Mrs. Wang Yu Fong passed away on 14th of March 2012.

We got news from ANYDA and Jeanluc Lesueur sensei mrs. Wang Yu Fong has passed away recently on the 14th of March and at 92 years of age.

Like many other older Chinese m.a. masters and continuing in the footsteps of her famous father O-sensei Wang Chang Zhai - called China's National Fist-  she has known her hardships. Especially during the Mao regime, when during an attack by young red radical Mao followers a gang tried to rob the house and tried to molest her. She defended herself and the house bravely and made the gang withdraw, but got hurt so severly in one kneejoint...she always kept problems.
She was a brave and open women and we could talk with her frankly.

We had met her already before in France when she came teaching Yi-Chuan at Jeanluc Lesueur's dojo. We visited her later in 2003 at her home in Beijing, when we went there to make a movie about the martial arts and its practitioners. See the interesting movie made by Eline Flipse called 'Eat your Enemy' (uitg. Boeddhistische Omroep Ned.) ...in which several other special teachers were interviewd and depicted also, like master Li Yuan Ju and Otake Risuke.
Still a handsome lady with a cerain dignity, she spoke frankly with me about our roots...like the challenge master Sawai had with her father...and how Sawai sensei became his student and frequented the Wang family.
She knew everything well about this period and     spoke begninantly about Sascha san (Sawai sensei) and how he supplied them with food, when there was a crying shortage.
Anyhow a relieving sound for me hearing all this from somebody so close...especially as many modern Chinese m.a. people mostly show a tendency to describe sensei in a negative way!

We stayed a whole day with her and the Yi-chuan group, who invited us for lunch together.
A good and very inspiring moment in my life and and a very nice encouter with the pure roots of Yi-
Chuan or Ta Cheng Chuan. Above you see us both exchanging news and interesting stories. At left you can witness us with her daughter and son...both practicing Yi-Chuan and also in a medical way, as therapists. A nice family, a very interesting meeting with Wang Chang Chai's daughter and grandchildren in Beijing december 2003 and a good memory of this very special women in the martial arts.

Shimada seminar in Honbu dojo

   

Wang Shujin (1904-1981)

TaiKi Seminar in dojo Municipal in Orgeval France, 11-12 Febr.012

the TaiKi participants, far right sensei Stoll, far left standing
sensei Jan...the long one near the centre is senior Frans

Senior Frans Befort and sensei Jan went to Orgeval.
In the dojo municipal where sensei Jeanluc Lesueur teaches regulary...we made a two days seminar.
There were students who really made an effort to
join us, as they had to come far away from the east:  from Graz (Austria) and from the south, from the
Pyrennees.

with the Hanshi Menkyo certificate from the FIAMT organisation

The weather was real cold, but the atmosphere outside and inside the dojo was perfect!

new training routines with the Punching Daruma Man

Above TaiKi punching
on our new 'Black Punching Daruma'

It gives us nice punching / kicking routines...next to the routines on our usual hanging punching bags, especially as it balances around it's loaden foot. This Daruma has 75 kg of sand in its basement.

So while attacking one always needs to create the right moment for hitting...as the upper body of this Daruma man moves around.

      This Black Punching Daruma was purchased at our ' neighbours'  the AiKi budo shop in Amsterdam.

at left Senior Daan's roundhouse kick

 

Our 2021 New Year Training, called Shin-nen Keiko.
After our traditional opening with the offering of a cup of sake by
the Seniors to the Juniors, all participants had to make a solo TaiKi practical performance.
One candidate for Seniorship Mark de Jong gave a performance with his electric bass guitar.
He displayed the special TaiKi Qualities with his guitar.
After the training and the performances we joined together for the club's New Year Reception.

Dear TaiKi members....

Honbu dojo announces a new initiative

It is with pleisure we announce a special series of TaiKi training, in which we concentrate on all ins and outs of 'kumite-training', or 'sparring' training in Honbu.

There are many prerequisites coming to the full kumite form...like tuis-shou, tanshu, (pre-)arranged kumite forms and free kumite forms.

In a good dojo there will be alsways a sensei to watch and control if the practitioners are delivering a good fight!

In TaiKi honbu Seniors like to build more experience on this item...interested Juniors can join also after admittance ...and we are happy Senior Marco Kraan, TaiKi Renshi and Senior Robert den Breeijen took the initiative and sensei Kraan is leading it.

The whole activity will stay under full auspices from the TaiKi Honbu dojo and the TaiKi teachers ofcourse.

We want to organize this Special TaiKi Training on every second saturday morning of the month 5 times until summer...from 10.30 - to 12.00 hrs.... with following dates:

11 februari/ 10 maart / 14 april / 12 mei/ 9 juni....from 10.30 till 12.00 o'clock

This means we choose for incorporating this special training in our regular saturday morningtraining, with this aspect that at the choosen days...the attentions goes to the kumite-item mainly.

Regular students can join ofcourse and don't have to miss this saturday. By the way, if you do know an interested fellow- trainee take him with you to our TaiKi training.

Please understand the regular training schedule on saturdaymorning will keep same time...from 10.00 - 12.00, especially for those who want to do ritsu-zen training before.

We do hope to see you and will be joining us...and according to our TaiKi nei-chia adagium and sensei's saying ...

"not every one can become the strongest, but all TaiKi kenpoka have to strive to become the best" ...and this training will offer you the possibilities.

For further info: responsible sensei's Marco Kraan...06 55868126 and Jan sensei 06 24273476

JAN KALLENBACH
TaiKi & Yi-Chuan Master-teacher

Sensei Jan Kallenbach yuri Marseille 2009

On photo Seniors  Marco Kraan and Hans Bakker during a good kumite in the dojo.
Note they fight barehanded, something we favor in TaiKi... as one is able to use more fighting possibilities than striking only...and will stay certainly more versatile. On a certain level - when there is the necessary control -   one is able to do it this way and for certain purposes we use other materials like boxing-gloves too.

Investigation in Honbu made clear...the students both Seniors and Juniuors want to have more kumite encouters / more training experience in kumite or tanshu.

Senior Marco Kraan (renshi licensed) will help us organizing it. Other Seniors offered their help and sensei Jan will join too.

 
We want to organize this TaiKi kumite
once a month / once in six weeks...and Marco will
make a schedule. For the moment is decided the regular saturday-morning lessons will be skipped for that special moment then, as we will organize it in our honbu with it's fascillities.

Also is decided that one's budo friends from other
disciplines may join; they have to pay a little contribution. So a saturday morning from 10.00 till 11.30 hrs sharp. Follow the news on this blog /or on the Facebook taikipractitioners account...or on the Facebook taikiken-honbu amsterdam account ...and read your email messages of our tai-i-ken@googlegroups.com  You can't miss it!

Contact the sensei Marco Kraan 06 20443124 / Hans Bakker 06 53328220 and for Rotterdam:
Senior Robert den Breeijen 06 911917868....and ofcourse the Honbu.

TaiKi's New Year Wishes for 2012

Sensei McDonagh and Jan sensei training with the boken in the Japanese garden of sensei  McDonagh in Gothenborg Sweden.
As previously announced,  the coming training period we will continue TaiKi ken-jutsu on a higher level in Honbu. Seniors are asked to find a good bo-ken and tanjo of their own,  as at their level they should master the TaiKi weapons as their own arms!

in memorial: Martin Gravestijn

Good newspaper reading friends acknowledged me about the passing away in august recently of my old training-mate during my stay in Japan in '67-'68 ... Martin Gravestijn (22-3-1937 -  9-8-2011).
After our return, Martin got a job at the police training-center in Ossendrecht. He would go to Japan later several times again and brought a Japanese wife with him.

Martin was a good man with special qualities...as a ikkyu in Judo and Kyokushin karate in the Budokai dojo of Jon Bluming where I taught at that moment...he decided one week before my announced departure to follow me to Japan. He made a shodan under Mas Oyama...but his arms and hands seemed to love the stick..so he concentrated on Shindo Muso Ryu Jodo and that's why he became welknown as a police stick trainer in Ossendrecht. Martin changed to Itosuryu karatedo later and leaves a club, students and children.
See Itosuryu.

In 1967 in front of Mas Oyama's Honbu dojo in Ikebukuro Tokyo with Oyama's famous bull struggle depicted on the wall behind...from left to right the author, the teaching sempai Royama Hatsuo and Okura and Martin Gravestijn.

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

Report from our last International TaiKi Gasshuku in June...Honbu Amsterdam

A real special TaiKi ability this time...one has to make a dedicated kick upward...yet so precisely done... the litlle beansack can land on your head. The landing really has to be a nei-chia activity, with your 'whole body'  and especially the head has to move so subtle, otherwise the sack will bounce off for sure.

Dedicated strength, space / environment awareness, adequate displacements. following your 'prey' with your eye ....and at the very moment you catch it with your upperhead. Please learn to move subtle too.
This is Senior Gert Molema in action.

TaiKi feeling for subtillity...

TaiKi long bo in Honbu

TaiKi team long bo triaining in Honbu 13th of april 2011.
We practised for over 2 month now...and as every one got the principles and ingredients to perform his own form, students can continue at home...and become better, preparing for next period of this budo weapon.
Seniors are working longer with the bo, but are still specializing to handle it with ease and let it work as a bo should work:
vigorous, yet precise and when you hold the bo right...and move with hara...the bo will start to move by itself.

The TaiKi Bo team in Honbu

This video showes  a special way of nei-chia TaiKi training, we call Tan-shu....
It looks like dancing, but it isn't. I can be a preparation for your way of fighting, or just a way of keeping mobile, agile and fit.
You can see it as the  'carte de visite' of a Senior kenpoka.

TaiKi Iai-ken (sword) training in Honbu dojo

In TaiKi we train with our shin-ken according to the principles and method of the TaiKi School of Sawai Kenichi sensei. Sensei was an experienced iai-jutsu-ka. Many fighting principles were developped by his experience with sword fighting...the footwork, the ma-ai, kamae, hara, the alert quickness of the zen-mind...and the sword really  influenced his ideas about deflecting, parrying, blocking, counterattacking.
So we make deliberate use of: of Zen-mind / flashing conentration / use of Hara as pivot / flexibility in moving and footwork / ki -steered actions/ Calmness in observing and handling the sword.

In this way our TaiKi iai-ken...is more or less an excellent equivalent of our Zen-training...the reason we call it  'Moving Zen',

Big Bo in action during TaiKi training

The TaiKi bo is a magnificent weapon...it is difficult to handle, as it is heavy and long...but when one has learnt to deal with these facts and is able to follow the possibilities of the bo...it can be wielded with flow..and becomes a formidable tool for selfdefense... and it can give you the pleisure it looks like it moves all by itself!

In the TaiKi tradition we first learn to move with tanto and tanjo (short stick) later on followed by the long bo and the bo-ken sword. Wielding the bo certainly asks for a senior level of training.
Above you see Senior Rob with boken vs Frans as bo-man.

kanji budo

 


















Calligraphy on the left: Do-jo...the 'place' (jo)  where the 'Way' (Do) is studied. Do comes from Tao and Taoism

Calligraphy on the right: Se-kai do-jo...the world is my dojo. (by sensei P. Krieger'sbook: Ten Jin Chi)

In this way we try to work in our Shin-ShinBuKen Honbu dojo...there should sound some laughter once in a while...just like in daily life..but when we make an effort to come all the way to train in the dojo....we should train and not talk or just hang around.
It is more or less like my old schoolteacher said to our class..."if you just want to do nothing...don't do it here'!  In this way his classroom was a kind of dojo.

At our New Year's Party we were able to place some nice presents from Otake Risuke shihan of the Katori Shinto Ryu school of Bujutsu under our dojo Shinden. The presents: a samourai doll with inscription and a samourai helmet (kabuto) Otake sensei gave to my family, when he and his Katori team -including Donn Draeger sensei, Kaminoda sensei, Tiki Shewan iai-do sensei- stayed with us giving budo exhibitions / training in Amsterdam 1980 (ALO dojo) and once more in 1984 when they were in in the Doelen theatre in Rotterdam during the big Japan Exhibiton (Yamato machi).

These presents found a good place in our dojo!

KATORI SHINTO RYU by Empty Mind Films

TaiKi Senior Seminar no 7: "are we still on our journey?"

With the help of our Seniors...a good lecture of Marco Kraan and lector Frank Heckman of Codarts we got good examples of answers on our queste for true budo and the question: 'are we still on our  Budo journey'.


Frank Heckman finished the Seminar and he all made us fully aware of our original dreams we all want
to fullfill....and as some of us already got so far on their way...with their dreams, their actualization...
the question and are we still on our road?  becomes real urgent!

Sandy Spil is missing on this picture as he was the photographer

Frank explaining the journey of the TaiKi Hero...are we still on our journey?

1e KBN karatedag 2010 Sensei Jan Kallenbach

  
On Sunday 21th of  nov.2010 TaiKi Honbu was asked to teach at a technical KBN day (Dutch Nat. Karatedo Fed.) in the brand new Sportscomplex the Universum in Science Park in Amsterdam.
Assisted by Senior Daan Dirkson and  Sensei Bert de Waart it became a nice day with TaiKi hanjo in the morning and TaiKi Stillness in Motion in the afternoon. The animo was goed and we were glad to meet  a few old Kyokushin members again.

see  http://picasaweb.google.com/114451353871695911100

A Life Long Journey

A most valuable meeting in Japan with the TaiKi Kyoshi Seniors in june 2010.

We had a very stimulating experience in the summer of 2004 when a European TaiKi delegation of six visited Japan to make acquaintance with the most famous TaiKi sensei.

In the meantime I went in 2007 once more with wife and daughter... also to tighten the ties with our Japanse TaiKi friends...but recently I went alone and I had several reasons for it.

This time I wanted to have good meetings and deeper talks with especially Sato sensei, Iwama sensei and Takagi Yasuhide, who runs the vast biggest TaiKi dojo in Japan and is a young promising organizer.

We dicussed the level of organisation and the responsability of  teachers for the building of their best students, and logically also the best way to do this. Our classical Menkyo grading is just one part of it.
For this moment I can say as most important, that the Teachers gave us in Europe full autorisation to continue the way we do it now!
As a token of confirmation I received an original stamp called 'hanko' with the writing:
Tai Ki Kenpo European Honbu which has to be used on all our official papers and certificates, indicating this paper contains the approval of full autorized Kyoshi teachers and has the full support of the Kyoshi Senior Teachers in Japan...who speak and act out of the name of Sawai soshi.

This what I for the moment can tell about the result of my trip. Maybe you can imagine I feel deeply honoured with this confidence the Teachers put in me and Marshall sensei's work.
So I bow... and say only 'onegai shimasu'

my last meeting with the TaiKi group, the Renshi and Kyoshi meeting at Ikebukuro 26-06-2010

the Place where it all started in 1967... the Meiji Jingu, with the traditinal mon-entrance gate....in this park Sawai sensei had a special  place where he trained early morning... and I found him.