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Friday, November 21, 2014
Friday, October 31, 2008
Day 20 - Friday - the end of my trip
Today I had to spend the day doing _something_ as I waited for the Kay and the kids to arrive ... so, I thought, well, why not go wrestle? Yes, that would be a fine idea, just the thing to do! One of the perks of being in a big city is daytime martial-arts; I went to groovy Bondi Beach, and trained at Paulo Guimeres' Roots Brazillian Jiu-jitsu club! It was awesome, here is me with the few daytime guys (all the others resting up for a big contest on Sunday)
I got to drill a really great cross-collar-choke to armbar sequence, I liked it very much. And I also learned two very, very, VERY cool little secrets that go a long, long way to completely shutting down a closed guard. I would tell you, but for now I want to keep this top secret ;-) Only a little hint that might help a few of you - one of them is to do with the so-called 'lunar plexus.' Anyway,
After that, got myself to the airport - devoured two Krispy Kreme donuts as I waited - then met Kay and the kids as they arrived on a flight from Coffs Harbour. That was great to finally hug and kiss my beautifuls again! The Japan adventure was fantastic, really would be hard to think of it happening any better than it did - but I also was quite ready to be home with my little family again. We've had a great day at Luna Park yesterday (Wild Mouse! Dodgem Cars!) then Taronga Zoo today.
Now back to Coffs tomorrow morning. Takashi is arriving to stay with us for a few months while he finishes a work internship experience, and I'll pick him up in the afternoon. I still have a couple days off before work starts, so maybe I'll get the tandem or my electro-bike operational. So, plenty of things to do. Maybe I'll even start another blog, hmmm .... Anyhoo thanks for reading, comments, and advice, cheers!
I got to drill a really great cross-collar-choke to armbar sequence, I liked it very much. And I also learned two very, very, VERY cool little secrets that go a long, long way to completely shutting down a closed guard. I would tell you, but for now I want to keep this top secret ;-) Only a little hint that might help a few of you - one of them is to do with the so-called 'lunar plexus.' Anyway,
After that, got myself to the airport - devoured two Krispy Kreme donuts as I waited - then met Kay and the kids as they arrived on a flight from Coffs Harbour. That was great to finally hug and kiss my beautifuls again! The Japan adventure was fantastic, really would be hard to think of it happening any better than it did - but I also was quite ready to be home with my little family again. We've had a great day at Luna Park yesterday (Wild Mouse! Dodgem Cars!) then Taronga Zoo today.
Now back to Coffs tomorrow morning. Takashi is arriving to stay with us for a few months while he finishes a work internship experience, and I'll pick him up in the afternoon. I still have a couple days off before work starts, so maybe I'll get the tandem or my electro-bike operational. So, plenty of things to do. Maybe I'll even start another blog, hmmm .... Anyhoo thanks for reading, comments, and advice, cheers!
Day 19 - Thurs 30th - Sydney; Albany Hills Judo Club
It was a long overnight flight back home, and we had two crying babies right in front of us, screaming all night long. I was glad I had my earplugs, and Cliff watched movies. Sleeping was really hard though, I find it hard to do it sitting up - it was a long torturous trip. Cliff got off at Coolengatta, and after than I slept for 30 minutes on the trip to Sydney.
After dealing with the Japanese Rail system, Sydney was a breeze. Found my way to Tarhlae's house, crashed for a few hours, did some washing, read for awhile and then found myself with nothing to do. So, may as well go out to Judo! This is the Albany Hills Budokan Judo club. Here is a photo from the junior's session:
I had a great time in the seniors. It was all standup, and there was a great technical portion at the beginning, where I learned a lot of fine details on the dropping kata-guruma.
- attack far leg preferrably,
- drop the knee down the middle,
- straighten the leg on the outside, keep a slight curl in it though
- simultaneously head under, must look at the sky and pull arm down _tight_
- falling to the _side_ not straight back
- bridging over and straightening your leg to plant them firmly
- turnover to consolidate the hold-down.
there is a very nice way to attack even if they have a death-grip on your lapel! lead with the elbow and weave it over ... be sure not to elbowstrike his jaw, that sorta hurts.
Randori with everyone went well, my shoulder didn't get too banged up. Ok a little squished maybe, but it was worth it, I had a great night!
After dealing with the Japanese Rail system, Sydney was a breeze. Found my way to Tarhlae's house, crashed for a few hours, did some washing, read for awhile and then found myself with nothing to do. So, may as well go out to Judo! This is the Albany Hills Budokan Judo club. Here is a photo from the junior's session:
I had a great time in the seniors. It was all standup, and there was a great technical portion at the beginning, where I learned a lot of fine details on the dropping kata-guruma.
- attack far leg preferrably,
- drop the knee down the middle,
- straighten the leg on the outside, keep a slight curl in it though
- simultaneously head under, must look at the sky and pull arm down _tight_
- falling to the _side_ not straight back
- bridging over and straightening your leg to plant them firmly
- turnover to consolidate the hold-down.
there is a very nice way to attack even if they have a death-grip on your lapel! lead with the elbow and weave it over ... be sure not to elbowstrike his jaw, that sorta hurts.
Randori with everyone went well, my shoulder didn't get too banged up. Ok a little squished maybe, but it was worth it, I had a great night!
Thursday, October 30, 2008
vid of Osaka sento
This was a great sento ... I find it very hard to put one sento over the other ... both Funoaka and Goko-yo in Kyoto were awesome, as was Saitama Super Sento ... but this was very nice too! Loved the strong denki-buro
Day 18 - Wed 29 - Osaka: Judo, joint health, clubbells ... and home
This last day in Japan, Cliff had a relaxing day then riding around Kyoto looking for the superb Nishiki Food Market, before making his way to the airport in the evening.
I woke up early and hopped on the train to Osaka, and stashed my bag in a locker there. Then I found my way to a sento I'd read about on the net. It was in a bit of a seedy area ... and while I was there, a Yakuza guy came in to use the sento! I knew him because he was covered from his wrists to his bum in a huge dragon tattoo winding across his body. He seemed nice enough, but luckily by the time he arrived I had to leave anyway; didn't want any trouble with gangsters!
It was a pretty good sento, with its denki (electro) bath cranked up high, second only to our Kyoto favourite Go-ko-yu. And cool interior decorations, check it out :-) I have a video but this connection is too slow, will upload it later.
cold tub in the corner, beside the denki tub.
hot tubs in the middle
(Also a neat little electric bike; actually I just saw one here in Bondi too)
Then I made my way over to the real point of the day, visiting Ryan Hurst. He is Japan's representative of the Circular Strength Training systems of RMAX inc, from Scott Sonnon. Sorry, that was was quite a mouthful!
Ryan is a great guy, very friendly, he and I really hit it off well - for the first hour or so we just chatted about Japan, crazy Americans, sentos, diet, martial arts, children, family ... basically life, the universe and everything. It is such a shame our trip worked out that I didn't meet him until the end -- if I could do it all again, I certainly would have found a way to spend a few of our first days down in the Kansai region over training with him. (Though I sure wouldn't have missed our Butokuden experience for anything!)
I recorded fairly copious notes on the way home, which I don't want to reproduce here, but I will summarize.
So, Soon enough we started on with some Judo.
- posture & weighting concepts
- an interesting angle on the hikkite (drawing) arm; incidently the old tai-otoshi wizard at Maranouchi showed me the same thing
- an interesting cross-crip hidari hiza guruma
- nice tweaks to o-soto-gari
- good 'head control' kuzushi methods
- rolling 'leg-pick' (aka kneebar method from Sambo) good for a failed uchimata
- interesting o-uchi-gari variation, similar to the RMAX joint collapsing method, IIRC
- screwing pushups (get your mind out of the gutter!) and their application in forward driving pushes
- a very interesting seoinage variation
- uchikomi discussion
Then we started talking about my sore shoulder -- he's had some very nasty injuries there, so was quite familiar with the typical tests for rotator cuff problems and the like. It seems I got lucky, should be no serious problems! We practiced a lot of methods that should be really good for rehabbing my injury, such as:
- packing the shoulder
- six directions of rotations
- hands & knees, weighted rotations
- same from forearms
- stretch sideways / forwards
- standing theraband strengthening exercise
- similar one lying down & light weights, apparently very popular with Sumo players
Then we started playing with clubbells a bit (using my good arm of course). It is so great to meet someone who actually knows what he is doing with them! In the past I've mimicked a lot of the motions using arm strength, but without proper form. This is a recipe for trouble. Ryan made it clear how I had to focus on proper use of breath and hip-thrust (actually seven principes all up) when swinging them. We then looked at:
- swings
- swipes
- mills
It was awesome how he related the use of these surprisingly heavyk, awkward bloody things to grappling. In so many situations their proper use requires the _same_ body positions and movements as is necessary in Judo! So you train with one, and it is helping you somewhat with the other. He could demonstrate this quite clearly, which made it so much more interesting for me ... these are far more relevant than a lot of other excercise methods, I think, and I'm highly remotived to practice with them.
Then we went over the old four-corner-balance drill, and I was reminded again about what a great routine that is for building a strong foundation of leg/joint strength coupled with good balance.
By this time, we'd spent over two hours playing around, and it was time to go or else I'd miss my train to the airport. I really look forward to meeting up with my new friend again one day! He has a lovely wife and beautiful little girl; maybe our kids will play together one day.
As it was, I got to the checkin counter 8 minutes before it closed! There was a bit of panic everywhere, let me tell you :-) Cliff was wondering if I would make it ... and if I didn't, maybe I'd be better off _staying_ in Japan, heh.
If only! What an awesome place. Now I'm down in Sydney for a few days ... I will continue this blog one more day I think.
I woke up early and hopped on the train to Osaka, and stashed my bag in a locker there. Then I found my way to a sento I'd read about on the net. It was in a bit of a seedy area ... and while I was there, a Yakuza guy came in to use the sento! I knew him because he was covered from his wrists to his bum in a huge dragon tattoo winding across his body. He seemed nice enough, but luckily by the time he arrived I had to leave anyway; didn't want any trouble with gangsters!
It was a pretty good sento, with its denki (electro) bath cranked up high, second only to our Kyoto favourite Go-ko-yu. And cool interior decorations, check it out :-) I have a video but this connection is too slow, will upload it later.
cold tub in the corner, beside the denki tub.
hot tubs in the middle
(Also a neat little electric bike; actually I just saw one here in Bondi too)
Then I made my way over to the real point of the day, visiting Ryan Hurst. He is Japan's representative of the Circular Strength Training systems of RMAX inc, from Scott Sonnon. Sorry, that was was quite a mouthful!
Ryan is a great guy, very friendly, he and I really hit it off well - for the first hour or so we just chatted about Japan, crazy Americans, sentos, diet, martial arts, children, family ... basically life, the universe and everything. It is such a shame our trip worked out that I didn't meet him until the end -- if I could do it all again, I certainly would have found a way to spend a few of our first days down in the Kansai region over training with him. (Though I sure wouldn't have missed our Butokuden experience for anything!)
I recorded fairly copious notes on the way home, which I don't want to reproduce here, but I will summarize.
So, Soon enough we started on with some Judo.
- posture & weighting concepts
- an interesting angle on the hikkite (drawing) arm; incidently the old tai-otoshi wizard at Maranouchi showed me the same thing
- an interesting cross-crip hidari hiza guruma
- nice tweaks to o-soto-gari
- good 'head control' kuzushi methods
- rolling 'leg-pick' (aka kneebar method from Sambo) good for a failed uchimata
- interesting o-uchi-gari variation, similar to the RMAX joint collapsing method, IIRC
- screwing pushups (get your mind out of the gutter!) and their application in forward driving pushes
- a very interesting seoinage variation
- uchikomi discussion
Then we started talking about my sore shoulder -- he's had some very nasty injuries there, so was quite familiar with the typical tests for rotator cuff problems and the like. It seems I got lucky, should be no serious problems! We practiced a lot of methods that should be really good for rehabbing my injury, such as:
- packing the shoulder
- six directions of rotations
- hands & knees, weighted rotations
- same from forearms
- stretch sideways / forwards
- standing theraband strengthening exercise
- similar one lying down & light weights, apparently very popular with Sumo players
Then we started playing with clubbells a bit (using my good arm of course). It is so great to meet someone who actually knows what he is doing with them! In the past I've mimicked a lot of the motions using arm strength, but without proper form. This is a recipe for trouble. Ryan made it clear how I had to focus on proper use of breath and hip-thrust (actually seven principes all up) when swinging them. We then looked at:
- swings
- swipes
- mills
It was awesome how he related the use of these surprisingly heavyk, awkward bloody things to grappling. In so many situations their proper use requires the _same_ body positions and movements as is necessary in Judo! So you train with one, and it is helping you somewhat with the other. He could demonstrate this quite clearly, which made it so much more interesting for me ... these are far more relevant than a lot of other excercise methods, I think, and I'm highly remotived to practice with them.
Then we went over the old four-corner-balance drill, and I was reminded again about what a great routine that is for building a strong foundation of leg/joint strength coupled with good balance.
By this time, we'd spent over two hours playing around, and it was time to go or else I'd miss my train to the airport. I really look forward to meeting up with my new friend again one day! He has a lovely wife and beautiful little girl; maybe our kids will play together one day.
As it was, I got to the checkin counter 8 minutes before it closed! There was a bit of panic everywhere, let me tell you :-) Cliff was wondering if I would make it ... and if I didn't, maybe I'd be better off _staying_ in Japan, heh.
If only! What an awesome place. Now I'm down in Sydney for a few days ... I will continue this blog one more day I think.
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Day 17 - Tues 28 - Emperor's Palace
Ok, our 2nd last day in Kyoto, we went and did the tour of the emperor's palace. This isn't used now, the Emperor resides in Tokyo (iirc). This one has a funny history - it kept getting burned down. Many, many times. Each time, the E moved into a little side palace. Eventually they said bugger it, and just decided to live in the side-palace, which we visited here. Except that it has been burned down heaps of times too! All this wooden construction materials, and buildings joined by wooden hallways, makes fire a devasting event.
These rooms were for visitors to wait in, depending on your status. First, the cherry blossom room.
next level up, was the crane room
top-level people get to use the tiger room
the bright orange colour was meant to scare away bad ghosts
the E's main gate. We came in the servant's entrance :-)
This is a display showing how the roof was made. It lasted 25 years or so, and is comprised of many layers of bark, skewered down hard with bamboo nails.
And then my favourite bit, the gardens
Funny building we passed on the way to lunch. Its some funky new religon's place, apparently.
a monk on the side of the road
and riding back to K's house beside the river. a nice bird
fishermen
their targets!
nice white bird. egret?
white bird flying
homeless live under the river bridges
they are pretty well set up, and must save a lot on rent!
OK, now we're off to hopefully find some cheap tempura, and then to the lovely Goko-yo sento.
These rooms were for visitors to wait in, depending on your status. First, the cherry blossom room.
next level up, was the crane room
top-level people get to use the tiger room
the bright orange colour was meant to scare away bad ghosts
the E's main gate. We came in the servant's entrance :-)
This is a display showing how the roof was made. It lasted 25 years or so, and is comprised of many layers of bark, skewered down hard with bamboo nails.
And then my favourite bit, the gardens
Funny building we passed on the way to lunch. Its some funky new religon's place, apparently.
a monk on the side of the road
and riding back to K's house beside the river. a nice bird
fishermen
their targets!
nice white bird. egret?
white bird flying
homeless live under the river bridges
they are pretty well set up, and must save a lot on rent!
OK, now we're off to hopefully find some cheap tempura, and then to the lovely Goko-yo sento.
Sunday, October 26, 2008
Day 16 - Mon 27 - exploring Kyoto again
Tomo sent me two more from Saturday night. Chihiro was loving the camera and took this photo
I think I was practicing how to say 'cheese' in Japanese
So, now we're in Kyoto, and its a great day. Again we've rented bicycles. We've gone up to see a normal shrine.
Cool dragon eh? We thought this might be a magic wishing fountain, but not sure now.
neat statue just on a street corner
symbol up on the wall on a Butokuden building wall
Also at the Butokuden. I have no idea what it says, but sure looks cool.
There are lots of Budo stores around this area, naturally. They had gi's, punching equipment, and some very high quality sets of armour and weaponry on display.
This one was around 500 years old, and probably blooded ...
The price on it was 2,000,000 yen, or $35,493 AUD !!
This is a naginata up on a wall at another budo store. Traditionally a women's weapon used in household defence, it is a long spear with a curving blade at the end.
We wandered the Nishiki Market after this. Lots of crazy vegetable displays
and then visited a garden close to K's House. The wall is nice, bamboo interspersed with reed bundles.
We were a bit early for changing colour leaves, but still it was great.
We stopped for a drink on the way to the Funoaka Onsen tonight, and beside the convenience store was this strange garden. Around the central disk window, was a glass window with water running down
and here is a close-up of the strange alien ... tooth (?) sculpture in the middle
The Funuaka Onsen was really, really nice! Its in second place, not far behind the Saitama Super Sento. Cliff didn't have any trouble with his tats - in fact, there were Japanese in here that also had them. Hmmm....
There was a nice outdoors hot and cold rocky pools too
I think I was practicing how to say 'cheese' in Japanese
So, now we're in Kyoto, and its a great day. Again we've rented bicycles. We've gone up to see a normal shrine.
Cool dragon eh? We thought this might be a magic wishing fountain, but not sure now.
neat statue just on a street corner
symbol up on the wall on a Butokuden building wall
Also at the Butokuden. I have no idea what it says, but sure looks cool.
There are lots of Budo stores around this area, naturally. They had gi's, punching equipment, and some very high quality sets of armour and weaponry on display.
This one was around 500 years old, and probably blooded ...
The price on it was 2,000,000 yen, or $35,493 AUD !!
This is a naginata up on a wall at another budo store. Traditionally a women's weapon used in household defence, it is a long spear with a curving blade at the end.
We wandered the Nishiki Market after this. Lots of crazy vegetable displays
and then visited a garden close to K's House. The wall is nice, bamboo interspersed with reed bundles.
We were a bit early for changing colour leaves, but still it was great.
We stopped for a drink on the way to the Funoaka Onsen tonight, and beside the convenience store was this strange garden. Around the central disk window, was a glass window with water running down
and here is a close-up of the strange alien ... tooth (?) sculpture in the middle
The Funuaka Onsen was really, really nice! Its in second place, not far behind the Saitama Super Sento. Cliff didn't have any trouble with his tats - in fact, there were Japanese in here that also had them. Hmmm....
There was a nice outdoors hot and cold rocky pools too
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