Balloongieko!

[Chook]

Hey all,
We had Balloongeiko at the dojo last night. If you're not aware of what this is, everyone gets a balloon tied to their mengane. Everyone gets in a circle and when the signal is given, it's a free-for-all. Once your balloon is popped, you're "dead" and have to sit out. At the end, the winner has the final balloon, and it's the whole dojo against the winner to see how long they last... :devious:

Video here of last night's training. It's a 23MB divx.

http://tastywheat.shackspace.com/balloongeiko.wmv

It's not exactly the cleanest kendo, but it's a hell of a lot of fun, heh.

[ShinKenshi]

Looks like a lot of fun. The guy who lasted the longest, what rank is he? His form looked really good. Looked like everybody spent a quite a bit of the time in jodan. Wish we had more people in bogu to try something like that where I am.

[Chook]

That's Dave Bunder, Yondan. I was the poor bugger who had to solo him at the end :ko:

[Anime12478]

No wonder he was able to hold so well against the rest of you. That was an interesting exercise there!

[nodachi]

What are the guidelines for ballongeiko? Are there any rules so that there are not ridiculous collisions and injuries from people running between other peoples individual confrontations or anything like that? I could see how this would be a ton of fun, but does everyone just take extra care before running through or are there set rules for safety?

[Kiyohiko]

wow, ballongeiko, that's such a smart idea! Sounds like a lot of fun :)

[T.Lee]

you should resize that video into something more bandwidth friendly.

and nice dojo floor btw.

[Chook]

I could see how this would be a ton of fun, but does everyone just take extra care before running through or are there set rules for safety?

Basically, nobody can get atacked from behind. It's a frontal assault or from the side.

[rottunpunk]

that looks way fun.

in aikido we did knife attack defences with washable markers. that was messy. it makes you realise how difficult the real thing is as well as having fun.
:p

[h2o]

Yeah! Ballon kendo is great fun :)
We've done another variant where we divide everyone into two teams, and then line up at each side of the dojo. Then on signal we attack the person standing on the opposite side. Simultaneous kiai is nice :D

[Andoru]

That looks like heaps of fun!!!

[iam_pk]

thats awsome!!!!!! i wanna try that sometimes!!!!!!!!

[stephanie dee]

Wow! That looks brilliant! Loadsa fun! Love the flying bits of balloon matter when they pop!

[nodachi]

Those aren't bits of balloon flying around, they are the blood and guts of your enemies as you slice them in half on the battlefield... MWHAA MHWAA HAA!!!

[Mugu]

I think they should have filled the balloons with water, it would've been more fun, kekeke j/k :p

I think it's a fun and great excercise to learn to defend your Men at all cost! I wish my dojo does it sometimes, I'm suggesting this to Sensei :)