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While studying at Aikido at San Leandro. Sensi Hendricks recommend that we attend a seminar coming up in March. The subject of the seminar as I could understand it was some technique called Doshu. Sensei Hendricks recommended it in strong terms, and stated that the opportunity only came along about every 10 years. This seemed pretty rare, but I wondered what a brand newby was going to do at a seminar. I would have a total of maybe of 8 weeks of training at that point and wondered if I would even have figured out where my feet where, let alone master some strange technique called Doshu? Something that was apparently only taught about every 10 years. Sounded tough to me; however Sensei Hendricks did stress that even those of us that were beginners should try and attend the seminar.
While getting back into my street cloths in the dressing room, Larry commented that "We really have to watch the beginners around the 6th week." I asked why, and he stated that was when most people dropped out. On the way home I thought well if I know that there is a problem with people persevering through the 6th week, would a seminar about that time serve as a good reward, and a possible short term goal for me? Seemed likely, if I thought that I would be in any position to learn anything about this Doshu technique.
So today, I decided to see what the seminar could be about. I remembered the web address that was on the board at the San Leandro Dojo, (www.ai-ki-do.org) and looked it up. There was a link to the seminar front and center.
I was a bit surprised to figure out that the Doshu was A> a person, B>the head of the Aikido organization, and that C> we would be seeing and participating in a seminar with him. This did seem to be something that could be wonderful. So I printed out the forms, signed a check and sent it in. Seemed a bit spendy for two days, but then again someone has to pay for the convention hall, and all the logistics that go into making up a large seminar like this one.
I am looking forward to seeing a lot of people of different abilities from a lot of different dojo's. Seems like I should be able to learn something in an intensive two day course.
This Japanese stuff is confusing. I hope that I don't have too many of these strange, and potentially embarrassing mix ups in the future.
Total Expenses on Aikido so far: 170. Signing up at for lessons on Thursday, registration fees, uniform, monthly payment should more than double this. I thought that I would keep track of the easily tracked expenses here. Might be interesting for others….
A note about my journal. One of the things that I noticed is that there is a lot of information out here on www.aikiweb.com about the art, but little about what it feels like to practice the art. What the daily pitfalls, and joys of it are. There are a few entries here in the journal section that elude to it, but little that talks of them directly. So I thought that I would do my best to share what I do, what I go through, and my viewpoint with others. I am hoping that this might help me to learn faster, as I go through the process of recording me learning, those that go behind me to see the path a bit more clearer, and those that are ahead of me to remember what it was like for the beginner.
01-14-2004 12:52 AM 