A resume of our last International TaiKi Gasshuku in Honbu dojo Amsterdam

A  Resume of our International TaiKi Gasshuku in June 2011 in Amsterdam.

                                we counted > 35 participants…with special guests:

            shihans McDonagh (Sweden) and Lesueur (Orgeval, Paris), sensei Stoll (Pyrennees,             Toulouse)…and special lecturer Frank Heckman with a percussionist mr. Ziga from   Codarts (Rotterdam) Unfortunately one of our most true TaiKi friends mr.Jacques Legree         had to stay home…but his nice French team and a Swedish team joined us also.

The Shin-ShinBuKen staff:  Rob and Fred Quant and Jan sensei has a long tradition with gasshuku’s. Already in may 1974 and later when Iwama and Sawai sensei (junior) stayed with us in ShinBuKen, we organized another one that year in Vierhouten, in the middle of the woods of the Netherlands.

 

We continued these gasshuku or ‘outside training camp’  with several and different unique colleagues for a quite long period (18 times) in Vierhouten since. Later on we even organized the gasshuku in my Academy for Phys. Education and Teacher-building in Amsterdam, the ALO.

McDonagh sensei and mr. Christopher (Malaysia) came, Pascal Krieger sensei brought  a whole Swiss team and in 1994 Sato sensei came over in the ALO to teach. Then we had a period with a lot of changes… master Li came to France and we went to Henabihen, I got a new directory, a new building and our possibilities of lodging diminished…towards  a training for one day only. Sensei Li Yuan Ju taught several times in the old ALO and mr. Shimada visited us in 2005 in the new ALO dojo.

How happy we were when sensei McDonagh and his YoShinKen Seniors took over and treated us with a nice location and perfect budo atmosphere in 2006 Lygnared Sweden. For five years we were their guest, until last year 2010 and we share unforgettable experiences together over there.

At the last European meeting McDonagh sensei stated he wanted to hand down the gasshuku initiative to another country. France and Holland were thinking about it…and as I had a new kind of format for this gasshuku …it became Amsterdam…and in our new Shin-ShinBuKen TaiKi Honbu dojo.

And so Shin-ShinBuKen became the host for the International Gasshuku 2011. Starting at Friday evening 17^th  of June and lasting until afternoon Sunday 19^th …with a perfect finishing touch of dinner together at sensei Bakker’s.

At Thursday evening we started with a program of socializing, a drink and an Indonesian dinner together…and a perfect lecture of Senior Conradi, yondan aikido about ‘Budo and it’s values’.

We had planned a nice location for our outside morning renshu in ‘het Twiske’ …but the weather forecast was utmost clear: rainshowers!…also on Sunday. So all training sessions (4x)  were given in our Honbu Dojo. And although some could participate for one day only…on both days we trained with over 35 kenpoka…and we managed to enjoy lunch together in our Shin-SBK-canteen and at Saturday evening we had a nice meal in the tavern of ‘het Sluisje’ at the old sea dike of Amsterdam North.

Although we feared several predictable problems…it all went perfect.  Head-teacher in charge Kallenbach sensei had his program and continuing red methodical line ready…and everybody with less kinesphere around seemed to move especially carefully now…and also the close community, the teachers…it  áll created a kind of concentration, a kind of mental melting pot, in which everyone created his own excellence!

The guiding essence of this 2011 gasshuku was…”how to show your TaiKi essence” and “how to handle your Bull”.

A difficult item as many m.a. schools propagate to be and move ‘strong’ above all… with which they create an idea of the modern gladiator…which in no way is a good model to grow and succeed in budo and life. So we wanted to make a statement this time and posed:

                           ‘it is nice to be strong, but is more important to be the best’ …

                                   and… we don’t fight a bull in the bull’s  way…

           we are human TaiKi martial artists and use waza, ki, strategy and human mental power.

Besides the lecture from mr. Conradi, all participants got a lecture from Jan sensei and gasshuku Guideline Paper…so they could  also mentally follow our items.

There was special ‘waza’ instruction…a special lesson: ‘how to play with the elements of moving’,  a session:  ‘performance of waza’ (TaiKi essence) , ‘embu’ meeting with the ‘unextpected’,  ’tanshu’ (freefight)  and ‘solo tanshu’.

This last item culminated in a perfect happening when mr. Ziga  guided the TaiKi players with his drums and bells during their moving…and so the kenpoka showed their personal and specific  moving signature in  their ‘tanshu-moving’ performance.

We finished with a special grading ceremony…mr. Alain Stoll, a Shotokai karateka yondan, and true shugyosa (see his book: Parcours d’un Adepte) who we know since 1988 and who ever since kept up contact with us wherever we taught…was incorporated in the TaiKi Family and was awarded a Moku-roku Menkyo (yondan) certificate with the Renshi allowance to teach TaiKi.

For him personally a very nice moment after such a long search and of 7 years experience with TaiKi in Yokohama Japan, where he trained with Shimada sensei. Our Congratulations!

After the Reigi…we all departed to sensei Hans and Daphne’s house where a splendid Suriname dinner was waiting for us. The one’s who had to travel home a long way, where treated first and the others enjoyed their stay with the Bakkers’.

Jan Kallenbach

TaiKi Kyoshi