Emh :)

I’ve split the post into 3 parts. Mainly to save some of you from having to read about Aikido if there is none interest, but still make you read the other part. First is this part, which is stuff general. Then there is Aikido, followed about some funny stuff about a place in Japan called Obama. (Just to mention it I passed the grading.)

 

My knee haven’t really gotten any better, in some sort of way, might even say worse. I hope its soon better tho. I just hope I don’t need to take a break from Aikido. Beside this life is okay. I’m not doing fine, but neither am I doing bad, haha, which is a good thing. I’ve had these part my entire life where its as if everything is stagnant and it feels empty and strange, but luckily  feeling this way is fine now. I sort of except it. Earlier in life, feeling this way always made me sad, lost hope and what not. I can even smile now by thinking how much better this is than what it used to be like.

A bad news for me is that I looked over my budget and figured out that I’m in serious trouble concerning the Japan trip. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still going, and most likely there is not much that could change this. I already paid the plane ticket and I can’t refund it, so I’m going, and even if I could refund it I wouldn’t. Chances are I’ll have problems when it comes to where to sleep. But as long as there is not any heavy rain I can sleep outside, haha. Or I could pimp my self out getting paid in roof over my head. I’m not genuinely afraid about this, but I really see that there might be a problem. I still have to pay the rest of the language school, the JR pass and the vaccines, this I guess will be okay, but I also have to earn enough for food and hostel for ca 34 days. Any advice any one? Either to make more money, or how to sleep cheap in Japan? I considered CF (coachsurfing)

 

Aikido:

Being graded is pretty much as turning 16/18/20 you don’t always really feel any different right away. But the fact that I graded gave me permission to attend the tuesday class for 6.kyu up. This was great, I loved it. I still haven’t gotten the “relax” part in Aikido tho. The word relax in martial arts isn’t any thing as what western culture puts in the word. We mostly think being relaxed is being boneless on a coach as if close to being in a comatose. In martial arts being relaxed is so different, I can’t even closely explain what it is, since I haven’t really understood all of which it covers yet. But I guess its something close to being in a relaxed state of mind and letting your body relax in terms of letting your shoulders sink down, don’t being rigid and having a strong center (center of balance and mind) and not using unnecessary force or energy when performing any sort of movement. I picture if you would remove all the stress in someone’s mind and body at once the person would “fall” into a perfect stance with the body and center just where it should be, haha. That should be a japanese a commercial where a lot of  stressed business men suddenly ate/drank or heard the product suddenly just dropping the shoulders and just being in a perfect center, maybe doing some smiling ukemi ha.

I haven’t practiced Aikido for long, but long enough to respect and enjoy peoples different approaches. One of the shodan’s at the seminar ( Kim, the instructor of a new dojo in Haugesund) is one of the people I like being tori or uke with. As well as one of my sempais at my own dojo, Bob, he is this amazing person and such a great practitioner  I hope he sees me fit to pass some of his knowledge to, and not just limited to Aikido. There’s is just something really pure with him. And Andrea my sensei, what I absolutely enjoy is his constant flow. He makes Aikido seem so effortless and natural. Its like “what’s the difference from picking up something I dropped and throwing some one attacking me?” It’s as if everything is fluent and natural. And the fun part is, even tho your preforming the same technique with them you get some insight in different directions from all of them, even when they don’t literally say it out loud, but the body and contact says it all.

 

Other matters: Japanese people, you got to love them!!

Obama is now the president of the United States of America, and if you haven’t yet heard, there is a little town in Japan with the name Obama. And of course the inhabitants embraced the name sharing and made (what else) business out of it. I must say the picture on the t-shirts are close to being racist, but I guess its not meant that way at all, ha. Check out these youtube clips to see what I’m talking about.

 

Advertisement

~ by costic on January 23, 2009.