NO.４

Thanks my John.

This story was translated by John Uchikura of my student from Aikinews-magazine vol.140

At the Hombu Dojo

About how many years did you spend at the Kenshyukan?

About 20 years. My sempai at the Kenshyukan were a really remarkable group of people. There were 6 or 7 whom I particularly respected: third and fourth-dans in judo and karate, and even a fourth-dan in sumo. Every day, I used to get thrown against the walls, and get my face rubbed into the tatami mats. The president of the Edogawa Aikido Federation, Ishii Sensei, used to practice with me all the time, and my techniques and movements started to look so much like his that people used to call us kyodai or “brothers”. And after practice was over, I would sit with both of my senseis in the inner tatami room of the dojo, and chat over a cup of tea. I learned a lot from those discussions and have many fond memories from those days.

When I entered university, I joined the university aikido club, but at that time, I was already a second-dan, and I came from a dojo where it went without saying that the sempai were better and stronger than the newcomers. To make a long story short, things didn’t go so well with the university club, and after a while, I wasn’t allowed to practice there (laugh). I was young, and reckless. I’m afraid I must have caused my sempai at the university a lot of trouble.

The instructor at the university club was Nobuyuki Watanabe Sensei, who was from the Hombu Dojo. It was because of him that I decided to practice at the Hombu Dojo. So in May or June of 1966, when I was in my first year of university, I started going to morning practices at the Hombu Dojo.

I practiced with many teachers at the Hombu Dojo, but I especially felt “flow” from the Doshyu at the time, Kisshomaru Sensei, and I felt “Wa” or “harmony” from Kisaburo Ohsawa Sensei. I attended Ohsawa Sensei’s practices for one and a half or two years.

O-Sensei didn’t teach regularly scheduled practices, but during morning practice, he would sometimes appear without warning from behind the sliding door to the left of the tokonoma. He would often call on one of his uchideshi, Shimizu-san, to take ukemi for him, and talk about kotodama, or the power and soul found in words and language. He would then look up at the heavens and whirl a wooden staff around vigorously. O-sensei passed away when I was in my fourth year of university, but I remember him coming to the dojo right up until the final days of his life. I was able to meet many different teachers during the time I went to Hombu Dojo, and because of that, I realized that there were many ways to think about aikido, and that aikido was broad-minded enough to accept all those differences. As a result, the philosophy of aikido appealed to me more than ever.

Finding one’s true ability through teaching

To be continued next