Fundamentals to Kendo
The following article is written by Cosmo, Quartermaster of UStA Kendo Club to highlight their experience at the Fundamentals of Kendo Seminar in Glasgow.
Early on November 11th we travelled to Glasgow for this year’s first kendo seminar – The Fundamentals of Kendo Seminar, hosted by Jacqueline Graham sensei (4th dan), Barry Straughan sensei (6th dan) and Dez Whitson sensei (6th dan). This seminar brought together university students from all across Scotland, and for many members of the St Andrews Kendo Club, it was their first-time practicing kendo outside of the University. We had participated in a practice session – ‘keiko’ in kendo terminology – at the Edinburgh City Club once this semester, but this was a completely different experience.
The trip itself turned out to be very painless, in sharp contrast to our trip to Edinburgh a couple weeks before, as all the buses and trains went on time. The relatively stress-free trip allowed us to prepare ourselves mentally for the intensive keiko that was ahead of us, as well as reinforce our team spirit! As one member of the St Andrews Kendo Club said: “Travelling together is a really special opportunity to make special team memories and random jokes. Hauling equipment to and from Glasgow from here is team bonding and no one can convince me otherwise!”
We were 11 members travelling to Glasgow, 6 of us having started kendo this very semester, and all of us started kendo at St Andrews. Despite the widely varying skill levels of everyone attending, we all had the opportunity to learn from the very experienced senseis (teachers) who were leading the seminar. Even our Captain, a 2nd dan (kendo rankings go from between 6th and 1st kyu, most UStA Kendo are somewhere in that interval, and then from 1st dan to 8th dan) had a lot to learn, which was motivational for us all: “Our captain is an amazing teacher, but it was cool to see her in an environment where she was also just as much of a student as we were when we have normal practice. It was motivating to know that we’re all still just trying to get better and there are always going to be other people we can learn from!”
During the seminar we were split into two different groups depending on whether one wore ‘bogu’ (armour) or not. Wearing bogu usually comes at a later stage of learning kendo, but different university clubs have different criteria for when new kendoka (kendo practitioner) can start wearing it, and so there was a nice mix of skill levels in both groups. The bogu-donning group practised some of the backbone exercises of keiko, which are usually a predefined set of strikes and movements, whereas the non-bogu wearing group focused more on the fundamental components of strikes and movements in kendo, though both groups emphasised both aspects.
At the start of the seminar, everyone in common enjoyed a talk on proper etiquette and how to carry yourself in the dojo, as well as showing respect to your partners and teachers.
The two groups practising.
Being taught by several different senseis, we got to see the different ways concepts in kendo, which is a martial art and thus has wider interpretability than sports usually do, can be understood and implemented in our own kendo. One of our members wrote: “Everyone has slightly different ways of explaining techniques and it was definitely helpful to learn new perspectives and put them into practice,” and I completely agree! The discussion on ‘zanshin’ – remaining spirit – was interesting in that it departed completely from how I had previously understood it. While zanshin could be interpreted as the constant awareness of my partner after my strike, one of the senseis at the seminar spoke of it as the remaining spirit of the strike itself, lingering on the consciousness of the partner. This had many implications for how we approach and recover from a strike.
After the seminar we all – the 50 odd attendees – headed for drinks at a local bar. Getting to meet people from the different attending University clubs was a great experience, as you really got the impression that the Scottish kendo community is quite close and supportive of each other, and reflecting on the past day of travelling and training made for a great ending to the trip’s time in Glasgow: “The atmosphere was great as there were so many people attending, the largest training session I’d ever been to, and it was really fun to interact with the other university clubs!”
Despite almost missing the train from Edinburgh to Leuchars because of an infectious fit of laughter, the trip back went relatively smoothly as well, and provided a good opportunity to reflect back on what we had learnt over the course of the day. From hair braiding to boba, from etiquette in the dojo to proper footwork, and with shared joy and stress of having to practice in front of most of our kendo peers and teachers, the trip proved an incredible experience of team bonding, of learning, and of reflecting on our progress up to that point, and the long way forward that we had before us.
Currently, we are hoping to participate in the Scottish University Taikai (competition) early next year, and of course keep working on and progressing in our kendo, because it is a journey of physical and mental learning which never ends.