Introduction

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[Shihan Sonny]

Hello Everyone,
I am new to this forum but have been doing Aikido since the mid
70's. I am a student of Sensei Suenaka who was a student of OSensei.
I am currently living and teaching Aikido in Guangzhou, Guangdong Province China. I also have a school in Orlando Florida that I started in 1990.
My Style of Aikido is Suenaka Ha (Wadokai Aikido) I would have to classify it as a harder style based on Sensei Suenaka's former instructors, Hohan Soken Sensei (karate) James Mitose Sensei (kempo) Meijin Kazuo Ito Sensei (judo) and Osensei and Koichi Tohei Sensei (aikido).
Our organizational name is Wadokai, not to be confused with Wadokai Karate.

[akiy]

Hi Sonny,

Welcome to AikiWeb and thank you for your introduction. Nice to have you here.

-- Jun

[Voitokas]

Welcome!

[Shihan Sonny]

Thanks for the warm welcome, glad to be here.

[dalen7]

Hello Everyone,
I am new to this forum but have been doing Aikido since the mid
70's. I am a student of Sensei Suenaka who was a student of OSensei.
I am currently living and teaching Aikido in Guangzhou, Guangdong Province China. I also have a school in Orlando Florida that I started in 1990.
My Style of Aikido is Suenaka Ha (Wadokai Aikido) I would have to classify it as a harder style based on Sensei Suenaka's former instructors, Hohan Soken Sensei (karate) James Mitose Sensei (kempo) Meijin Kazuo Ito Sensei (judo) and Osensei and Koichi Tohei Sensei (aikido).
Our organizational name is Wadokai, not to be confused with Wadokai Karate.

Sounds cool, welcome to aikiweb!

Do you happen to have any clips on youtube? I enjoy looking at different styles of Aikido and havent heard of this style specifically.

Peace

dAlen

[Shihan Sonny]

DAlen
China has blocked youtube here so I am not sure if there are any clips of me but I do remember at least one of my Sensei that was posted on youtube several years ago.
I can also tell you that neither me nor my Sensei really like our waza being shown on you tube and prefer that students come and see our class and feel the waza rather than simply watching it. Judging someones technique by what you see on video can be very tricky at times.

[dalen7]

DAlen
China has blocked youtube here so I am not sure if there are any clips of me but I do remember at least one of my Sensei that was posted on youtube several years ago.
I can also tell you that neither me nor my Sensei really like our waza being shown on you tube and prefer that students come and see our class and feel the waza rather than simply watching it. Judging someones technique by what you see on video can be very tricky at times.

so you get to miss the joys of youtube... some may say thats a good thing. :)

I understand your concern about people judging technique by video... there are a lot of subtle nuances which can easily be missed with video - was just curious to see the overall flow. [even within our system the senseis seem to vary on how they teach a technique... before my exam last week I relearned 3 techniques according to how the visiting, testing sensei taught.]

As for going in person to see, who knows, maybe the family will be in China one day - one never knows, we are 'world travelers' :)

Peace

dAlen

[Shihan Sonny]

dAlen,
Yes, China has also blocked facebook, where our organization (wadokai aikido) and both my dojos have sites.
China is not the only place you can visit for my style of Aikido and if you really want to see it, Charleston South Carolina is where my Sensei is based. We also have 15 dojos in the US, mostly on the east coast, one in Texas and one in Wisconsin. So if you ever find yourself in the states, Charleston, as unlikely as it may seem, is where you can find one of Osensei students and the founder of Wadokai Aikido, Suenaka Sensei.