カテゴリー: 2009年5月米国セミナー

There was nothing I didn’t like about the seminar except my own lack of ability to assimilate it instantly. And my flagging will to continue at points on Sunday afternoon. But that was me. I did hear Ark wonder if we needed to go to 6 on Saturday, so it might have gone an hour long each day. If I were in as good condition as you, I wouldn’t have noticed.

Something you could mention to Ark is my final conception of him. He seems to have a lot more power than Bruce Lee but he seems to have it by opposite approach. Where Bruce sort of collected techniques, taking something from judo, something from Northern Shaolin, something from boxing, something from aikido, Ark just develops the body to absorb and feed back forces to the opponent. And he’s fun to be around.

The information passed was concise, clear and meaningful. He is a wonderful instructor and seems to deal with each person on their own level.I had the feeling several times during the day that almost everyone was discovering new things that related to their practice.

I really enjoyed his work on the body mechanics of the arts and feel sure that going forward, this practice will become an core

part of my training and the principals that I teach.

I was impressed by the amount of time we got to spend training each day, and that Akuzawa Sensei seemed sincerely interested in giving us as much information as we could handle and taking the time to help us understand. It’s amazing that he tries so hard to give us in a short time what it took him many years of work to get himself. I really hope that we as a group can surprise him by making progress and getting other people interested.

The one improvement I think could be made is that there could be a more organized way for people to get “hands on” time with Akuzawa. For example, maybe if each person did pushout with him or received other techniques. I found him to be very accessible for those of us who were interested and asked questions, but it was easy for some people to sort of remain more in the background. I don’t think you can really understand what we’re trying to do unless you get the opportunity to feel Akuzawa Sensei. If the drill was that everyone had to push with him in turn then everyone would have an opportunity to get a glimpse of what this is about and possibly benefit from corrections at the same time.

On the whole, I thought the seminar was excellent. As I said previously, I’d rather get too much information than too little, and while I saw lots of topics discussed that I had to understand are just outside my reach for now I wouldn’t change this. It may be a long time before some of us get to see Akuzawa again, and some things may “click” later.

maybe we’ll have to save up for a trip to Tokyo…

Going to this seminar was kind of a leap of faith for me, and I wasn’t really sure what to expect, but it certainly exceeded my expectations. Ark were great, and graciously put up with all of my inane questions.

I am also glad that I purchased the dvd’s. I don’t think I could have remembered everything that was taught, and it is nice to have reference material to review the finer points.

I don’t recall ever feeling so uncoordinated in my life. As a result, I am not exactly sure what I was supposed to be feeling. I think I had some fleeting moments of feeling something, but I am hoping that the correct feeling will develop with more training. However, the one thing that I did come away with was a plan with specific exercises to start training with, and for that I am very grateful. The trip to Atlanta was completely worth it.

I also had some insight into a few things as a result of the seminar. The streching exercise at the beginning looked similar to ju no kata from judo, but it felt completely different from anything I had done before. The whole concept of kicking with the frame while maintaining the cross was also unique. There are similar moves in the judo solo exercises (5 direction kick), but again the Aunkai version felt completely different.