HOPE YOU ENJOYED YOUR SUMMER!

I had the thrill of a lifetime this June when I had the honor and great pleasure of receiving sensei Kimo Wall at the dojo and having lunch with him. Look him up on Wikipedia.

WHAT HAPPENED IN MAY:

Sam Wykoff became a dad! Just in time for Father’s Day! Sam and Chizuru are the proud parents of the lovely Yuki, born last May. They are currently spending the summer back home in NJ (from Kobe, Japan) and Sam is training with us again for a few weeks. Welcome back, Sam, and congratulations!

WHAT HAPPENED IN JUNE: KIMO WALL SENSEI’S VISIT, JUNE 19.

When I was in Okinawa last year, I met a student of Kimo Wall sensei’s. He alerted me to Wall sensei’s connection and the Boston Kodokan dojo. That’s how I came to invite the two instructors from there, Fred Lohse and David Nauss to come train with Kurashita sensei during the latter’s visit last March.

Wall sensei himself e-mailed me several times and lately mentioned he was going to pass through New Jersey on his way back from a seminar in Washington, D.C., and wanted to have lunch with me.

We met June 19 at noon at the Asian Arts Center. Now in his early sixties, Wall sensei was thinner than the person I had seen in many photographs; cooly clad in khakis and a summery short-sleeved Hawaiian shirt, he was very sweet and genuinely appreciative of our Goju dojo and marveled at its spirit. Me, I was in awe at being in the presence of this legend! Here’s his brief biography and my interview of him over lunch:

William James “Kimo” Wall was born in Hawaii in 1943. “Kimo” is the Hawaiian equivalent of “Jim.” As a youth in Hawaii, he studied Goju-ryu with an instructor who came from Itoman, Okinawa, and had trained under Seko Higa sensei. When he joined the Marines in 1961 and was going to be stationed in Okinawa, he brought his teacher’s letter of introduction to Seko Higa. Even though he was already a black belt at the time, out of courtesy, he trained as a white belt at Higa’s Itoman dojo. The dojo was tiny and located in the middle of a field; a small dirt road led to it. The place was shared by Higa (whose house was in the back of the dojo) and Mateyoshi Shinpo sensei, the famed kobudo master. Higa worked during the day but Mateyoshi, being a wealthy man, didn’t, and lived in the front area of the dojo.

Wall sensei brought his letter of introduction and was received very warmly by Higa sensei. He came to train regularly at 7:00 p.m., a class which consisted of beginners and shodans. After a while, Higa told him he could put his black belt back on and invited him to train in the 9:00 p.m. class with the more advanced group. Wall thought that meant he could dispense with the 7:00 p.m. class but Higa told him to go to both. It was a much rougher class, much more physical, with a lot of strengthening and conditioning done, peopled by nidans, sandans and above, and taught by the likes of Takamine and Kina Seko senseis.

They told him, “You’re a Marine; you can take it!” Sometimes those classes would stretch late into the night and Wall just slept at the dojo.

About encountering Mateyoshi sensei: when Wall first came to the Itoman dojo and met Mateyoshi sensei, he didn’t know who he was. He thought the latter was some employee there and struck a casual conversation with him. As it turned out, Mateyoshi sensei invited Wall to train kobudo with him. He taught there in the morning, since Higa used the dojo in the evening. Not all of Higa’s students studied kobudo with Mateyoshi sensei since many of them had started some form of kobudo training before Mateyoshi established himself there (being away in mainland Japan, teaching), and simply could not switch over. So there was another lifelong relationship Wall sensei developed with Mateyoshi sensei and his family.

Wall sensei returned to Okinawa on his many tours of duty. The first time, he didn’t have a car and only rode a bike to the dojo. Later, after his promotion to Sergeant, he was equipped with a vehicle and rented an apartment near the dojo for convenience. He also drove Higa sensei around, acting as his personal chauffeur. To supplement his income, he worked at the docks, loading ships. One day, his instructor, Takamine sensei, came to visit him at work. His boss saw the two of them engaged in conversation. Later, he asked Wall: “Do you know who that was? That was Takamine sensei!” Wall replied, “I know; he’s my sensei.” Deeply impressed, his boss repeatedly bowed to him and the crew later kept asking him to show them some karate (many Okinawans don’t know karate but have a very deep respect for the senseis.)

Wall sensei also helped Mr.Nakasone found the famous martial arts uniform and equipment company, Shureido. Mr. Nakasone knew every karate instructor on Okinawa, near or far.

About the difference in kata performance between dojos and individuals: There are many factors that enter the equation when it comes to discerning kata performance and who decides how and in what order Goju katas are performed. First, we have to consider the fact that there was a pre-WWII Goju-ryu and a post-WWII Goju-ryu. Miyagi sensei did modify some katas after the war to make them more accessible. Pre-war Goju-ryu was closer to the original. Secondly, Miyagi sensei just did not teach the entire syllabus to everybody; many learned only a few katas, then later learned the rest from their peers. At the same time, Miyagi sensei taught different people differently, depending on their size, body type, ability, and availability. As an example of the last condition, Wall sensei mentioned one of his instructors, Kina Seko sensei: this man was vastly underestimated because of his hare lip and subsequent inability to express himself clearly. However, he was always at Miyagi’s dojo doing menial work and was taught some special Sanchin techniques that other senseis are not privy to.

In addition, when federations were organized, certain chief instructors decided on the order of the katas depending on their assumption of Miyagi sensei’s predilective preference. Consequently, there is a disparity today between the Goju-ryu lines concerning the katas that come after Shisochin and before Suparempi.

[In 1981 Wall sensei taught for the Phys Ed department at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst; he also opened a Goju club there and has many students who today pepper the MA-MD area. He founded the Kodokan dojo in Cambridge, MA, in honor of Mateyoshi sensei; he and his students founded schools in Puerto Rico, NY, Guatemala, and California. He learned Thai massage while in Chiangmai, Thailand, and incorporates it into his karate and kobudo teaching at his dojo in Panajachel, Guatemala, where he currently resides.]

WHAT HAPPENED IN JULY: Michael Boasso became a dad! Little Cassidy is the proud daughter of a new father! Congratulations to the Boasso family!

WHAT HAPPENED IN AUGUST: THE AAC THIRD ANNUAL JUNIOR KARATE SUMMER CAMP, AUG 14-18: With ten campers evenly distributed (five boys and five girls) our summer camp was off to a great start and we had fun all the way! Thanks to the invaluable help of Samantha Bahia from the Kobudo class, the students learned bojitsu and saijitsu and did their katas quite nicely at Friday’s mini-tournament. It was quite impressive. The following are gold medal winners in various categories: Obi-tying contest: Lillian Silver; Advanced kata (3-stripers and color belts): Ben Amoreno; Advanced sparring: Olivia Haveron; Beginners’ kata (2-stripers and below): Anthony Bartley; Beginners’ sparring: Anthony Bartley; Kobudo-bojitsu: Lillian Silver; Kobudo-saijitsu: Noah Lebovitz; Camp’s Most Helpful: Maria Pepper; Camp’s Best Listener: Gale Lyon; and Camp’s Most Improved: Jonathan Bartley. Thanks also to Mr. And Mrs. Lyon for bringing in snacks and juice to the pizza party!

WHAT’S HAPPENING IN OCTOBER: OSHIRO SENSEI’S YAMANNI-RYU SEMINAR, SATURDAY, OCT 28: Oshiro sensei will be hosted by sensei Cleve Baxter of the Bronx at his annual seminar/tournament in Queens. The seminar will take place at the Royal Regency Hotel in Yonkers.

WHAT’S HAPPENING IN NOVEMBER: THE FIRST INTERNATIONAL YAMANNI-RYU TOURNAMENT IN TOKYO, JAPAN, NOV 5: The very first international Yamanni-ryu tournament! Competitors from Germany, France, the Czech Republic, the United States, and the host nation, Japan, will get to show the world for the first time what Yamanni-ryu is like.

THANKSGIVING: The dojo will be closed for Thanksgiving, Thursday, Nov 23. Happy Thanksgiving!

WHAT’S HAPPENING IN DECEMBER: The dojo will be closed for Christmas vacation, Monday, Dec 25 and also New Year’s Day, Monday, Jan 1, 2007. Happy New Year!

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

MY TWENTIETH ANNIVERSARY WITH YAMANNI-RYU

by Tran sensei

I first met Oshiro Toshihiro sensei October 26, 1986. I was invited to his seminar in Queens, NY, when he was hosted by Miyazaki Toyotaro sensei, the best known Shotokan instructor on the East Coast. My then chiropractor, who was a third degree black belt student of Miyazaki’s, aware of my lifelong interest in Okinawan kobudo, had proffered the invitation.

At that time, I was no stranger to kobudo. I had been studying (if such was the word) the popular Shinken Taira style, the Mateyoshi style, and even the Shorinkan Shorin-ryu style from various instructors who had trained in Okinawa, first-hand or second-hand. Let me clarify the aside concerning the use of the word “studying”: I, along with many others, were conscious only of learning kobudo katas. If you learned (or, rather, collected) a number of katas specific to a particular style, you were said to “know” that style or “do” that style. The more katas you “learned” or accumulated, the higher in status you were in regard to that system of kobudo. Since there were no authentic teacher of those styles or no true affiliations, nobody acquired any kobudo ranking; people simply transferred their karate ranks to their kobudo training. It was an umbrella rank; all a black belt had to do was practice a bo or sai kata and, presto! He was imminently also a kobudo black belt. Mostly, practicing kobudo was more like doing karate with weapons in your hands. Such was my experience at the time, before I stepped into the presence of Oshiro sensei.

I had never heard of Yamanni-ryu before, only from what my chiropractor told me and he assured me it wasn’t like anything I’d ever seen. He also made sure I brought a cylindrical bo, not a tapered one.

When Oshiro sensei walked into the gym where the seminar was taking place, I was more than a little shocked and disappointed: he didn’t wear a full gi, only his gi pants with a T-shirt over it. For a moment, I panicked and thought maybe he wasn’t an authentic teacher. How could he be so casual?

All my apprehension vanished when he whipped out his bo and did magic with it: he made it sing and moved it the way I’ve never seen anybody swing a bo before! Not only that, he actually taught how to hold it and how to move it. He also made it a point to debunk the long held myth that Okinawan kobudo was created by farmers and peasants who used their readily available farm implements to defend themselves against the oppressive Japanese Satsuma samurai. Instead, he made it clear it was the Okinawan aristocrats–the bushi, or warrior class–who originated the traditions. In the mists of time, Yamanni-ryu can trace its roots back to the legendary Sakugawa who passed the tradition on to the Chinen family, where Masami Chinen named it after his grandfather, Sanda “Yamanni” Chinen. Strictly speaking, Yamanni-ryu is a bojutsu; it’s also known as Yamanni-Chinen-ryu or sometimes called Chinen-no-bo.

I learned Yamanni-ryu’s first classical kata that day: Suuji-no-kon. It was short but very difficult (so difficult, in fact, that twenty years later, I am still learning it.) Of course, with my experience at the time, I could not appreciate just how difficult it actually was. In my mind, I “learned” a Yamanni bo kata and was “doing” Yamanni-ryu. I also “learned” a sai kata: Kyan-no-sai. Kyan-no-sai was not a classical Yamanni kata, only an introductory one that Oshiro sensei had altered from an existing Okinawan kata–subject, of course, to his teacher (Kishaba sensei)’s prior approval. Kyan-no-sai is a long kata and also difficult. What I didn’t know then was that I still could not swing the sai proficiently enough yet.

Oshiro sensei was a man of few words; he only gave curt answers when asked about Yamanni-ryu. However, I was deeply impressed with my introduction to this unknown and wonderful art, the parent style of the other systems.

I decided to restart my kobudo career from scratch and discarded (deleted from my memory) all my other styles’s katas and only practiced the Yamanni ones I was taught, to my then dojo business partner’s dismay.

The following year, I returned for another seminar and learned the advanced version of Suuji-no-kon together with an intermediate kata, Ryubi-no-kon (this one, like Kyan-no-sai, also is not a classical Yamanni kata, but a modified one from an existing Okinawan form). In saijutsu, I learned the complicated Kishaba-no-sai.

I would have been very happy just showing up at these annual seminars had it not been for a disastrous (but eventually fortuitous as it turned out) decision on Miyazaki sensei’s part to stop bringing Oshiro sensei over. I did not know the reason for this at the time but suddenly I found myself stranded, so to speak, with no way of continuing my Yamanni-ryu education. So I did the only logical thing: I decided to take matters into my own hands and invited Oshiro sensei himself to New Jersey and teach his seminars at my behest.

In 1992, at the first (and only) Ozawa tournament held on the East Coast in Pittsburgh, I saw Oshiro sensei again, this time with his friend, Nishime Kiyoshi sensei from Cincinnati. I learned that Nishime sensei was the Mid-West Director of the Yamanni federation, the Ryukyu Bujutsu Kenkyu Doyukai, or RBKD for short. At the tournament, I performed Kishaba-no-sai. I didn’t place, but after the competition, Oshiro sensei said something very cryptical to me: “I have to teach you how to swing the sai.” I mulled that over and over. What does he mean, “teach me how to swing the sai”? Don’t I already know how? How could I do the kata if I didn’t know how??

In the fall of that year, Oshiro sensei took his first trip to New Jersey. Then, in the privacy of my dojo, he really taught me. I never knew before what it meant to learn kobudo from a master, privately. Oshiro sensei emphasized to me, “There’s a difference between seminar learning and personal learning.” Everything I thought I knew about bo, sai, kata, was gone in a flash. Deep humility set in, however with a tinge of hope: Oshiro sensei also revealed to me that the only reason he was actually teaching me in this manner was because I had the ability to pick up Yamanni-ryu.

I was invited to join the RBKD and eventually gained rank in Yamanni-ryu. I will always remember an article I saw in Black Belt Magazine about a system of kobudo written by a lady instructor, hostess to her Okinawan sensei. I remember her fierce eyes filled with the pride of knowing something that other American martial artists didn’t. Mostly I remember her rank: nidan in her style of kobudo. I thought to myself, “I will be higher ranked and even greater.”

Over the next many years, I immersed myself in Yamanni-ryu; I brought Oshiro sensei to the East Coast twice a year and traveled to his dojo in California twice a year as well. At one point he held his West Coast seminars at his Chico dojo. Chico is 80 miles north of Sacramento and the site of the 1938 filming of Robin Hood, starring Errol Flynn. The dojo was a modified warehouse. It was cavernous and located in an industrial park. Today, Oshiro sensei no longer runs it but concentrates his efforts instead on his dojo in San Mateo (which was moved from its original location in Redwood City). His seminars took place in the Japanese Community Center in San Francisco, in the heart of Japantown.

On many of those occasions, it was Sensei’s habit of demonstrating an advanced kata, just to whet our appetite, I guess. One of my favorites was Yonegawa, a left-handed form. This particular bo kata was done entirely from the left side. Needless to say, I always left the seminar with a deep sense of awe and the feeling that Yamanni-ryu was this bottomless ocean which I will never be able to explore completely. There are many advanced katas I still have not seen.

One of my greatest thrills was when Oshiro sensei’s teacher, Kishaba Chogi sensei, came to visit in 1994. A small man with a very proud bearing, Kishaba sensei was an inveterate smoker. When I went to meet him, I was told to bring a carton of Virginia Slims as a gift. He had trained in Goju-ryu with Miyagi sensei himself in his youth and was the recipient of the Chinen family’s tradition of Yamanni-ryu. A very classical man, he would have let the art die had he never met Oshiro sensei, who became his premier student–and his successor, as I see it.

On this occasion, Kishaba sensei brought over two katas he had created at the request of the Governor of Okinawa: Choun-no-kon sho and dai; these beginner katas would facilitate learning by newcomers. He also brought an advanced sai kata called Tokubetsu-kihon (“Special basics”) which, Oshiro sensei swears, is a blur in his hands–even when captured on video.

Oshiro sensei has told me so many stories of how he had met and trained with Kishaba sensei, the brother of his karate teacher, Chokei Kishaba; how he was told not to return to class unless he had practiced the previous lesson on his own; how he learned Sakugawa-no-kon in the darkness, listening to Kishaba sensei’s whistling bo; how he was shown something only once and expected to remember; and how he tricked Kishaba sensei into teaching him the sai, which consisted of only one swing, one lesson. Every time I hear these stories, I am reminded of the Confucian parable: if you’re shown one of a table’s legs, you must be able to complete the entire table.

Oh, did I mention the time when he snapped his bo in three pieces (just by swinging it at blinding speed) at a demonstration in Panama? The bo was a special one that Kishaba sensei had given him prior to his departure for the States.

That’s why I am persuaded that Oshiro sensei is no ordinary martial artist, but belongs in the genius category. Many high-ranking instructors, both Japanese and American, seem to agree with me and seek him out to study with him. Not just his amazing skills in kobudo, but also his peerless Shorin-ryu karate. Many students at the Asian Arts Center can attest to the efficacy of his “soft punch”.

Not to be overlooked or underestimated is Nishime sensei from Cincinnati. Although a kohai to Oshiro sensei, he is his equal in many regards and his closest friend. When the two of them get together, it’s like two high school kids exchanging pranks. Nishime sensei has been invited to the East Coast on various occasions by prominent instructors who thought they’d give Yamanni-ryu a try. I came to those seminars to lend my support. Yamanni-ryu proved too much for those people. They dropped it like a hot potato.

Very sweet and affable in public, Oshiro sensei is very demanding in private. When he says, “Follow me”--as his teacher had told him countless times before--and I have difficulty doing so, he gets quite annoyed. This is typical Asian behavior on a teacher’s part. There’s a very high level of expectation and his patience is quite thin in those circumstances. He would growl at me, “What’s the matter with you? Why can’t you do this?” I have to summon all my personal genial ability to comply. Later, he would compliment me, “You learned this kata in only a half-hour; that’s pretty good!”

Oshiro sensei is a stickler for elegance. To him, not only does the art have to convey elegance (because it’s an aristocratic art) but also the practitioners’ bearing and outfit. Even the badge he chose conveys that sense of elegance: not wanting to display sai or any weapon on his patch, Oshiro sensei went back to Kishaba sensei and asked him for his kamon (family crest). This mon became the RBKD’s patch.

Over the years, I learned how to stand, how to squat, how to move; Oshiro sensei’s teaching is quite Zen-like: “walk without walking; turn without turning; don’t use your legs; fold like paper...” I’d squeeze against a wall, slinky fashion, or turn around like a zipper. I learned to slide, monorail-like, in moto-dachi, matching seichusen with embusen, how to do (or not do) tame, never be itsuku, how to kawaru instead of mawaru, how to use te-no-uchi, and the difference between ura and omote teachings.

Oshiro sensei came to the USA in 1979, when he replaced a deceased sempai. He never breathed a word about Yamanni-ryu for the next five years. Then, one day, at a tournament, he performed a demonstration of Yamanni-ryu, revealing it to an American audience for the first time. Lightning had struck and the American kobudo world was never the same again. Many prominent Japanese kobudo teachers stopped teaching and never gave a demonstration again when they were in Oshiro sensei’s presence. They simply deferred to him. This was something Sensei did not expect to happen and after searching his soul for a long time, decided to stop appearing in public in order for the other senseis to return to the fore. The reasoning was that those other instructors had been here first and had paved the way for Okinawan kobudo; therefore it was only proper to let them continue their work. As a relatively late comer, Oshiro sensei would take a back seat.

A complex man, Oshiro sensei would speak his mind freely, making him quite unpopular with many martial artists; and yet he is very humble about himself. One day, as I was driving him past a golf course, and knowing Japanese people’s fondness for golf, I asked him, “Do you play golf, Sensei?” His response startled me: “I can’t even swing a bo yet; how can I find the time to play golf?” I made a mental note never to mention to anybody that I could swing a bo.

Oshiro sensei was always plagued by the fact that Yamanni-ryu was so difficult for people to learn; he always bemoaned the fact that the art was not as popular as other styles because it was so hard. “But”, he complained to me, “I cannot make it any simpler. I have already made it as simple as possible. Any simpler and it won’t be Yamanni-ryu anymore!” Once he told me he had spent two hours teaching Suuji-no-kon to a group at a seminar, then asked them if they’ve got it. Upon their affirmative answer, he asked them to begin the kata. They just stood frozen because they could not remember how to even start the kata! Because of such incidents, he endeavored to create two katas for neophytes: Do-nyu-no-kon ichi and ni.

Similarly, in saijutsu, he deemed Kyan-no-sai too hard for beginners to approach so, over time, he developed the (originally called) Shimabukuro-no-sai ichi and ni. They became known simply as Kihon kata ichi and ni. Recently, he added an intermediate kata, Nakan-dakari-no-sai in honor of one of his early teachers, Nakamura sensei, I presume.

In1995, probably after deliberating with Kishaba sensei after the latter’s US visit, Oshiro sensei introduced shiai kumibo (tournament-style bo sparring), borrowing from kendo its equipment and techniques. He fashioned a shiai-yo-bo (bo for competition sparring) from a shinai and an aluminum shaft. He introduced the concept at his Chico dojo, demonstrating techniques with his wife, using a kendo bogu (armor). Mrs. Tomoko Oshiro is just as formidable as her husband, being a world-renowned teacher of Okinawan dance, with the title of shihan, and a naginata practitioner. Sensei’s idea was to introduce this form of sparring at tournaments and thus make Yamanni-ryu more noticeable; however, I think the concept and the training was too difficult (not to mention the expense for kendo equipment) and the whole notion has remained on the back burner.

Oshiro sensei is at his funniest when he regales us with tales of his rascally youth in Okinawa and the many anecdotes about his friends’ sorties and misadventures. The funniest story he told me was when he was once introduced at a tournament as “Sensei Oshiro’s husband!” taking a back seat to his famous wife. Mrs. Oshiro once laughed at how ridiculously cheap karate uniforms are, compared to the tens of thousands of dollars her students have to spend on their dance kimonos (which they have to make themselves!)

Oshiro sensei is a wealth of information and knows everybody back home. That’s how he came to provide me with an introduction to Kurashita sensei. I will always be grateful to him for that gesture. But more than that, to me, he will always be the Man Who Learned A Kata In The Dark Listening To The Whistling Of His Master’s Bo.

NOTE: You can read my interview of Oshiro sensei on his website, www.oshirodojo.com.

If you want to see him in action, buy his DVDs: YAMANNI-RYU and UCHINADI vol. 1 & 2 (in volume 2, you can see him demonstrate Kyan-no-sai, albeit an altered version, for special reasons.)

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

WORDS TO LIVE BY:

–“The clarification of the goal belongs at the beginning, for it is this which will determine the outcome.

“The peace of God is my one goal; the aim of all my living here, the end I seek, my purpose and my function and my life, while I abide where I am not at home.

–“I am responsible for what I see. I choose the feelings I experience, and I decide upon the goal I would achieve. And everything that seems to happen to me I ask for and receive as I have asked.”

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

RECOMMENDED READING:

GIFTS FROM A COURSE IN MIRACLES, edited by Frances Vaughn and Roger Walsh, published by the Foundation for Inner Peace, 1988. This is a compendium of important quotes and messages from A Course in Miracles, a compact form of it. Usually, when I travel, I carry with me The Buddha Speaks (by Anne Bancroft; a compilation of the Buddha’s quotes from his sutras). A Course in Miracles, being too thick, is not easily transportable; now this compact form will be ideal. Do you remember questions people used to ask you, like, “What book would you take with you if you were stranded on a desert island”, or something like that? Well, for me, it’s these two.


The very successful Asian Arts Center Junior Karate Summer Camp 2006!