The fourth Aikido practice in Guayaquil almost was in danger of non-existence. When I arrived at the dojo, there was nobody. I called Herbert (the sensei) and just as I was calling, the replacement teacher arrived to open the door. Herbert wasn’t coming today and this was for a number of students a reason not to show up. I don’t really understand why, because his replacement doesn’t wear a hakama for no reason, he is competent. Nevertheless, when a father showed up to bring his kid to practice and heard that Herbert wasn’t coming, they both left. Later I heard that he thought his child would be hurt or something. Remembering how the same boy was thrown around on Tuesday, I couldn’t imagine it any worse (even though he wasn’t harmed in any way on Tuesday).
Anyway, there we were, the two of us waiting for at least two others to show up, since a private lesson just wasn’t going to happen. Luckily for me, two others did show up. And this is still close to a private lesson. We started out like most days, but we skipped the torturing of the legs and we didn’t do any rolling either. I guess we skipped all that, because we weren’t going to use the legs that extensively today. We proceed after meditation with a form of kokyo ho, standing up. That is, a kokyo nage without the nage (throw), meant to relax.
We then continue with the basic techniques and spend quite some time on them. Ikyo was just a bit different then I’m used to. That, or it is explained differently. Starting with bringing uke out of balance by pushing the elbow up and walk forward, bringing the arm down. Here is where it really is different: you don’t continue the forward movement, but rather walk around uke and while turning him around, blending him with the mat (tatami). The Ura version is different in my memory as well. Pushing uke out of balance all the same, but by stepping into the back, doing an irimi tenkan, bringing him to the knees, kneel down with the knee closest to him in his armpit. At this point the hand of uke rests on my knee, and then kneel down entirely. This technique has been known to me before, but we never use it because it is slightly uncomfortable. Then move away, while still controlling the hand and let go.
Nikyo, as we do it everywhere, starts out the same, omote and ura. But when turning the hand in to the lock position, the arm of uke rests on the knee of tori, who is at that moment in a stable and relaxed position. This makes it that tori has all the time in the world to get the right grip. Now in omote, tori does the same as with ikyo: turn around uke and kneel down. Pushing uke’s arm down in a 45° angle and pushing the fingers to his face. The ura form is about walking out, pushing uke’s hand to your chest (not the shoulder), while holding the elbow down, and bend forward a little. This should hurt like hell, so Uke kneels down. Sensei shows us that if you wait too long with putting this lock on, uke can go down earlier and kick tori in the groin. And that would not be the desired effect. Anyway, after uke kneels down, you blend him with the mat and make the usual end control (pinky side in the elbow and turn.
The sankyo technique we did the hard way. Even with omote, grabbing the hand in a lock and pushing it to the face. Then hack down and step in front, pulling uke down on the way. The end control is done standing up. Ura is different. When the hand goes to the face, tori makes a tenkan, ending up on the other side of uke, but since this hurts, uke moves along. Then ‘push’ uke down and move in the opposite direction (standing in front of uke and moving towards him), dragging him down further.
When I tell sensei later that we do the basic techniques a little bit different in the Netherlands, he says I should teach next week. Being only 5th kyu, I’m not sure I wish to. Besides, I’m not even sure I still know the Dutch techniques that well…
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