Beginners Class at Goan Gym

Honestly there were no beginners. Not a single one, i think they prefer fridays at the embassy. Ah well, this meant learning normal techniques as opposed to...Anyway, the attack was gyaku-hanmi katate-dori and the techniques were uchi-kaiten nikyo, uchi kaiten yonkyo and soto kaiten sankyo. We finished with morote-dori kokyu-ho. For the first time i kinda had some bit of fun with yonkyo. It was explained that this technique is very rarely taught, mostly due to its complexibility, or boringness? Am not so sure. But it was fun raising up uke's arm and cutting diagonally into their centre. Watching someone fall in a heap like that just sends... down one's...Moving on, mizogi. This is done during special days like Japanese Holidays, or when there is a special need for celebration. The idea is; when practising with someone you now very well, you are uke for like a whole hour, and only one technique is performed for the whole period. with a stranger, the technique is repeated over and over again with constant change in roles. Say, ikkyo omote and ura. You do both versions once, then change with partner, and so on. Sounds like fun.

At Goan Gym

Admittedly, one major problem with me is forgetting too fast. But that is a story for another day. The attack of the day was gyaku-hanmi katate-dori. From this we were able to get into the intricacies of kokyu-nage and shiho-nage. It was not all smooth-sailing though as the hip movement involved, especially in kokyu ho, proved to be quite taxing. All in all, the basics were very clearly laid out for us. Don't stay in the line of attack, it is vital to move off this line; use your hips as much as possible and always keep your hands in front of you; keep contact with uke until he/she is down. Simple,no?

With bokken, we had to start with the basics again, given that it has been quite a while since we last did this. So we did some little bit of kiri-kaeshi and the beginning of ichi-no-tachi. This is to be continued...

Beginners Class at Goan Gym

Essentially we covered 3 techniques; ikkyo, kokyu-ho, and irimi-nage. With Ikkyo, the challenge is in remembering the whole process and not skipping a single step; meet the attack, tai-sabaki and kuzushi. These 3 steps are the toughest but most basic in any martial art. With kokyu-ho, the movement comes from the hips. A common mistake is getting too much carried away with making uke fall and forgetting that you are the one who should make the latter fall,hence the lost contact. We were shown the conditioning excercise for kokyu-ho and it would be best to remember this always. The irimi-nage versions covered were gedan and chudan. I had a problem with the gedan version;my hand always gets entangled in uke's elbow. Talk about self-immobilization...

@ the Embassy 17th June 2011

Considering Daniel has covered the last hour of the class, I'll try and remember what we covered on the first hour.


After the warm-ups, the classes started with ukemi exercises both mae and ushiro in suwariwaza and tachiwaza. But that was the easy part. Two more ukemis were introduced; Gyaku ukemi (left foot forward and roll over your right arm and vice versa) and yoko ukemi (rolling sideways!!)


In yoko ukemi, one is supposed to roll sideways on a straight line, but most of us....no, ALL of us were doing something from "our own worlds", rolling to an angle almost doing mae ukemi. Well didn't work this time, maybe next time.


Next followed shomen uchi ikkyo both ura and omote, not bad, but a little more practice and we will be ready to go!


Finally on the 1st hour we did shomen uchi sumi otoshi whereby tori has to keep arms straight but not stiff and throw uke downwards to his weak spot, the imaginary triangle.

At Embassy

Granted i was very late for class. Again. Friday is just not working for me, is it? Anyway, in the last half that i attended we did gyaku-hanmi katate-dori kokyu-ho, then ryote-dori kokyu-ho (omote and ura) and finally ryokata-dori kokyu-ho (omote and ura). I understand am not the only one with a slight discomfort in the back due to our ukemi on hard floors. Any remedies?

At Goan Gym

Warm-up involved a variation of gyaku-hanmi katate-dori kokyu nage. This was to help in ukemi. We started with a variation of ai-hanmi katate-dori nikyo omote, followed by various techniques from a yokomen-uchi attack;namely nikyo (omote and ura)and sankyo (omote and ura). Then we moved to a shomen-uchi attack and did kata-gatame and sumi-otoshi.
We did not have a weapons class due to some power/electricity hiccups, which forced us to sometimes practise in darkness for upto like 2 minutes or more. Come to think of it, it wasn't so bad. You don't always have to see, sometimes you just move instinctively.

Begginers Class

This is just a follow up of Daniel's post earlier on...
The more one learns (aikido) the more you realize how much you don't know (or maybe it's just me). Ikkyo techniques are some of the basics in Aikido, but after doing them in Suwari-waza, thanks to Daniel for sore knees, I realized just how much more their is to learn, e.g straighten your hands as Tori when performing it or uke will easily turn things around (I learned it the hard way)

The next hour was Shomen-uchi techniques that included kotegaeshi, sankyo, kaiten nage(?) and finally what Sensei described as the most dangerous technique in aikido, Koshi nage, which for obvious reasons (read, lack of tatamis) couldn't be performed to its deadly end.

Next class on Wednesday, boken techniques are back!

Aikido words

I do not have any knowledge,working or otherwise of Japanese.And this,I convince myself is the reason I still have not mastered the names of most of the techniques and stances.
I refuse to believe it has to do with my lack of concentration in class.Most of the time,one joint or other in screaming in pain or am wondering what'll I will have for dinner(Disclaimer-the information here shall not be used against me)
So maybe,a tiny percentage(o.1-9.9%)can be blamed on me,the rest is because I do not know Japanese.
Then I read somewhere that when u write down something,it's harder to forget so I will write and see if this will work.
Common names used in Aikido-Nikio,Ikyo,Kokyo,Rokyo,Yakohami,Aihami,Omote,Ura,Kote nage,Tenkan,Shiho nage,Uke(am assuming Japanese is like Swahili where the how the word is pronounced is the same way it's written)

To be continued...................

Beginners Class

On Monday evening, we had the premier of our beginners classes. As expected, the pace was gentler than normal classes since more emphasis is put on basics. So there was ikkyo. Starting with suwari-waza and followed by tachi-waza, we got to understand a little bit more about shomen-uchi ikkyo omote. The second half of the 2 hour session was spent reviewing what we have been concentrating on for sometime now, namely shomen uchi kote gaeshi, shiho nage, sankyo and rokkyo. Finally, we were introduced to one of the most dangerous aikido techniques of all;koshi nage.
For this wednesday's class, guys were advised to dust their bokkens and come with them.

At Embassy

Despite being very late for class, i was able to learn a thing or two. I must have missed a lot (translated its never good to be late), because several guys had some minor injuries. So there i am full of energy and i realise guys are not so...physical. I move from person to person and its the same story. Only later did i realise what had transpired. Keep it up people. Remember, no pain no gain. So if you got injured, take it as a lesson and use it to grow stronger.
Anyway, the attack was yokomen-uchi, and from this we were able to do shiho-nage, kokyu-ho, kote-gaeshi and rokkyo. Unfortunately with some techniques like these, uke is under much more stress than tori. As uke, if you attack blindly and don't pay attention to what's happening to you, a number of very bad things could happen. Like getting slapped on the face (if tori is being very nice to you).And you thought Aikido was defensive?

At Goan Gym

On Wednesday we practised a number of techniques ranging from ikkyo to rokkyo, and not exactly in order. I believe the point was to get past the surprise/shock one gets as soon as a technique is mentioned. During exam time people are keen on the names of techniques, but this is not so during normal practice sessions. Ever considered that during a real encounter there will be no time to play out the techniques’ name and motion in your mind?
There was no weapons class due to the unavailability of the said weapons. Guys were encouraged to dig out their bokkens since it has been quite a while since we had a bokken class.

Wednesday class

Irimi nage. Hmmm, what to say? An interesting fact about this technique is that several aikidokas have experienced the bitter version of it. Obviously every aikido technique can cause death if executed perfectly. With irimi nage, the class version usually ends up with uke's broken nose, if the latter responds too late. But in Kenya we don't worry about this for obvious reasons. Despite this, sensei tried as much as possible to tune our minds to the idea that uke needs to respond appropriately. This was achieved by tori making uke's life as hard as possible. Uke was slapped in the face if they did not move as instructed. In this way, we were able to practise shomen uchi/ai hanmi irimi nage omote.

Since some of the more experienced aikidokas knew the whole sansho 1, the last session of the class was spent practising this. It was mentioned that the rest is up to us now. Knowing all this stuff is useless if we don't make constant use of it...