Wednesday Class at Goan Gym

I believe if you go to all Birankai dojos, the way they do things is the same because aikido is passed down from the master. So, there is this custom of bowing to the weapon and the sensei before practise. The procedure was explained to us; i never knew why we did it the way we do it. When standing, the sword/bokken is held on the right hand, with the blade facing backwards (to your back). To do the bow, shift it to your left hand, (handle on the left), and hold the weapon horizontally in front of you with outstretched arms. The blade should face you. Then bow. Reason for handle being on the left is so that you cannot use the weapon at short notice. I guess it shows honor, that you are not going to attack at the wrong time.

When sitted there are a few differences but that is for another day.

We went through the first tachi, called ichi no tachi. Apparently there are 7 of them, and if we are lucky, we will get to practise all of them. We also did some conditioning exercises,(the ones from last week), which were quite tricky, but we managed somehow.

For the techniques, we started with ushiro ryotedori shiho nage. pointers included, (1.) the 2 authorised ways for tori to get out of uke's grip. and (2.) the necessity for quick movement to avoid uke counter-attacking. and also (3.) the necessity to not stay in place. It is vital to first move off the line and then forwards. this keeps uke occupied. This was best demonstrated by a conditioning exercise from ushiro ryokatadori, which requires uke to do ukemi over tori's shoulders.
The next technique was yokomenuchi tenchinage. Pointers included tori neutralizing uke's attack by attacking uke's elbow at the moment of uke's attack. Then tori has to keep both hands in front and outstretched, just like in normal ryotedori tenchinage. Another point is that the stike to uke's face is like an upper cut, which means it is an upward movement. It is not a karate punch. This is necessary in order to keep in line with aikido's 'opening' as opposed to 'striking'. (Hope this makes sense).

Ok, at the end of class there was one broken bokken and a few minor injuries, but nothing worth noting. I have seen injuries during iaito class, where people use live blades, so...For what its worth, injuries are never intentional, with a few exceptions as can be expected in life. So if something bad happens to you, take it all in stride and move on. I think.