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Old 09-05-2002, 10:25 PM   #9
Edward
Location: Bangkok
Join Date: Oct 2001
Posts: 803
Thailand
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I think aikido is the martial art where you find so much theory, and so much less practical applications. I have been to classes where teachers (usually non-Japanese) spend half of the class explaining the mechanics and the physics behind a particular movement, contradicting themselves almost in every sentence.

I think the traditional Japanese got it better. Most of the Japanese teachers (not the ones teaching abroad) do not teach anything really, they just perform. And it is the student's responsibility to steal the teacher's technique, or what they consider to be the teacher's technique. This is considered to be the Path or the Way of the student to realise himself and his own understanding of the style through this process. This is at least how I understand it.

I can see the difference at our own dojo where the Thai teachers will come and insist on the placement of one foot or hand, or even the direction of one toe, whereas the Japanese just walk around nodding in approval, even if the students are not following exactly their instructions, as long as the technique seems to work for them. And their interference would be limited to demonstrating on the student himself the correct way of doing the technique without getting into lengthy theoretical explanations.
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