only one of my kohai showed up for practice today (being May 1st) I decided it was time to get some practice in. We practised for only an hour or so, instead of two, and I got to practise the entire time. Yay! I hope I don't get worse after this as I really need to get more practice in before the taikai.

No fun :(

2007-03-27T22:45:00.000+02:00

I was just about to recover from my cold, and then I was hit by another fun. Have been feeling under the weather all day today but still went to the dojo to teach (only watching and commenting, mind you). No fun at all. :(

Coming up with titles is the most difficult part of blogging

2007-03-20T16:17:00.000+01:00

I'm starting to fall back into Lazy Blogger mode. だめ！ So, to get back on track, the inflammation in my foot went away almost as suddenly as it appeared, and I'm not complaining. I'm still not really getting rid of these perpetual colds though, so I went to the pharmacy a few days ago and got some Echinacea (or however it might be spelled) that I'm hoping will help. Actually, I think it's helped a little, but...

Stupid as I am, I go to practise even though I have a cold. Despite knowing of all the horrible things that might happen to me. Really need to get my brain checked.

Anyway, back on track again, Hannes and I went down to the dojo by ourselves last Friday to practise together. We did first half an hour of kendo where I surprised both of us with foot-hand timing that was worse than ever. Very strange, because even though this has always been one of my biggest problems in kendo, it hasn't been that bad for quite some time now. Hannes also noted that I tend to strike his mengane. Of course this has to do with him being taller than me, but then, so are most kendoka, so this is something I need to get better at. We tried some different ways, and now I know what it should feel like. Needs a lot of work, though! My plan of grading 2kyu i May seems far away right now... :(

After kendo we switched to another half an hour of iaido. We pretty much just went through seitei twice by ourselves. Also reigi of course, and I quickly went through the koryu kata I'm working on (shohatto, ryuto, seichuto, inyoshintai). I'm really starting to mess them all up, but I don't really know what to do about it until I get some proper instruction again.

Last night Hannes was teaching the newbies and I went along as sempai. I was hoping for a relaxed session, because I could still feel my cold a little, but his plan was to make us sweat. A lot of fun, but didn't feel like an entirely good idea, so I skipped out for the last 15 minutes of practice. I'm not that stupid. ;)

Foot inflammation

2007-03-13T22:57:00.000+01:00

Yesterday, after a long slow day of studying on the coach, I got up and realized I could hardly walk because of the pain in my left foot. For some reason it had turned red, swollen and was aching, no, more like cramping every time I took a step. It was still pretty bad this morning, but seems much better now (still slightly swollen, but no pain), but I didn't want to risk anything and so concentrated on teaching the others today so that it gets time to heal.

I hope for it too be back to normal on Thursday, at the latest.

Lots of chocolate, little of iai

2007-03-11T22:58:00.000+01:00

The already mentioned chocolate festival has left me with an unhealthy amount of good chocolate in my possession. I won't complain though.

I decided right after writing the last post here that I would try to get some training in after my mother left town on Sunday, which happens to be today. The original plan was aiming for an hour, but as I was not feeling very well and have lots to do before my Japanese exam on Tuesday, it ended up getting shortened to 15 minutes where I just managed to warm up with a skipping rope, go through reigi and do each seiteigata twice.

Ukenagashi is no good at all. The overall timing is crap. This will be one of my projects for a while.

The thrusts in tsukaate and shihôgiri are...well...weird. I think I've gotten too careful. Need to shape up.

In morotetsuki the beginning feels a little shaky. Mostly the actual morotetsuki.

I noticed that my yoko-chiburi looks like the angle might be a little off (could be due too mirror angle though). It is also shaky. And my right hand gets too much relative power in tenouchi sometimes, resulting in the kissaki going off center.

That would be the main issues right now. ;)

Sloppy technique

2007-03-08T22:53:00.000+01:00

My cold is almost gone, so I decided this morning to skip kendo (to not risk getting ill again), but attend iaido so that I can at least get some practice in this week. Jocke was teaching the class and focused a lot on different turns and morotetsuki.

I had some bigger issues though: generally sloppy technique. As I have suspected for some time, these last six months or so when I have practised way less than what I ought to, I've lost a lot. My grip is sloppy, my tenouchi was hardly at all today, my balance comes and goes... Also my nukitsuke and noto needs a lot of practise as I've had pointed out to me on multiple occasions this winter from different teachers that I'm bending my wrist in a weird way when performing these two.

With about 2,5 months left until the Swedish Championships it's definitely time to shape up! I really want to keep kendo up, so this probably means that I need to be more disciplined when it comes to studying, so that I can devote more time to practise. I'll have to sacrifice my "lazy time", and try to be more effective. I want to practise at least an hour by myself each week, outside the regular training schedule. I think I will need to work out a plan. Probably using FunBeat, because it's great for these things.

Another cold :(

2007-03-06T23:00:00.000+01:00

There was a combined seitei and tameshigiri seminar this last weekend that I was supposed to go to, but a very weird cold struck me Thursday, and so I ended up staying at home. Three other people from my dojo went though, and they claim to have had a lot of fun. No surprise there.

Because of said cold I stayed away from both sessions last Thursday (first kendo, then iaido - hard, but it works) and the session yesterday (kendo kihon with the newbies - lots of them!). Today I still have a cold, even though it's gotten a little better, but I still went to the dojo to teach as I usually do on Tuesdays. There were more people than regular at practice today, so I could easily refrain from practising myself to make sure the others had enough room, and health-wise that was probably a good thing.

I probably shouldn't do kendo (even though kihon) tomorrow either, but I hope to be back on track so that I can take part in both sessions this Thursday, as I'm going to miss practice on Saturday as well. That's because my mom's coming to town and we're going to the Chocolate Festival that day. :D

Updating...

2007-03-01T12:43:00.000+01:00

I've spent some time now reading up on my previous posts, to see what I should write about to get the few readers out there back on track with what's been happening. I soon realised that there is quite a lot, but I'll try to keep it reasonably short.

From the beginner's course in iaido last spring, that I was writing about about a year ago, only two people are still practising. Most girls dropped out, which was of course a sad thing. At the moment there are still only 3-4 girls practising in the club, including me. In total I'd guess we're around 10-15 people practising iai, and with almost no interest from potential beginners this semester, it doesn't seem that we're going grow until the autumn, at least. There are enough of us to keep things running without getting too lonely though (if you read some of my earliest posts here, you'll see that not too rarely I was practising all alone).

I decided during 2006 to aspire for the national team again, which was a great thing because I got to go to a lot of great seminars and learned loads. I practised very intensely the entire first semester of the year and at the Swedish Championships in May I received one of the bronze medals in the shodan class and, even better, got one of the judges' vote against someone graded higher than me in the team competition! During the summer I was told that I'd been chosen for the national team and in September I got to go to the European Championships in Brighton and compete. I soon fell out of the competition in the shodan group, but I graded nidan (didn't think I'd pass, but I did!) and had a lot of fun. English food is really crap, though. ;)

I also managed to keep my kendo attendance at a high enough level to manage to grade for 3kyu at the beginning of summer. Not a great accomplishment, but it felt good.

Then came the autumn... And, well. Things didn't go as well. Basically, I had a more or less perpetual cold during these months and nothing to motivate me. In essence, I practised way too little, but didn't really know what else to do.

Right now I'm trying to raise my motivation for iai, as I've already seen how much I can benefit from that. Using FunBeat, I've set a goal to practise for at least 3 full hours a week, which isn't really a lot, but I think that as a minimum it is enough to get me going again. I haven't decided yet if I'm going to aspire for the national team again. I would really like to, but am not sure if I will have the time and money to really go for it.

On the kendo side of life I'm trying to shape up. Last March I started a "101 things in 1001 days" project, which is basically a list of 101 things that I want to accomplish before december 2008. One of the tasks is to grade shodan in kendo. This has motivated me to get off my lazy butt and go to practice, and made me notice that:

1) It was more fun than I remembered!
2) Even though my stamina is out the window I can do a lot more than I thought. Yay!

So the short term goal right now is to get ready for 2kyu at the end of this semester. And have fun getting there.

Needless to say, maybe, my body seems to have entered some sort of shock state due to the sudden increase in practice time, but I think it's coming out of it again, though slowly. I'll rather deal with a few aches here and there than repeat what happened in the autumn though.

And so...I managed to write an all-too-long blog post anyway. But at least now you know what's happened. :)

Hmm...

2007-02-28T23:06:00.000+01:00

I probably should try to start writing in this blog again. Actually, I was trying to import these posts into my Wordpress blog just because I realized that I can...or rather should have been able to. It didn't work. Then I started reading my old posts here, and remembered again how much I benefit from this kind of thing. I'll try to motivate myself, and should probably start by writing a long post of what has happened since my last post. Won't do that now though (maybe tomorrow?).

I suppose there isn't anyone out there still checking this blog? (I know I wouldn't.)

The reason

2006-04-16T22:53:00.000+02:00

I know that nothing much happens around here any longer. That is mostly because I prefer to spend my time at www.kendoka.se. See you there! :D

Nearly healthy

2006-03-08T09:23:00.000+01:00

I haven't given up on the blog, don't fret, but the "slight cold" turned into a not-so-slight cold, which means I've been away from all kendo and most iai for three weeks. Yesterday was my first day back for kendo, I had planned to stay away until Thursday to get healthy for real, but since the practice was all kata I decided to join in (I was already there because of the newbie session).

I really like kendo no kata, but I'm not really any good because I've done them too little. Yesterday we did 1,2,4 and 5. Number 4 was the one that posed me the most trouble, I tend to want to take a step forward when doing the cut (as shidachi), but at the very end I managed not to do that and everything got a lot better.

I also had a lot of trouble with number 5 (I think it is?), both as uchidachi and shidachi. As uchidachi I failed to make a decent straight cut...not much to say about that as it's just plain embarrassing. I worked it out, though. As shidachi I tend to raise the sword and pull it slightly backwards instead of straight up in suriage. This is no good, as my fingers soon found out. It got better, but I still need to work on it.

A slight cold

2006-02-17T12:39:00.000+01:00

I think I sort of overdid it last week, when I went to every practice after being away from training a lot before that. I started this week with a sore body and a slight cold...and have hence stayed away from kendo so far this week, and only done iai. I hope I'll feel better soon and maybe get an hour of kendo on Sunday or so. :/

Tenouchi, please!

2006-02-12T09:51:00.000+01:00

On Saturdays, we have a one-hour kendo session which we dedicate entirely to jigeiko (that's sparring, for you iaidoka out there ;). Jigeiko is not my strength, really, and I seem to have a habit of being even worse on Saturdays. Maybe it's because I'm thrown right into it without all the technique training we usually do first, I don't know.

Yesterday was no exception, I made a terrible performance. What was slightly worse though, was the fact that everyone else seemed to try to punish me for it. I received loads of blows above my kote, one to my thigh, and the worst one was a missed men which banged into my shoulder so hard that I actually had to stop for a minute and catch my breath. It still hurts a little today, guess I will get a nice little bruise in a few days (I'm a slow bruiser). Hence the title. ^^

Keeping it up

2006-02-09T23:54:00.000+01:00

Another day of double practise. The first times this whole thing seemed like too much, but I'm actually beginning to like it. It's growing on me. :)

Iaido is first as always (seriously, who can focus on iai after some sweaty jigeiko?). Not a lot of practice for me personally, as is usually the case with Thursdays, but I think and hope that on some level I am learning things by watching, correcting and explaining. We did jogeburi, one-step-one-cut, hayasuburi (only 20, this is iai after all ;) and some kirioroshi training. Then mae (focusing on jo-ha-kyu in nukitsuke and timing in noto), opening torei (here I just poured details over them, which is not a good way of teaching, but sort of my way to try and compensate for going trough these things too rarely) and finally shihogiri before some free stretching. We didn't get started right on time, so I didn't leave much time for stretching. It's a good thing, but iai is more important. :)

I missed the first part of the kendo warmup because of changing clothes, but I was back just in time for jogeburi, which means I didn't miss any suburi. :) Kendo on Thursdays is a little more laid-back and basic which I really enjoyed. We did kirikaeshi (well, duh! ;), large men (a lot! focus was on ki-ken-tai-ichi, or mainly ken-tai-ichi, really), and then defense against men, by staying in kamae and doing tenouchi right into the mune (no thrust, though!). Very effective but very difficult. I tried several times to find openings for trying it in the following jigeiko (three of them), but didn't manage once. I hope I can manage to do this in jigeiko at least once, sometime soon! I got one landed on me though, well...more or less. The attack I was going for was actually a kote, but the other guy perceived it as men, and put a nice little tenouchi right there on my tsuki (which was also a way of doing the same kind of defense, just not the way we practised it). Very effective against kote as well, it seemed. ;)

Another come-back and a cool website

2006-02-08T15:54:00.000+01:00

Finally! My body seems to be more or less in one piece. My throat is a little sore and my foot is still a little stiff towards the end of a training session, but I don't really care any longer. ;)

First newbie iaido. We went over the kihon again (nukitsuke, kiritsuke, o chiburi, noto) and then started learning mae. I seem to have improved my teaching skills - mae looked a lot better yesterday than it did the first time for the previous group of newbies. I take it as proof that my new ideas are actually working and that they are the improvement that I hoped. We summed it all up with some 180° turns in preparation for morotetsuki, which will be the next kata they learn.

The last 5-10 minutes of the newbie session we gather all the iaido and kendo people together and have them stretching together. It's actually quite nice. This whole thing with iaido and kendo newbie session at the same time and place (well, more or less) seems to be working fine. Especially for the girls I think, as we girls always seem to be a minority, this way we all get to know each other and the dressing room isn't as lonely. ;)

After that, there was kendo as usual. Although this time I was finally back again, wohoo! We started out with warm-ups, 100 hayasuburi and kirikaeshi. Then small men and small do, hiki-men and this pain-in-the-ass variant of hiki-men where we did first hiki-men and then regular men without really stopping in between. Now that's something to make you sweat! :D The last 15 minutes or so was of course jigeiko. I only did one because of the whole foot thing. I can tell you that doing jigeiko when only being able to take 2-3 steps at the time is very interesting, but...not really jigeiko.

Also, I found a really cool website yesterday: FunBeat. It's sort of a training community where you can keep a training diary and keep track of how much you are actually training, keep record of your weight and pulse, and all these kind of things. It's mainly in Swedish, but is available in English as well, if you're interested. I'm "Caroline L" on there (tricky, huh?), come say hello if you join.

180°

2006-02-07T13:04:00.000+01:00

Joacim was teaching the iaido class last night and had us doing turns and cuts for 40 minutes or so. The turns were all 180° turns, and since I am trying to learn a new footwork for the turns I am having loads of trouble with it. This might seem a little extra troublesome as I am supposed to be teaching turns to the beginners tonight... ;) Well, we'll see what happens. And I happen to know that even though I am still having some trouble with the technicalities, learning it this way from the beginning than the way I taught last semester will be so very much easier on the newbies. Why, you ask? Because this way is so much more intuitive and, well...just plain better. :)

But this was supposed to be about last night. For kata we were doing morotetsuki and sanpogiri, as they have a lot of turns. I found that it was also an excellent possibility to really consider the different angles in the different nukitsuki, so that got a lot of my attention. I think I might have tried to get the morotetsuki one a little too steep, though. What was really causing problems was the sanpogiri nukitsuki. So difficult!

Not much

2006-02-04T17:25:00.000+01:00

Not much happens on the blog, and not much happens in real life either. We've got a nicely small bunch of beginners for iai, almost as many as for kendo (yay!). Lots of girls too, which is great. I'm just hoping they will stay...

I have missed pretty much all sessions this week because I haven't been feeling have, had some stomach aches and nausea in the beginning of the week, that I think was mostly because of stress at school, and I haven't been feeling normal until...well, today, pretty much. Skipped the jigeiko session today, just to play it safe. Kendo is cancelled for tomorrow as almost all the instructors are in Malmö for Sugo Cup (I decided not to go because of money issues - good for me), so I will be back to iaido on Monday and to kendo on Tuesday. I want to go to practise!

Microbreak and back

2006-01-19T23:49:00.000+01:00

The morning after the masspass I woke up with intense stomach and joint pains plus a headache and sore throat. No fever though, so I don't really know what happened, but I decided to take a week away from the dojo.

I was back again for iaido last Monday, and that session was so much fun! Joacim was teaching, which meant that I got to be the student for the first time in about a year (apart from seminars and the like). He had us doing a bunch of cutting and turning exercises, and I worked up a sweat pretty fast. My cutting was way too tense though. I really need to relax and trust my technique.

On Tuesday, kendo was cancelled, so I got a few days off from training again.

Finally today was the first day with our new training schedule which means first 90 minutes of iaido and then 90 minutes of kendo. I had to quit the jigeiko part a little early, because I was starting to have trouble breathing (think I still have a little bit of that cold left in my body), but still it was a lot of fun. First iaido and then kendo turned out to be a really good idea, as well...it makes for a nice acceleration (from yogeburi through kata and kirikaeshi, and ending up in jigeiko) and you can build up a little on spirit during iai that can then be used in kendo. Mwahaha! :D

Masspass

2006-01-11T11:49:00.000+01:00

As a tradition in the budo club, every semester starts with a "masspass", which is a training session where everyone trains everything together. Sound weird? Well, I can tell you it's a lot of fun. :) This monday was my first masspass ever, and from what I understand it was also the first ever to actually have all styles represented.

The jujutsu people had us wrestling for a bit, doing some warm-up exercises and getting rid of stranglers, the karate people had us kicking and blocking kicks, the taichi guy showed us a technique where you block a punch and get the attacker down by your feet. Aikido had us doing some falling, and their version of kakarigeiko.

For kendo we got to do 100 hayasuburi (but I still wasn't feeling very well, so I stopped after 70) and for iaido I had them doing tsukaate. The details were on the level of "sit like this, hit, turn around, thrust, turn around, cut" but it actually worked quite well, which amazed me. Especially as we didn't have enough bokuto, so quite a lot of people were using jo, hehe.

As I said, a lot of fun!

They're coming back

2006-01-04T23:50:00.000+01:00

Skipped kendo yesterday because of this bad cold I've got. Too bad I had to get a new cold and a new bogu at the same time.

Anyway, today was iaido which I cannot skip. There were some more of us this time, so I guess people are starting to come back to Linköping. The training was not much special apart from that. We started out with jogeburi, some cutting exercises and doing chiburi from hasso. Then mae twice before we concentrated on ukenagashi and kesagiri. To wrap it up everyone got to pick a kata to practise, then we went through all four kata in a row and then another cutting exercise.

The good news is that for once I remembered to put in a little stretching at the very end. :D

Kendo no kata

2006-01-02T23:35:00.000+01:00

I came up with the idea of a kendokata (isn't it kendogata by the way?) session for both kendoka and iaidoka sometime around the beginning of December I think, and we've talked about it a lot since then, although mostly the discussion has been based on thoughts such as: "yeah, that'd be cool, let's do that". Anyway, today we finally had the session. A lot of people are still gone and most of the others are probably still a little disoriented with the idea of a new year and everything, but we did actually manage to get a decent gathering of people. There were eight of us, with seven being iaidoka, but only one is not kendoka. What I can say about kendogata (right?) is this:
1. it's SO cool
2. I need to practice SO much

In other news my bôgu arrived today! I haven't taken any pictures of it yet, but I really should and then I really should post them here. Let's hope I remember to. ;) The kote are perfectly snug and nice (I have small hands and know why to hate too large a kote), but the men might be a little too big. Hard to say without softening it a little with a few whacks to the head first... :D

Bad teaching

2005-12-29T20:36:00.000+01:00

Iaido practice was a little...different last night. Most of the people in our dojo are students at the university here, and I guess they are still at their parents' homes around the country. At least, Hannes and I were the only people who showed up for practice last night, and Hannes only came after being talked into it. Trying to teach one person is very rewarding, but also very tough on the one being taught... I did try to spend some time on my own iai, but still I think I was a little too much. Whenever this happens again, I really have to remember not to overdo the teaching... :|

Week before Christmas practice

2005-12-20T00:05:00.000+01:00

Two posts in one day. Yay, go me! ;P (Oh well...it seems to be past midnight. Whatever.)

Anyway, tonight was the first practice with both the "newbies" (although technically they're not newbies anymore, as they are all yonkyu now) and the "old people". It went really well, I think. Since it's the holiday season practices don't have to be as serious, but I happened to put together something pretty tough anyway. We did some warming up, then a bunch of cutting exercises: the one cut per step one, cutting in sonkyo, really low turns and cutting dwarves (no offense, short people! ;). Then we went through all twelve kata in a quite fast manner before focusing on mae, ukenagashi and soetetsuki.

In mae we played a little with slow-motion, mixed speeds and normal speed. Then we got a clock out and timed the kata to around 35 seconds. We talked some about where to take you time and where to not take your time, to build zanshin. I could spend the entire practice on just mae, so I had to force myself to move on.

For ukenagashi I tried to show with bokken what the attacker is actually doing, as I wanted to make people understand how short the parry (spelling?) moment actually is, and why the cut is slightly diagonal. They looked pretty puzzled, which hopefully means that they understood my point. ;) After that I let them practise in a more traditional way, with me moving around helping them out with a few pointers.

I then realized that time was running out, so I threw in just a little bit of soetetsuki before going back to doing all the twelve kata in order, but this time without any hesitation or annoyed faces. That actually seems to be working a lot better for them than for me, which I hope is a sign that it is a good way to train for gradings, competitions and such.

Back to blogging (?)

2005-12-19T17:08:00.000+01:00

I really need to improve my blogging habits. Although, truth is, I am not only a lazy blogger, but have also been a pretty lazy budoka during the fall, which has of course meant less to blog about.

Still...lazyness counted, I have missed out on writing about a lot of stuff.

Kendowise I have been really lazy. Things to do with iaido (not practising though...more like administrating) have occupied a lot of my time and kendo always loses that battle. I had a little incident with my foot a few weeks ago, which hasn't exactly helped either, but now it seems to be getting better (went to see a physiotherapist a few days ago and got some tips). I actually did some kendo earlier today to make up for all missed sessions and got the usual remarks on going in too close for do (in harai-do this time), which I really need to stop doing.

Iaidowise there has been a lot of administration as I said, with the word "administration" representing everything about iai that is not practice itself. This also includes teaching, because I have to have full attention on the others, so that there is no time for my own training. Luckily, we are getting another session each week next semester, and I will not be the one teaching. Hooray! Time to practise! I really need this as I REALLY need to qualify for the national team next autumn, and I also need to practise for nidan (although these two things are actually the same ;).

I went to a seminar with René van Amersfoort in Gothenburg again, but I still haven't written anything about it here (no need to look), and to be honest I don't think I will. I have tried to implement some of the things that he said into my own training though, so the seminar wasn't a waste of time. ;) The monouchi problem is still there, so I don't really need to mention that. I have been working a lot with my noto (trying to get it horizontal) since the seminar, and it's improving, but still a long way from good.

What else? The newbies from the last semester graded for yonkyu last week and they all performed a lot better than I had expected. Where do they learn everything? ;) I guess René was right: teaching newbies is easy. ;)

Got to go now...and got to blog more often...

Stockholm Kendo Open

2005-10-31T15:00:00.000+01:00

Yup, it's true, I am still here, just being a lazy blogger as always. ;)

Anyway, last weekend I was at the Stockholm Kendo Open (in Stockholm, of course) and had a lot of fun. I don't really have the time to thoroughly write down all that happened, but I'm pretty sure that someone else will. I didn't take any points, kiai'd a lot and generally learned that I need to practice SO many things, SO much.

Shodan in Malmö

2005-08-14T21:04:00.000+02:00

This weekend there was the coolest iaido and kendo camp ever in Swedish history. Or so I think, anyway. There were...14 (?) Japanese sensei gathered in Malmö and over 100 people (I don't know the numbers), mostly from Sweden, but also from Denmark, Norway, Germany, Belgium, France and whatnot. The camp consisted of alternating sessions of kendo and iaido in a very newbie-friendly and happy spirit. This is what budo should always be like, I guess.

Sadly, I decided not to participate in the kendo sessions because I was going to grade today (Sunday) and didn't want to put my bad knee through too much before that. Therefore, I decided that it was better having my heart ache when seeing all the others having so much fun with kendo, than have my knee ache. I am sad that I had to choose, though.

Sunday was shiai, ippon shobu, and gradings. People weren't really prepared for the speed of ippon shobu, and that was embarrassing, or at least I thought so. The Japanese sensei in general, and Hirakawa-sensei in particular, should not have had to work so hard on getting people to put on their men and go to the shiaijo. On the other hand, it was really hard to follow the results because of the speed, so I have some sympathy for the competitors.

I was the only person grading in iaido, and I was slightly uncomfortable when I realized that I was going to grade all by myself in front of all these people. However, the grading went fine, with not too many mistakes, and people I had hardly seen before congratulated me everywhere I went for the rest of the day. That was nice. ^^

I was also REALLY honored to have Soejima-sensei, hachidan hanshi, telling me personally about what I need to work with and what he thought of the grading. Just having his name in kanji on the "diploma" is an honor, really.

I could rant about this forever, but here are some things which Soejima and some of the other sensei pointed out:
Make a nukitsuki that uses more space.
Make sure the strike in tsukaate is really towards the suigetsu, I was aiming more for the stomach, kind of thing.
Make sure that the blade is slightly diagonal after kesagiri kirioroshi (as in not vertical).
Make sure to actually sit in seiza before beginning torei (meaning hands on thighs!).
Tie the sageo above the sword instead of below it. This is something I find to be a lot more diffult, and Soejima didn't comment on it, but another sensei did, so I will work on it. I want to at least be equally comfortable with both ways.

Soejima-sensei was also trying to comment on timing and speed, but the interpreter had some trouble translating what he said because she was kendoka, and not iaidoka. I think he was trying to say that I should slow down, relax and make the differences in speed more apparent.

Kendo banzai!

2005-07-10T22:21:00.000+02:00

My motivation for kendo seems to be returning. Yay! A few pointers for myself from today's practice...

...flatter angle in men & kote; don't come too close for do in kote-do; don't straighten up until the very end in kata #1 as uchidachi...

...I really am too tired to do this right now, but I need to start writing things down from kendo as well.

Lazy blogger

2005-07-07T23:28:00.000+02:00

Yup, that would be me. Haven't been posting much lately, now have I... Well, it's not entirely out of lazyness. At first it was because of things like midsummer and visiting the parents and things like that. No training, in other words. Lately, though, I've just been lazy. And now that I noticed that Amersfoort-sensei commented on my blog I have to shape up. ;)

Anyway...there's been another training camp, this time here in Linköping with Mike Henry-sensei. Mike is coaching the Swedish national team this year, and as I am aspiring I of course hade to attend this camp. Not that I would have missed it if things were different. The camp was great, very basic (just what I need(ed) right now!), but it's already Thursday, and really a little late to try and remember everything.

Just some very basic things: I need to work a lot with my grip/kamae, should use the bony part of the hand more; need to work more with lower arms and less with wrists when cutting, and also think a little more forward and a little less down; must grip more from side in nukitsuki; work with lower part of arm in chiburi; generally use tanden more.

Apart from that I got some very basic points on how to do kesagiri and soetetsuki (pretty much things that René talked about as well, but that I had already forgotten >_< ). Must. Remember.

In other news, I trained kendo tonight for the first time in ages. There were only four of us (quite good as it's summer...), it was hot like crazy and my kendo is worse than ever due to severe neglect. But I had fun! :D My kamae still sucks (se above ;) ) and my brain still shuts down temporarily during keiko (all of it), but I had fun. I really must make sure to have time for kendo this coming semester.

It's all about the monouchi

2005-06-10T21:57:00.000+02:00

The first day of practice with Amersfoort-sensei is over, and I should try to write down some points. I am still so confused, though, that I am not sure if I will be able to get anything useful out of my head. On top of that, my body is hurting. I am already longing for tomorrow. ;)

We used a lot of time to practise proper cutting. I realised that it is really all about the monouchi, much more than I have understood before. The monouchi should actually move before the hands, although this seems almost impossible to me. Amersfoort showed me how by holding my wrist and telling me to move the monouchi without moving my arms, but still it was terribly difficult. This is something I really need to practise.Along with this is the idea of a short, sharp sound above the opponents head.

We did a lot of fun and exhausting exercises, which are difficult to write down, but which I will try to remember (with the help of Hannes of course) and use in my own training and during the summer practice, at least. I think my favourite was one where we started on our knees, with one knee forward (as in mae), then turned around, took a step forward and cut while sinking down again. As I said...these things are hard to put down in writing.

About kata practice...I don't know where to start, but I'll try to sort through the chaos in my mind.

General points: flow, timing, no hesitation!, relax! (relaxed muscles move faster). Use wrist as brake in o-chiburi, NOT elbow.

Mae - step and cut in that order, not exactly at the same time; timing in o-chiburi: slow, slow, double speed; timing in nôto: 2, 5, 3; saya-biki, saya-biki, saya-biki; make sure to start the draw as soon as the left hand is in place.

Ushiro - don't think about turning, think about moving the left hand.

Ukenagashi - tsukagashira should be out of center; there is not a lot of time to do the block; relax between the block and the cut.

Tsukaate - move the body, not the elbows; let the body show when the kata is finished; timing: fight or no fight?

Kesagiri - tsukagashira threats opponent before sword is turned; avoid being too straight in hasso no kamae.

Morotetsuki - ki ken tai ichi (not a problem?), no hesitation!!!

Sanpogiri - "straighten" back foot in first cut, think about "the box".

Ganmenate - turn quickly.

Soetetsuki - walk straight, then turn (no half-turning in walking); move right hand in one movement to the "wiping phase".

Shihogiri - think of it as a little bit of everything.

Sougiri - block!; make separate cuts, don't just swoosh the sword around; first cut to chin, third cut to navel.

Nuki-uchi: be careful!; time left hand and left foot; think kendo.

And whoever reads this...please remembers that these are just my confused notes to help me remember my own practice, and not intended for anyone else to use as answers. It's all just my interpretation and memories.

Summer practice

2005-06-08T10:02:00.000+02:00

The semester is over, and yesterday was the first day of summer practice. Tuesdays mean iaido, but as we were only three people there, and as Hannes and I will miss kendo practice on Sunday, we ended with some well-needed uchikomi and kirikaeshi. I have major problems with my footwork in attacks, there is no timing and also there is the tendency to jump. I need to practise this alot alot alot!

Iaido was just plain overall crappy. Nothing really worked. The problem of letting the left hand cheat and return more to the saya than to the belt area is still there and needs special focusing on.

Back to kendo

2005-06-06T09:47:00.000+02:00

Yesterday was my first real kendo practice for a really long time (the lazy kata time doesn't really count). It was more of a playing session than a learning one, though, and I had so much fun! Of course a month away from more or less any form of physical exercise makes kendo a really sweaty business, which didn't matter as much as the fact that I have become even slower than I was before. Crap!

Anyways, we played a little with a few soft balls and did some suburi for warm-up (and why can't I throw a ball properly?). After that, some kirikaeshi (no good!), then jigeiko (even worse!). Markus pointed out to me that when I strike men on people taller than myself (everyone, that is) I tend to jump. I tried to think about this during jigeiko and realized that somehow I manage to use my right foot to move forward instead of my left. Don't ask me how as I don't understand this myself.

Then, during the last 45 minutes or so we had a game of balloon kendo. I suck at this too, of course, but it was fuuuuun. Derka derka!

Swedish Championships

2005-05-30T18:16:00.000+02:00

Swedish Championships in iaido was this Saturday. My goal this year was to win one match, but I ended up winning three. Obviously, I'm really happy with this. I was even close to getting a medal as I lost in the quarter finals. ^^

In the team competition I was in my club's all girls team (actually, we're the only club with enough girls to have one). We didn't win anything, but I think we had fun anyway.

After the championships there was some time for grading, but I decided that very morning to not grade for shodan. Instead I will wait, and aspire for the national team. I don't know if it's all that realistic to hope for though, as some people that I lost against are also aspiring...

Well...not much to write down as the things one learn at competitions is mostly related to handling stress and thinking in the right way, although I do need to practise these things.

Also, I overheard Momiyama-sensei correcting shômen ni rei to some people, and I realized I am making the same mistake. I have already started changing this, but I also need to tell the others here in Linköping about it (it being that hands should be shifted at the side and not in front of the centre).

Nice n00bs

2005-05-25T23:56:00.000+02:00

Not much to put down in writing tonight, as I haven't been practising myself, only guiding the newbies. And I have to admit they are starting to really get the hang of it. It's too bad that they only have one session a week and have only had half a semester...but still! I'm impressed of what they have grasped in just the last two or three weeks.

Off to bed!

Last night's practice

2005-05-25T13:34:00.000+02:00

There were actually a whole bunch of as at practice last night. Well, we were three, but I guess "bunch" is sort of relative... This was a good thing for me, as I have been feeling lately that I practise better with people around. It seems I need the social part of it all to make it work.

I focused a lot on metsuke and could feel that it made a difference. I'm not finished yet, but I'm improving. ^^

I'm getting used to the weight of my bokken now, which is real good. I even tried doing a few hayasuburi, but they don't work when doing them alone and without kiai. Jogeburi on the other hand work better than they have in a long, long time.

Horizontality in kiritsuke was quite good when standing, but in the seiza and iaihiza no bu I have a tendency of cutting too deep, even though I've hardly ever done koryu. I can't wait until the full day of MSR practice with Amerfoort-sensei in June. After that, at least I will have an excuse. ;)

Over all, everything work better than the day before, which was nice of course. There are a few more things I have discovered though. One is that I have started making a face when cutting. It doesn't happen all the time, but is bad enough when it does. I think this comes from kendo, actually, but I have had this problem before when trying to breathe out through my mouth. That means the breathing will have to wait till after the championships. The face-thing needs to go away this week. I have also noticed that my left hand cheats during chiburi: when it should be going all the way back to the obi, it lands sort of on the saya. Bad, bad habit. This I will also try to get rid of this week.

And, of course, better metsuke.

Why karateka shouldn't sweat so much

2005-05-23T22:15:00.000+02:00

I had forgotten all about practise today until someone asked me about it. I'm really thankful for that question, as I really needed to practise, but sadly the person asking didn't show up. That meant it was just Hannes and I, which of course is better than the times I'm there alone. ;)

Overall, it was a good session. My throat is aching, as I did some bad kiai during warm-up (mainly to scare off the karateka of course ;) ), but other than that...no huge mistakes. Or, well... The thing is our dojo is equipped with an officially crappy floor. I don't like blaming every mistake I make on this, but today the karate class that has the session before us had been sweating a whole lot, which meant the floor was even stickier than usual. This in turn, meant that sliding gracefully across the floor was absolutely impossible.

Anyway...my bokken suburi worked out a lot better than they did Saturday. I did focus a little extra on my kiritsuke and I felt that it made a difference. Also metsuke worked rather well, but only when I think about it. :/ To ni rei was a little so-so...again.

The things that need more work this week:

metsuke - eyes mustn't follow the sword through kiritsuki even if I'm concentrated on something else

kiritsuke - works fine, but I need to actually *know* that it does

footwork - will see if I can steel a corner of the training hall at kendo practice tomorrow

to ni rei - mainly the sageo is causing trouble

A little bit of kendo

2005-05-22T02:13:00.000+02:00

There was supposed to be a kendo seminar here in Linköping this weekend, but unfortunately the invited sensei got ill just a fews days before, and it all had to be cancelled. This of course meant that we had a lot of people with a lot of time on their hands and we had paid for some time in a training hall. What did we do? Of course we had some practise.

Today was hence lazy-kata-practice-day. I didn't do any kendo kata, but I did try some bokuto kihon bla-bla. First kendo I have done for a looong time but it was kind of nice. Didn't go well, but was fun. Better than the other way around. ;)

As the others continued with kendo kata, I switched to iaito and did iaido kata. Tried to start by doing reiho, then five kata in a row, then reiho...a little like shinsa/shiai as the Swedish Championships are coming up. Didn't get to the finishing reiho before people started asking questions, but no harm done really. I was rather in a more social mood anyway. ;) Because of this, not much did get done.

I feel that I need to do more suburi with my bokken, as I have to get used to it's weight, which is close to zero. I also need to practise my kiritsuki as I have become a little lazy when it comes to dai (as in Dai Kyo Soku Kei) and horizontality. It seems a little late to start doing any important changes in the kata, but to ni rei still needs polishing. Also metsuki and speed need to be focused on.

Inspiration

2005-05-19T15:28:00.000+02:00

Wow, this is something I thought I would never do, getting a blog at some blog service. However, over the last few days I have discovered a lot of kendo blogs...and I was inspired! Considering that I am usually too lazy to take notes on my training these days, maybe a blog will do me good. We'll see!