How's everyone been?
Not much update since mid week huh, so I hope no withdrawl has kicked in LOL.
I watched another movie (I seem to be doing a lot of that lately), another Korean film, called My Love, a 2007 one. It's probably best described as an asian style version of Love, Actually. It has four stories about love, with different events and outcomes across the four that run in a parallel. Very touching, emotional, well made and a touch of humor and gentleness in many ways. I thoroughly enjoyed it and it gave some food for thought upon the topic of love, the ways it presents itself and how different perspectives of it can be taken. 8.5/10.
Friday training was entertaining because our instructor chucked a sickie to come and train us. He took the beginners for a bit to see their progress, and also taught us a different variant of the kirikaeshi exercise, where instead of doing the men cuts forwards and backwards, it was cutting the air infront, but both motodachi and shidachi were cutting at the same time so that your shinais are connecting in the middle. It isn't as if you are trying to bash their shinai out of the way, but rather you are cutting sayomen and stopping in the middle when you hit the other person's shinai. I think it is a good exercise in tenuchi and control of the cut instead of hitting/swinging.
Saturday training was a little harder than normal because we had a visiting sensei from Sydney Kendo Club, Itakura Sensei. We did some stuff that we normally don't do except when we have state squad training with us, but I guess it is always good to have a harder session to push you and see how you are going. I think I survived fine, though some of my cuts are a little off.
Some things I have noticed in my training. I believe my Kihon Men cuts are getting better. Taking Mark and Leo's advice, I have done more Kihon Men cuts than before, and it is shaping up nicer. I can hit more confidently and it feels better. Of course, whether that is actually true or not is a entirely different matter and I haven't really had feedback from any of our senior players to tell me how it is or isn't going. I know that I still need to fix my footwork more, but it is probably slooooowly getting there. I dislike playing against one of our members, and I also dislike doing waza training with him as the partner. This particular guy, I don't get him at all. He comes but doesn't try to learn what we are doing, doesn't try to practice what we are practicing, and doesn't even seem to put any effort into jigeiko. It's almost like a hitting dummy, but a really bad hitting dummy..... I mentioned this to someone else, and they said that they just come to play to play... and maybe exercise... but he doesn't even do warmup or footwork, and well, he doesn't push himself so it's not exactly exercise. As for playing... he doesn't do anything in jigeiko.... so what playing???? I guess it's not really my place to criticize and I certainly haven't said anything to this chap, so I'll just leave it as is.
Another point is people who hit hard. There are two types of hard hits. Ones that hurt, and ones that don't. Someone can hit bloody hard, your entire head rocks, you feel the shock of the cut and it transfers straight into your body and you get a little bit of the 'stun' effect. Then there are those that hit bloody hard and it hurts. And sometimes you can even get dazed with white light or 'stars' that you see with cartoons when someone gets smacked on the head. How do you tell the difference? Well, the skilled players, the higher level ones, senseis and alike, they hit hard but it doesn't exactly hurt. There have been quite a few people who I have received cuts from, it delivers a 'damn that was a hard hit' shock, but it isn't a direct sharp point of pain. I can handle that because it's a good, solid 'punch' of a cut, the way it is meant to be. Then there are the two or three people who hit fricken hard, and it hurts, and sometimes really hurts. Especially when they miss on the kote and nail you on the same spot, in the wrong spot... that is when you have to shake out your hand to get some feeling and strength back.... and you still get a bruise through the massive amounts of padding you get on a good kote..... I don't know if it is because they don't tenuchi properly, or if they hit with the kensen and the point digs in, or something else, but surely they could hit just as hard, like the Dan players, but not have it hurt?? I guess that is why they are just Kyu and not Dan players... ~sigh~
I'm hoping to order some shinais from Sankei, with the club order. I'm down to one shinai as I may have mentioned earlier, so I am ordering three different styles (all koto though) in terms of size and balance to see how they differ, if I can tell the difference. I'm hoping that with three shinais (four if you count the one I still have), and I rotate through I'll be able to use them for a while. They aren't cheap just because of import costs around here... though I wish someone would grow bamboo here and then manufacture since I know you can grow decent bamboo in Sydney and Brisbane since my father has grown it for ages and around Middle Cove there is a bamboo thicket outside someones house LOL.... that would certainly drop costs.
In terms of the social scene, hmm, Friday night was dinner at Market City, then home. Saturday night was a bit of a mix, French Riviera before dinner at a Szechuan joint near the French Riviera. Leo is going home in a few days so they went to hang with him for a little while. Sunday, went down to Darling Harbour to check out the Thai Grand Festival, bought a coconut and was drinking it when it started to spit so we piked for cover before it absolutely bucketed down for a while. Sheltered around at Lindt Cafe before heading back to Chinatown for some dumplings LOL.
And that was about it.
Tomorrow there is a careers fair at uni, so will probably check that out and see how careers seem to be.
Not much update since mid week huh, so I hope no withdrawl has kicked in LOL.
I watched another movie (I seem to be doing a lot of that lately), another Korean film, called My Love, a 2007 one. It's probably best described as an asian style version of Love, Actually. It has four stories about love, with different events and outcomes across the four that run in a parallel. Very touching, emotional, well made and a touch of humor and gentleness in many ways. I thoroughly enjoyed it and it gave some food for thought upon the topic of love, the ways it presents itself and how different perspectives of it can be taken. 8.5/10.
Friday training was entertaining because our instructor chucked a sickie to come and train us. He took the beginners for a bit to see their progress, and also taught us a different variant of the kirikaeshi exercise, where instead of doing the men cuts forwards and backwards, it was cutting the air infront, but both motodachi and shidachi were cutting at the same time so that your shinais are connecting in the middle. It isn't as if you are trying to bash their shinai out of the way, but rather you are cutting sayomen and stopping in the middle when you hit the other person's shinai. I think it is a good exercise in tenuchi and control of the cut instead of hitting/swinging.
Saturday training was a little harder than normal because we had a visiting sensei from Sydney Kendo Club, Itakura Sensei. We did some stuff that we normally don't do except when we have state squad training with us, but I guess it is always good to have a harder session to push you and see how you are going. I think I survived fine, though some of my cuts are a little off.
Some things I have noticed in my training. I believe my Kihon Men cuts are getting better. Taking Mark and Leo's advice, I have done more Kihon Men cuts than before, and it is shaping up nicer. I can hit more confidently and it feels better. Of course, whether that is actually true or not is a entirely different matter and I haven't really had feedback from any of our senior players to tell me how it is or isn't going. I know that I still need to fix my footwork more, but it is probably slooooowly getting there. I dislike playing against one of our members, and I also dislike doing waza training with him as the partner. This particular guy, I don't get him at all. He comes but doesn't try to learn what we are doing, doesn't try to practice what we are practicing, and doesn't even seem to put any effort into jigeiko. It's almost like a hitting dummy, but a really bad hitting dummy..... I mentioned this to someone else, and they said that they just come to play to play... and maybe exercise... but he doesn't even do warmup or footwork, and well, he doesn't push himself so it's not exactly exercise. As for playing... he doesn't do anything in jigeiko.... so what playing???? I guess it's not really my place to criticize and I certainly haven't said anything to this chap, so I'll just leave it as is.
Another point is people who hit hard. There are two types of hard hits. Ones that hurt, and ones that don't. Someone can hit bloody hard, your entire head rocks, you feel the shock of the cut and it transfers straight into your body and you get a little bit of the 'stun' effect. Then there are those that hit bloody hard and it hurts. And sometimes you can even get dazed with white light or 'stars' that you see with cartoons when someone gets smacked on the head. How do you tell the difference? Well, the skilled players, the higher level ones, senseis and alike, they hit hard but it doesn't exactly hurt. There have been quite a few people who I have received cuts from, it delivers a 'damn that was a hard hit' shock, but it isn't a direct sharp point of pain. I can handle that because it's a good, solid 'punch' of a cut, the way it is meant to be. Then there are the two or three people who hit fricken hard, and it hurts, and sometimes really hurts. Especially when they miss on the kote and nail you on the same spot, in the wrong spot... that is when you have to shake out your hand to get some feeling and strength back.... and you still get a bruise through the massive amounts of padding you get on a good kote..... I don't know if it is because they don't tenuchi properly, or if they hit with the kensen and the point digs in, or something else, but surely they could hit just as hard, like the Dan players, but not have it hurt?? I guess that is why they are just Kyu and not Dan players... ~sigh~
I'm hoping to order some shinais from Sankei, with the club order. I'm down to one shinai as I may have mentioned earlier, so I am ordering three different styles (all koto though) in terms of size and balance to see how they differ, if I can tell the difference. I'm hoping that with three shinais (four if you count the one I still have), and I rotate through I'll be able to use them for a while. They aren't cheap just because of import costs around here... though I wish someone would grow bamboo here and then manufacture since I know you can grow decent bamboo in Sydney and Brisbane since my father has grown it for ages and around Middle Cove there is a bamboo thicket outside someones house LOL.... that would certainly drop costs.
In terms of the social scene, hmm, Friday night was dinner at Market City, then home. Saturday night was a bit of a mix, French Riviera before dinner at a Szechuan joint near the French Riviera. Leo is going home in a few days so they went to hang with him for a little while. Sunday, went down to Darling Harbour to check out the Thai Grand Festival, bought a coconut and was drinking it when it started to spit so we piked for cover before it absolutely bucketed down for a while. Sheltered around at Lindt Cafe before heading back to Chinatown for some dumplings LOL.
And that was about it.
Tomorrow there is a careers fair at uni, so will probably check that out and see how careers seem to be.
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