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I don't want to go training. It's a course and I hate courses, no-one trains with kyu grades on courses; we're avoided like the plauge.
Then there's the reason I'm going. I'm off to brown nose some shidoin so that finally I can pass 1st kyu.
Not that after two years of failing it I care about it, but Sensei wants me to pass it and so I'm playing "Sensei says." Sensei says pass 1st kyu, I do it.
Not that anyone gives a flying f*** about shodan because the way the past two years have gone has pretty much devalued rank to the point were no-one in my dojo sees any value in grading. Last night Bob said, he's said it before, that he probably wont bother with Shodan because the only way to get it is to kiss ass and if he has to do that then it instantly devalues shodan to the point of worthlessness. I totally agree. In fact all the senior students are struggling to find a reason to take shodan.
I hear the shidoin are bitching because 1st kyu gradings interupt the teachers course. Which is ironic because the reason 1st kyu gradings were moved to teachers courses was that most shidoin found something better to do when gradings were held and so putting together a panel was becoming impossible.
Not that 1st kyu gradings are held in front of a panel even on teachers courses. Nope usually we're shuffled into a back room where we're asked a bunch of interesting questions about which teachers we've been training with. Then after we've failed we're politely told not to train with other people and advised that perhaps if we trained with them that we'd be 1st kyu by now.
So here I am again for the fourth time. It's something when your instructor says that you need to kiss arse at HQ in order to get your grading. I feel an attack of honesty coming on.
09-18-2009 10:02 AM 