A couple of questions

[King of Blades]

Hi, im new to this forum, and i have a great love for the art of kendo. but i am concerned because my good friend Jin taught me Kendo, but not in an official dojo. i was taught privately at his home. My concern is that i have learned a good amount techniques, but i believe i am missing out on some important elements of the art. i was taught strictly attacking and countering techniques, and i am pretty good in a match, but i think there are other things i havent learned. i asked my friend if there was anything besides attacking and countering i could learn, but he replied with "i am teaching you everything." are there other aspeccts of this art i have not been taught? it just seemed wrong to me that there was no mention of the spiritual aspect, which seems to be one of the core areas of most if not all martial arts. thanks in advance.

[Genya]

I got nothing more to say than if you really want to practice kendo try to find dojo near you. Watch one or two practices, if you are interested ask if you can join them. That way you´ll get to learn real kendo. Best way to learn is in the dojo with sensei and other students. If your friend does kendo and is good at it I think he hasn´t teached you anything wrong but might have missed something that you learn from dojo.

[nodachi]

No one can teach you everything, even the best sensei. Much that there is to learn in kendo needs to be discovered on your own while working through the usual assortment of drills and practicing with many others in a normal dojo. The spiritual stuff usually isn't directly instructed since it is open to interpretation. So ya... get to a dojo if you really want to learn. Your friend may or may not be teaching you properly, but you need the interaction with many others to really learn. Different techniques work against different people and you need a group so you don't get into a rut from only going against one person's style.

[Newbie]

May I ask what rank the guy teaching you is?

[mark]

Part of what you need to learn can only be discovered if you train under a sensei with a great number of other people both stronger and weaker than yourself. If your friend has taken the time to train with you, he/she would also likely benefit from training in a dojo with a strong sensei.

[King of Blades]

thank you all for your feedback. i tried to locate a dojo nearby, but the only one is an hour and a half away and thats too far to drive. thats why i started training with my friend. i can see how training with others would help. i have one other question as well: can i still enter tournaments and competitions or do i need to be a member of an official dojo ( i mean one that is part of a kendo federation)?

Newbie- he told me he is 2nd dan, but i have nothing to go on but his word. he is a trustworthy guy though.

[ScottUK]

I expect you'll need to be a member of the host organisation. Whereabouts are you in the US?

[King of Blades]

i'm located in richmond, virginia.

[pgsmith]

Had a couple of minutes, so I went to the forum entitled DOJO, and looked in the sticky that Hamish put at the top of that forum entitled NEED A DOJO? LOOK HERE FIRST. I then followed the links for the U.S. Kendo Federation, looked up dojo by state. Looked at Virginia and, lo and behold ... Kendo in Richmond, Virginia ...

http://www.koryomartialarts.org/kendo/

Why do people ask questions before bothering to look for answers first?

Sorry King, but it's one of my pet peeves.

I have a lot of them ...

[King of Blades]

hey i didnt ask where a dojo was located! i said specifically that the only one nearby was an hour and a half away. so maybe try reading the rest of the posts next time?

[ScottUK]

Bloody hell! How big is Richmond? You can't drive across the city in an hour and a half? Not going on walking holidays there...

[King of Blades]

what do you mean? no it doesnt take an hour and a half to cross richmond, but i couldnt find a dojo in the city. the nearest one i saw was outside of it... way outside.

[King of Blades]

pgsmith- forgive me for being hasty in reading your message. i didnt read it completely, but i snapped at you saying you didnt read the previous posts. sorry about that. i looked at the link and i plan to go check out this dojo. thank you for your help. again i apologize for being an a$$.

[pgsmith]

pgsmith- forgive me for being hasty in reading your message.
As our Aussie friends say ... No worries mate! I'm just glad that you're going to go check out the dojo. It's really the only way to actually learn kendo properly.

Good luck.

[Alison2805]

Hi, im new to this forum, and i have a great love for the art of kendo. but i am concerned because my good friend Jin taught me Kendo, but not in an official dojo. i was taught privately at his home. My concern is that i have learned a good amount techniques, but i believe i am missing out on some important elements of the art. i was taught strictly attacking and countering techniques, and i am pretty good in a match, but i think there are other things i havent learned. i asked my friend if there was anything besides attacking and countering i could learn, but he replied with "i am teaching you everything." are there other aspeccts of this art i have not been taught? it just seemed wrong to me that there was no mention of the spiritual aspect, which seems to be one of the core areas of most if not all martial arts. thanks in advance.

If your friend is a kendoka, where does he train? Cant you get a lift with him? If he's not training, how long has it been since he did?? what the hell is he doing teaching other people?? I used to drive 4 hours a week to learn golf and I hated the damn sport. If you enjoy kendo and really want to improve a 1.5hr drive wont be that bad.


In my personal (and possibly offensive) opinion, your friend is an ass. Was he the one that had the opinion that the dojo was too far away? He has deprived you of all the wonderful benefits of being part of a dojo, being part of a club, the etiquite that goes with that, being able to practise with a variety of people, the experience of gradings, shiai, etc etc. If he really wanted you to become a good kendoka he would have made sure you joined a dojo, made sure you were a member of the appropriate associations etc.

I could teach someone to be a geo at home, if I was arrogant enough not to realise that Id be putting them at a BIG disadvantage when they decided to go to university to do it - I cant show them the wide variety of stuff you learn when you have 6 or so professors to do it. Its very hard for someone who thinks they already know about something to learn it the proper way from scratch.

Good on you for getting on here to find out if youre missing out on stuff in your training!! Now get into that dojo!! Youll love it.

[King of Blades]

thanks allison. my friend is no longer in training, but i understand what you're saying. i am definitley going to check out that dojo. i gotta go though. mom's breathing down my neck because she needs the computer. thanks again.

[Alison2805]

:] good on ya!

[ScottUK]

King,

Just out of interest, how old are you?

[King of Blades]

i am 16... i'll be 17 in about 3 months.

[mark]

i am 16... i'll be 17 in about 3 months.

It is a great age to start kendo.

How old is your friend who was your kendo teacher?

[King of Blades]

He is 20... he started kendo when he was 10 i think. But i just realizesd something after looking at the rest of the topics on the forums... what the hell is "Kote" and "Men" and stuff like that? the only word i recognize here is waza (technique?) i'm getting a wierd feeling that i'm not learning kendo... rather a form of fancy backyard stick fighting...

[dimfeld]

Take a look at http://www.eanet.com/sckf/refinfo.htm. The first few links there list many Kendo terms and their meanings. "Kote" and "men" are in the equipment section.

[verissimus]

I'm curious though: what do you yell when you strike men or kote, if you don't know what they are?

[King of Blades]

thats the point. i dont yell. my teacher never told me too. im beginning to wonder what he really knows about kendo.

[ender84567]

as tagawa sensei would say, people have no buisness teaching anything they cannot do properly themselves, nidan is still a fairly low grade, i would hope they could hit men properly, but even alot of the sandan's i've seen have really bad habits that even i can spot after only doing kendo for a year.

[yahiko_venom]

king, tell me..... where do you hit? ya know, too score a point?

[verissimus]

I don't know your friend, or his abilities, so I won't comment about him, but it's pretty obvious that you need to join a dojo.

[ScottUK]

i am 16... i'll be 17 in about 3 months.How did you get to 6th dan in TKD (as stated in your profile) by such a young age? Is it:

a) you're a talented individual?

or

b) you are unaware that fantasy & reality are two different things?

Please tell me it is a) as b) gives me cause for concern over 'your friend' teaching you kendo.

[King of Blades]

Yeah, all i know about my friend's kendo experience is what he told me. He also taught me Tae Kwon Do...at least after i became a 1st Dan and quit training at my dojang. He awarded me a new degree about once a year after testing what i had learned. I know that sounds kind of dumb and untraditional... but i know that a real, dojang-trained 6th dan would own me violently in a sparring match. So, i'm not lying and saying that i've trained for many years. I just wasn't very clear on my training. perhaps i should take that out of my profile, since it seems to give people the wrong idea. sorry about that.

[Paikea]

Yeah, all i know about my friend's kendo experience is what he told me. He also taught me Tae Kwon Do...at least after i became a 1st Dan and quit training at my dojang. He awarded me a new degree about once a year after testing what i had learned. I know that sounds kind of dumb and untraditional... but i know that a real, dojang-trained 6th dan would own me violently in a sparring match. So, i'm not lying and saying that i've trained for many years. I just wasn't very clear on my training. perhaps i should take that out of my profile, since it seems to give people the wrong idea. sorry about that.This is classic!

[Bryan]

King of Blades- you are really not getting anywhere with this. just admit that you are trying to get attention. I'm 16 as well. I just got my 1st Dan after four years of hard, dedicated training. Nobody can become a sixth degree black belt that quickly. Nobody. I'm with Scott. you are living in a fantasy world. you can get help for things like this. Even a newb on this forum like me can see through this.

Just realized something- you said you live in richmond in an earlier post. I'm in midlothan, which is not too far away. where did you train in TKD?

[King of Blades]

To all who have made recent posts: this is ridiculous. I am not lying. My friend really did teach me. Bryan- I trained at martial arts world for a year and then i became a black belt.

[Bryan]

To all who have made recent posts: this is ridiculous. I am not lying. My friend really did teach me. Bryan- I trained at martial arts world for a year and then i became a black belt.

that is the biggest load of BS. my brother does TKD at Martial Arts World and it took him three years to become a first dan. then it took another 2 on top of that to become second. you lie like a rug, my friend. just stop trying.

[KhawMengLee]

To all who have made recent posts: this is ridiculous. I am not lying. My friend really did teach me. Bryan- I trained at martial arts world for a year and then i became a black belt.

Why does this feel like I'm reading Robert Hamburger's Ninja website all over again?

[mark]

To all who have made recent posts: this is ridiculous. I am not lying. My friend really did teach me. Bryan- I trained at martial arts world for a year and then i became a black belt.

None of this really matters.

What does matter is that you have decided to go to a real dojo and will practice hard in order to kick yudansha but at next years competition. As the ad says" Just do it".

Let's just hope that you have not picked up too many bad habits that you will have to unlearn.

BTW, expect to sweat a lot, pick up tons of blisters, and not get to fight in armor for at least six months.

[pgsmith]

King,
I advise you to listen to Mark here. It's nice that your friend has worked with you, but it's pretty obvious that your friend is living in his own fantasy world. Remove any reference to dan ranking from your profile, believe that you really do know nothing (always approach budo with an empty cup), and get yourself to a dojo for some real training. It will be hard, repetitious, and require a lot of commitment and sweat. In the end, it will be more than worth it.

Good luck!

[Andou]

Note to all KWF users, I am not the Jin he is talking about.

[Bryan]

Andou- of course you aren't. I'm sure that you're a REAL kendoka. King of Blades, come to the Koryo martial arts dojo with me. we live very near eachother. if its too far to drive, you can hitch a ride with me.

[Alison2805]

Now we are getting somewhere!! Everyone stop insulting the kid - his friend is the ass, not him by the sounds. At least he was willing to get on here and find out what is wrong with his training. Plus he has been pretty humble about it. Thats more than most people in his situation are willing to do.

[neko kenshi]

Yeah, dude. Just go to a dojo and train. I'd avoid trying to defend yourself too much too. It just makes people look stupid.

[Andou]

Yeah, dude. Just go to a dojo and train. I'd avoid trying to defend yourself too much too. It just makes people look stupid.

No it doesn't! I'm not stupid! I swear that's just what my friends told me to do!

But seriously, practice--and if you have already welcome to the wonderful world of Kendo. Good luck and happy training.