We didn’t actually get to the kodachi seiho last evening. For one thing we had yet another crop of folks at a Niten class for the first time this year. I’m truly happy at the number of folks coming out this summer, if they all showed up at class at once the place would be full. We started with some nito kihon but even that didn’t get too far. After going through the kamae we just lifted and let fall the bokuto. Up and down and step toward the mirror. We took a long time at that one because it was time to learn not to use the muscles, just gravity, a swing through the shoulders, and eventually the natural spring of the muscles. It was a lot of “let the sword swing you”.
Then, according to the modified plan we were to quickly run through the tachi seiho but again, the fundamentals caught us up. The kata were done as kihon, just the shidachi side against “mirror sensei”. From sasen we started connecting the sword to the hip. This is easy in this kata because you can touch your hip with your right hand and then launch the sword forward as you move off line. I was going to connect this kata with suigetsu of zen ken ren jodo but didn’t remember. Quite a few of the Niten kata have cousins in the jo kata and the students were catching that all evening.
Once we got the idea of connecting the hip to the sword (hips and tips as I used to shout… a lot) we moved on to hidari hasso. From the hasso position, and especially from the position of furi kaburi we once again worked on lining up the muscles from the left foot to the left hand and pulled the sword into the target with the hips. They were getting it, they really were. At one point we were doing the Karate Kid drum technique, letting our arms flail around like strings as we turned our hips. Doing hidari hasso to a target 90 degrees left of front helped get the feel of pulling the sword through the left shoulder rather than shoving it around with the right hand.
The Pamurai called the class “epiphonic” at the bar. I was barely awake by then, having tired myself out with a hundred trips up and down the basement stairs but I woke up enough to be happy to hear that.
Hasso migi is a lot more difficult to see the hips, but if you drive the sword up it’s long axis into furi kaburi (the instant you start cutting downward) you cross the left elbow to the center of the chest and then as you step out with the left foot and rotate the hips the left elbow can be connected with the right hip. This hurts us old guys and our shoulders if we shove the sword upward. On the other hand, leaving it still, relative to the room, and stepping past it while relaxing the shoulders (keeping them relaxed) lets the muscles stretch without fighting their opposing muscles and all is peaceful in pain-town.
The two uke nagashi were used to really get into the hip turn driving the sword. Throwing it up in a relaxed curve threatens uchidachi, letting the monouchi come back onto the shoulder protects the ribs from clever uchidachi, and the left hand is in a great position to pull that sword around with the hip turn. Do we need to keep a firm and correct grip on the sword all the time? Maybe not.
The power the students were generating in the sword tips was a bit unsettling. They are starting to understand how powerful a relaxed swing can be, and Niten is certainly the place to work on that.
The rest of the kata went a little bit more conventionally, this foot here then there. Moji gamae was done with emphasis on the hip turn taking the body offline and slapping down on uchidachi’s sword.
Hari tsuke was a great chance to once again connect the right hand to the right hip as we used that hip to slap away the attacking sword. I think we used the “Sei Do Kai wet towel attack” to illustrate the “plane of death”. Once you understand that bokuto-width wall that is created when uchidachi commits to a swing, it’s easier to keep all the body parts off that line.
In working on nagashi uchi we examined the step into the first uke nagashi movement and compared that to the shift of the forward right foot into the second uke nagashi movement. With the plane of death in mind it was easier to see that moving the back foot through meant squaring up the body on that second, close and fast, cut from uchidachi. Faster and safer to just shift the front (right) foot to the left and turn your back on all that bloodshed.
Bwaha, see what I did there?
Which brought us to tori buri and the famous “Sei Do Kai rope sword”. We actually have a bunch of rope in the box that we haul out for exactly this kata. (Haul out the rope!) I think this kata might be where it was created. Anyway, the comment from the class was “we should have started with this” as they learned how to pull the rope-sword from the koshimi (waki gamae) position and let the arm stretch out toward the opponent at the right moment (let the sword swing you). You can’t manhandle a rope, you have to find its rhythm and use a constant acceleration to get it to go where you want it to go. You coax a rope, you don’t shove it around.
When we moved to kazu ki we had a discussion about how this is the other side of hari tsuke but had to be somewhat modified because the “wrong foot” was forward for the sword in the right hand. Try stepping to the left with the right foot forward while swinging the sword to the right…. it’s a formula for falling over.
By this time it was beer ‘o clock so we talked about ai sen uchi dome and amashi uchi but didn’t do much with them. I’m sure the principles worked on for the two hours last evening can now be applied by the class.
On the way out the door I tried to recruit the girl on the front desk who said she had a lot of anger and probably shouldn’t have a sword in her hand. I promised her that she could try and smack the seniors and they’d get out of the way.
Just a warning if a new girl shows up.
A reminder to those who are signing up for the Guelph Niten seminar (see the link below) that you can claim a set of long and short bokuto with your registration.
No, you are NOT going to get a kage chokuto for free. Those take me way too long to make, probably half a day each, and use up way too much material.
July Niten and Kage seminars:
Seito Bugei Juku 