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Old 06-16-2006, 01:50 PM   #26
Mark Freeman
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Re: What do you think?

Quote:
Mark Uttech wrote:
Then and again, one cannot point at a single demonstration and say: "This is aikido"
Even when it was done by O Sensei?

regards,

Mark

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Old 06-16-2006, 01:52 PM   #27
Ron Tisdale
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Re: What do you think?

Well, then you can say "this is aikido at this moment". But once the moment is passed....

Best,
Ron (who knew what the crazy old koot was going to do next???)

Ron Tisdale
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Old 06-16-2006, 03:12 PM   #28
Aristeia
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Re: What do you think?

I liked it - nice flow and timing. I think that demo has a lot to do with Aikido as budo (emphasis on DO). The flow of energy was nice and unlike Ron I didn't mind the bounciness at all - quite liked it in fact.

"When your only tool is a hammer every problem starts to look like a nail"
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Old 06-16-2006, 03:32 PM   #29
NagaBaba
 
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Re: What do you think?

Quote:
Mark Uttech wrote:
Asking age is kind of a cheap shot. Then and again, one cannot point at a single demonstration and say: "This is aikido"
O sensei did it every time when he came from Iwama to Tokyo dojo. He was yelling it many times - "this is not aikido". So yes, it is possible to develop eyes to the level when you actually see THE reality.

Of course, when you follow a teaching, where everything is presented by instructor as in the plate, one will never develop his eyes, and will never be able to distinguish False from True. It is not magic, simply matter of training.

Also, one must be honest, and not hide under false politesse his opinion. Not long ago, we had a topic discussing O sensei teaching:

Quote:
Through The Way, through our practice, we come to gain the virtue of sincerity. Through the virtue of sincerity, we come to know The Way -- we come to develop our practice. The virtue of sincerity is both the entry to The Way and a product of The Way. Sincerity is what connects the outer form to the inner essence. The cultivation of sincerity is then the purpose or the reason why we train in the martial arts. Through martial arts training, we are trying to gain a distance from the superficiality of our lives, our relationships, our thoughts, our actions, our identity, etc. Through the cultivation of sincerity, through a capacity for sincere action, thought, and word, we can come to clearly observe the holiness that is all around us -- that which is the true essence of everything and every one. Being able to give witness to this holiness, in turn, allows us to have an even greater capacity for sincerity, which, in turn, brings us more clarity regarding this holiness -- this cycle continues ad infinitum. This is what it means to practice the martial arts as a Way. It means we are here to mature our spirit, to realize the ultimate divine principles and purpose. We are here to bring a particular kind of depth to our lives, for this we need the virtue of sincerity.
So if I see somebody develop illusion of Budo practice I tell what I think. If anyone have no idea what is aikido as a Budo, please visit San Diego Aikikai -- west coast or NEAikikai or NYAikido if I may give some good examples.

Good ukemi skills? -- lets allow to these girls take ANY judo throw as uke -- they will be broken in pieces.

As a tori they are not able to throw ANYONE outside of their dojo. This is caricature of aikido techniques. How can someone allow them to deform it to such point?

Nagababa

ask for divine protection Ame no Murakumo Kuki Samuhara no Ryuo
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Old 06-16-2006, 05:04 PM   #30
graham
 
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Re: What do you think?

I thought it was beautiful.

They seem to be very young, maybe teenage girls? So, I'm perfectly happy with it being partly choreographed.
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Old 06-16-2006, 06:02 PM   #31
Talon
 
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Re: What do you think?

I see Szczepan has developed the sensitivity and vision of O'sensei....Wow Szczepan can you please teach me? or possibly all of us on here. I don't think that anyone else on here has achieved what you apparently have.

I thought the demo was just that a nice demo, however I must admit that I did share similar thoughts as some others on the lack of martial looking technique and attack. I believe Aikido being a martial art has to be martial so I can see where Szczepan is coming from but I just would not be so blunt about it....

Last edited by Talon : 06-16-2006 at 06:10 PM.
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Old 06-16-2006, 06:45 PM   #32
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Re: What do you think?

I thought it was a great demo. And lets face it, a demo is a demo. Was it practiced? Probably. I don't know how many times I've practiced crap at work for some kinda dog and pony show for visiting officers (Sorry Kevin!) and higher ups. You look pretty dumb when you're putting on a demo for a ton of people and you don't practice it.

I can't argue about their skill level or effectiveness of whatever their doing. My amateur opinion is aikido is a tricky thing to use against someone. I know everytime I've tried to demonstrate aikido to someone it hasn't worked and buddy just powers through it or resists and I can't do anything. The few times when I've "used aikido" without thinking or preperation (ie someone grabbing me from behind) it's worked surprisingly well.

I think it was a great demo, i'd love to bean uke for them. I can't argue the "what if" it will work question due to lack of experience AND because I've seen "what if" arguments go on for hours and degenerate into sillyness.
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Old 06-16-2006, 08:24 PM   #33
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Re: What do you think?

Quote:
Paul Nowicki wrote:
I see Szczepan has developed the sensitivity and vision of O'sensei....Wow Szczepan can you please teach me? or possibly all of us on here. I don't think that anyone else on here has achieved what you apparently have.
..
Szanowny panie Pawle,
I dont pretend to teach, I simply quoted O sensei words. His teaching is simple, do it in daily live, this is not theoretical blah blah blah. Be honest with yourself and with others -- and many emotional filters will disappear. So your senses will become actually 'purified' from superficial opinions, prejudges and other scrap. You will be able to FEEL springtime around you, may be first time in your life, who knows.......

The beauty of the techniques comes from their completeness. It means the technique includes martial elements among other elements -- to be able qualified as a Budo. It is good to practice healthy gymnastic, or social dance, but don't call it aikido.

Nagababa

ask for divine protection Ame no Murakumo Kuki Samuhara no Ryuo
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Old 06-16-2006, 09:28 PM   #34
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Re: What do you think?

I would like to take a poll. How many would like to see a video of Szczepan Janczuk doing Aikido?
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Old 06-16-2006, 09:45 PM   #35
xuzen
 
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Re: What do you think?

me me me!

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Old 06-16-2006, 10:00 PM   #36
aikigirl10
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Re: What do you think?

Quote:
Szczepan Janczuk wrote:
Good ukemi skills? -- lets allow to these girls take ANY judo throw as uke -- they will be broken in pieces.

As a tori they are not able to throw ANYONE outside of their dojo. This is caricature of aikido techniques. How can someone allow them to deform it to such point?
How could you tell just from watching that clip how capable these girls are or are not? To me, it sounds like you are basing this solely on the fact that they are girls.

Does anyone else think these comments sound a little bit sexist, or is it just me? If no one else agrees then i will shut up.

*Paige*
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Old 06-16-2006, 10:20 PM   #37
statisticool
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Re: What do you think?

Quote:
Szczepan Janczuk wrote:
Good ukemi skills? -- lets allow to these girls take ANY judo throw as uke -- they will be broken in pieces.
There were judo-ish looking throws IMO at 1:11 and at 1:32 in the clip.

A secret of internal strength?:
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Old 06-16-2006, 10:21 PM   #38
ChrisMoses
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Re: What do you think?

Quote:
David Skaggs wrote:
I would like to take a poll. How many would like to see a video of Szczepan Janczuk doing Aikido?
Oh dear God yes. I've been searching for some real material to work with for years... I would love to be proven wrong however. We seem to agree at the weirdest times.
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Old 06-16-2006, 10:30 PM   #39
Nick P.
 
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Re: What do you think?

On one of these forums, not too long ago, someone posted a link to "Iron Uke", or something like that; it is a toung-in-cheek Aikido-meets-spaghetti western, and our friend Szczepan Janczuk appears in it...
However, I should point out that his acting skills were refined under a true master, and only they know the one true light...or something like that. I am sure he will enlighten us.

Mr. Janczuk; the floor is now all yours...your audience is waiting.

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Old 06-17-2006, 07:12 AM   #40
Jory Boling
 
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Re: What do you think?

Tenkan of Steel
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bLT03GcTlXw

maybe iron uke is the sequel

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Old 06-17-2006, 08:32 AM   #41
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Re: What do you think?

Quote:
Paige Frazier wrote:
How could you tell just from watching that clip how capable these girls are or are not?
*Paige*
O sensei was able to perfectly know what and how his students practice by only listening sounds coming ffrom dojo.
Me I'm only a mortal, so I need to see at least some practice with my eyes.

Nagababa

ask for divine protection Ame no Murakumo Kuki Samuhara no Ryuo
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Old 06-17-2006, 10:31 AM   #42
giriasis
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Re: What do you think?

Quote:
Does anyone else think these comments sound a little bit sexist, or is it just me? If no one else agrees then i will shut up.
Yeah, my impression, too. But Szczepan says things like this to everybody so I take it with a grain of salt. He trains up somewhere in New England so he thinks is aikido is oh so much more superior than everyone else's. ~tongue firmly planted in cheek~ A similar comment, from someone else, was said about the women attacking in the Women In Aikido DVD, but to me it is a reflection of the perception that the smaller attacker can't possibly have a strong attack. Let them dwell in their own delusions as far as I'm concerned. I'd love to see Ron and Szcezepan put a demo together, post it on the web and let us tear it about for them, too. I don't know who said but there is a lot of armchair quarterbacking going on here.

Anne Marie Giri
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Old 06-17-2006, 11:07 AM   #43
Dominic Toupin
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Re: What do you think?

Hi everyone,

I usually sit down and read the posts here on Aikiweb and rarely post myself because my English writing isn't that good (my first language is french...)

But I'm tired to read post from Szczepan Janczuk (Nagababa). It's always negative, the aikido from this sensei is poor, that demonstration had nothing to do with aikido and the best one that I can remember :" Someone who train hard never talks in the dojo".

I look at the demonstration and I will give you my take positively and without any bias toward an organization

Did you look at the crowd ? They were kids. The aim of the demonstration was probably to show kids what their aikido will become later if they continue to train. The public wasn't some military type guys that want to see real attack, real defense. It was a demonstration with the aim of showing techniques to kids. Those girls attacks were OK for that purpose...

Also, you said that those girls have not enough ukemi skills to take some judo's throws ? What the ? I train in Yoseikan Aikido and our hardest falls come from some of the sutemi techniques or some judo like technique and I'm sure that those girls can take those falls.

You said that It wasn't aikido ??? Do you know what is aikido ? If the demonstration motivates those children in the crowd to keep train hard, to keep in good shape, to apply principles show in the dojo in their life and develop their bodies and mind, this video is definitely aikido...

Dominic
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Old 06-17-2006, 01:52 PM   #44
Mike Cook
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Re: What do you think?

Quote:
Szczepan Janczuk wrote:
Good ukemi skills? -- lets allow to these girls take ANY judo throw as uke -- they will be broken in pieces.
Their ukemi is better than mine and I have never had a problem taking ukemi in judo randori. I reckon they would be fine, their ukemi would look different but they wouldn't get hurt.

Mike
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Old 06-17-2006, 02:13 PM   #45
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Re: What do you think?

Quote:
You said that It wasn't aikido ??? Do you know what is aikido ? If the demonstration motivates those children in the crowd to keep train hard, to keep in good shape, to apply principles show in the dojo in their life and develop their bodies and mind, this video is definitely aikido...
Very well said!
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Old 06-17-2006, 03:37 PM   #46
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Re: What do you think?

Quote:
Jory Boling wrote:
LOL, that was pretty funny.

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Old 06-17-2006, 03:51 PM   #47
George S. Ledyard
 
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Re: What do you think?

Once again, I find myself in a position to agree with he of the unpronouncable name... Szcepan, while not someone I would want running public relations anywhere, is correct in many of the things he is saying.

What you see in this demo is a very good example of the aiki of movement. It's fluid, relaxed. It's show's aikido kihon waza to good effect in that it is large and expansive.

What is missing is the energetic side of actual intention. None of the strikes were done with real intention to hit. The uke is feeding a "strike-like" movement to the nage. In that way the uke is simply fascilitating the nage's technique.

The Mind moves before the body. When a strike is executed, the intention has already preceded the physical strike itself. If someone with very strong intention attacks, the challenge of ki musubi is to reach out and meet the intention with ones own. If one can't do that, one has a collapse of his energy field, or his field of intention. If that occurs it is impossible to actually make an effective entry against an attacker who has strong intention to hit you. You can know 500 techniques but they are simply 500 techniques you can't actually do.

Ushiro Kenji Sensei, at last year's Rocky Mountain Summer Camp, stated that the single weakest area in Aikido was our attacks. I think that is quite evident here. These young ladies are simply not trying to hit each other. There is no projection of strong intention moving out from them when they attack. None of those strikes would have even hurt if they had made contact. No hara.

It's not hard to do physical blending movement when the attacks are "low voltage" so to speak. As I say, I think the demo was a very nice example of the aiki of movement. But none of those ladies would keep her projection if attacked with real intensity. This is not meant to, as Szcepan has, disparage the whole demo. All of the components of good Aikido are there in the physical sense. But the inner strength that is required to take this movement to the level of Budo isn't there.

I think that this is a very important thing for people to understand. In an Aikido interaction, at the higher levels most of the important stuff is going on energetically in the communication between the partners. How you project your intention, where you place your attention, etc are very significant. If you train with low intention or no intention, you can develop very fine movement and technique but your ability to actually do your technique in any martial sense will be limited at best.

I run into this all the time. I find san dan and yondan level people who cannot do an irimi if you attack with strong intention. Their energy field collapses. As I have stated elsewhere, I can usually tell if I am going to hit someone before I even start to initiate the physical attack. You can tell by how the project their intention towards you (or not).

I am not intending to be unappreciative or disrespectful here. These ladies obviously have spent quite a long time and much effort in their training. It was a very nice demo, as good as many of the demos one saw at the Expo by higher ranked folks. But this lack of intention and lack of energetic projection is something that must be addressed if they are to make any progress towards higher level technique.

Szcepan, I am always wondering at what you feel is the necessity to be insulting, derogatory, inflammatory, etc. You can be right and I still feel embarrassed to be in agreement with you. It feels like hanging with bad companions.

George S. Ledyard
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Old 06-17-2006, 04:42 PM   #48
Keith R Lee
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Re: What do you think?

First off, I think the demo was fine. Aikido is a lot of different things to a lot of diferent people. Being a Yoshinkan practioner, I thought the attacks were weaker than they could be, the ukes appeared to be on auto-fall, and the techniques were not as crisp as I would like but whatever.

These women obviously put alot of time into it and enjoy their practice, more power to them. Not all Aikido has to be at one hundred percent power and effectivness. It certainly needs to exist, but not everyone needs to do it. Part of the appeal of Aikido is that it has such low barriers to entry that it is accessible to many people who would not normally get into martial arts.

Let people practice how they want, and get whatever it is out of Aikido they are looking for. If people are happy practicing Aikido, whatever it appears to be, I think that's a good thing. However, by filming oneself and releasing it into the wild (the web) one definitely opens themselves to praise and criticism, and people just need to be thick skinned enough to deal with that. Especially if the video in question is of a "softer" sort of Aikido and it is shown to Aikido people of a "harder" mindset.

Keith Lee
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Old 06-17-2006, 05:06 PM   #49
Upyu
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Re: What do you think?

Quote:
Paige Frazier wrote:
How could you tell just from watching that clip how capable these girls are or are not? To me, it sounds like you are basing this solely on the fact that they are girls.

Does anyone else think these comments sound a little bit sexist, or is it just me? If no one else agrees then i will shut up.
I don't think he's being sexist, just making a pretty objective observation.

George was also correct about the intent, but let's see if anyone want's to break down the "why"s.

Specifically at 1:03 in the video, you can see where the Nage's lack of structure rear's its ugly head. Movement is disconnected. She's using arm only to throw Uke, and Uke is only being thrown becuase, well...they're throwing themselves mostly. Plus she's bent ever so slightly to the left. It sounds like a minor quibble, but it's not. It's pretty major, and it's the reason why the arm movement of the left hand looks disconnected as well.

So what does this mean?
Means that none of the exhibitors know how to "stand" properly, and to use structure to reinforce their movements (This is of course, sans all the Ki stuff Mike and others have been going on about). The movement is really no different from say, a kickboxer in K-1 throwing his kick. All the joints are relatively disconnected.

This results in that, all of the throws, have a "1, 2" tempo. They use simple twisting of the body/redirection of the vectors to throw the person.
If any of the people demoing had a proper core, you'd see much smoother execution, plus a more solid feel.

Alec noted it doesn't feel like "Budo". A large part of this is due to the fact that "Budo" movement happens on a "one" count and has to be able to be ended instantaneously at any point. At the second of contact, you could end it, but you don't.
None of the Nage's in this video exhibited that feel.

And that's besides the people in the vid being too floaty/hop skippity, using too much arm in all the throws etc.

If they're teenage girls demoing the "frame"work of what they know. Props to them. But it's still just a beginners demo.

Chinese have a specific term to refer to similar artists that start out.
Jade Hands, Brocade Legs.
Beautiful movement, but you'll get pulverized the second something r3al happens to you.
Typically the term refers to wushu people

The point is, I don't think the performers of this vid should be criticized one way or another. They're still learning.

But the person that brought them up as an example should probably rethink what they consider to be good/solid/efficient "movement" (in any activity, not just aikido)

FWIW

Last edited by Upyu : 06-17-2006 at 05:12 PM.
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Old 06-17-2006, 08:39 PM   #50
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Re: What do you think?

Quote:
Anne Marie Giri wrote:
he thinks is aikido is oh so much more superior than everyone else's.
Hi Anne Marie,
This is not true. There are tons aikido very high quality around. But not on this video.
This topic is not about me, so relax your shoulders and lets go back to the topic.

Nagababa

ask for divine protection Ame no Murakumo Kuki Samuhara no Ryuo
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