Training with a shinken

[mingshi]

He 'ordered' me to take my ikkyu at the lidstone.

Hmmm... Not sure about what's going on, but there is no ikkyu grading at the Lidstone. It should be the BKA grading on the following Sunday at Mumeishi, which is a completely separated event.

[Jamurai]

Why do you keep feeding him? He is either one of two things;

1. He's a troll, which means he's just here to bother us and get some flames going.
2. He's serious but thinks we are incredibly naive for believing that any sane kendo/kenjutsu teacher would ever "spar" with a student whilst using live steel and "titanium" armour.

It's no use agruing with him. We all know that you it's difficult to find even a mid-range Japanese style sword for any less than $1000USD. We know that no teacher in their right mind would ever fight his students with live swords. And we know that there is no way this kid has "titanium" armour. I wouldn't even waste my time, because he's probably going to leave the forum tomorrow anyway. Just a thought.

[The great I AM]

Man you gotta be really careful with your cheapo one Anjin san. I spent £35 on one and the blade fell off when I hit my partner on the head with it! It nearly fell into my foot! Yikes! I'm ok though, and Dave only bled for a few minutes, and his ear is fine now.


I think I'll spend a bit more on my new one, like Dartagnan, maybe £60 or so.

[EzzzE]

*cough* err this must be a joke... i mean it is blasphemy to call theese wallhangers katana..but to call them shinken.... :P

btw: that is what my 100€ katana looks like dissembled

http://www.deviantart.com/view/20777739/

don't want to use it....

EzzzE

[The great I AM]

*cough* err this must be a joke... i mean it is blasphemy to call theese wallhangers katana..but to call them shinken.... :P

btw: that is what my 100€ katana looks like dissembled

http://www.deviantart.com/view/20777739/

don't want to use it....

EzzzE

WOW! You got a good one! The bit at the bottom of my blade was completley rusted away, I guess thats why it came off so easily.

And the ebay description said shinken, so I called it a shinken. Whats wrong with that?!

[Anjin-san]

Earth to Najaf, Earth to Najaf......
Are you drunk again?

hahaha, Probably was...

Kaoru

I really find this offensive. Look, if you don't like the Kendo that I practice then you're entitled to your opinion. To mock me for something I do, just because its different to what you deem to be normal 'Kendo' is just plain silly... you... morons! Didn't you learn anything from the second world war?!?!?!! Dirka Dirka, mohammed jihad! Bak Dirka Shurpa!

[Anime12478]

WOW! You got a good one! The bit at the bottom of my blade was completley rusted away, I guess thats why it came off so easily.

And the ebay description said shinken, so I called it a shinken. Whats wrong with that?!

If you look at descriptions on Ebay, you will notice that the description may not be in total correlation to the item. For example, they are trying to sell you Megaman 2 for the NES. The description might read as such, "Megaman 2 NES, SNES, GBA, Gameboy, GBC, Gamecube, RARE!!!" Of course, the game was only on the NES. But sometimes, people use these descriptions just to pad out their title to come out from more searches (as annoying as it may be). This is likely what happened. The worst case scenario, with all of these samurai/sword movies that have been coming out and with the increasing popularity of Anime and Japanese culture, they use that description to sell an unsuspecting Japanophile what they think is a real shinken, when in fact it's a cheaply made one that should only be held in your hand, if that. While I can't really tell, I think that doing a bit of homework should let you know how to select a good one.

Try http://ejmas.com/ejmasiaitosource.htm to look at different retailers involving iaito/shinken. When you look at prices, you usually spend $200 US for an iaito and considerably more money if you go for a shinken.

The reason why people don't really like what you are doing is because of experience issues with using a sharp blade. I don't know if you have been doing this for quite some time, but purchasing a 25-pound shinken would tell me otherwise. Those cheap blades are usually just wallhangers and not meant for anything else.

[Fai]

Hey, I'm just wondering if its the same elsewhere. We regularly have kendo/kenjutsu training sessions with shinken, typically we do armoured practice and then kata without armour.

A lot of people say that shinken are too expensive for this kind of thing, but really you can get one for quite cheap. I got mine on ebay for £25. They last longer if you go easy on the tree-cutting practice.

Gibbo what type of classes are you doing? hitting each other with shinkens.

[The great I AM]

Gibbo what type of classes are you doing? hitting each other with shinkens.

Yeah, but its ok, because most of us wear protection like motorcycle crash helmets to soften the blows and protect against the odd "shaving cut"!! Breaks alot of blades though, but thats only when they don't cut properly. One of our guys wears the top half of a HenryHoover modified to stay on his head.

And to the Bacon-man. What about the terminology of shinken eh? Didn't see anything about Bacon there my good man.

Anyway, we don't let people attack us in armour until at the very least they can carve up 3 white plastic garden chairs in under a minute. Thats not so easy, especially if you get stuck half way into the chair! You have to lever your sword out. That takes loads of time so if they end up doing that they fail and have to wait 3 days before they are allowed to test again.
And they have to supply their own white plastic chairs.

[ShinKenshi]

And to the Bacon-man. What about the terminology of shinken eh? Didn't see anything about Bacon there my good man.

Goddammit, I'm not talking about F***ING BACON!!! I'm talking about the wavy line you see on either side of the blade!!! Go here and look at the picture below the navigation bar. See the pic of the bare shinken? See that wavy line? THAT'S the hamon!!!! If you still don't believe me, try this, or this and search for the word "hamon". After you read through those, see if you still think I'm talking about bacon. By the way, all I did was type "shinken, terminology, hamon" and I got dozens of sites.

[Lloromannic]

There is a slight chance I'll go to Britain on Christmas time. Can I join your practice? My nihonto is more expensive than yours but it was still a bargain, who can expect to find a Muramasa for $850? Any museum would pay millions for it. I'm afraid I don't have much practice with persons and most of the trees here are eucalyptus and they ake my sword smell funny.

[The great I AM]

There is a slight chance I'll go to Britain on Christmas time. Can I join your practice? My nihonto is more expensive than yours but it was still a bargain, who can expect to find a Muramasa for $850? Any museum would pay millions for it. I'm afraid I don't have much practice with persons and most of the trees here are eucalyptus and they ake my sword smell funny.

You may join our practise as long as you bring your own protection. They very minimum we ask for is cricket gloves and a TuffTops (tm) polystirene bicycle helmet. Or a horse riding hat.

Your sword is called Muramasa? The description on eBay said mine was called Butanikunoken, but I don't know what that means. Can someone here translate?

[Lloromannic]

Your sword is called Muramasa? The description on eBay said mine was called Butanikunoken, but I don't know what that means. Can someone here translate?

Here is my sword. Amazing, the guy is standing on a goldmine and he doesn't know it.
I don't know what Buttanikunoken means but it's a bloody long name for a sword so it must be something important.

You may join our practise as long as you bring your own protection. They very minimum we ask for is cricket gloves and a TuffTops (tm) polystirene bicycle helmet. Or a horse riding hat.

The helmet I can manage but those "cricket" gloves I don't know, cricket is that British Baseball right? That's not very popular in Mexico. I'll need to find a substitute. How about kitchen mittens? I left them inside the oven once and they survived so they must be tough.


PS I thought Hamon was spelt with a J (Jamon) and it meant Ham, not Bacon. At least in spanish it does.

[Yiu Fai]

Hey, I'm just wondering if its the same elsewhere. We regularly have kendo/kenjutsu training sessions with shinken, typically we do armoured practice and then kata without armour.

A lot of people say that shinken are too expensive for this kind of thing, but really you can get one for quite cheap. I got mine on ebay for £25. They last longer if you go easy on the tree-cutting practice.

At my dojo, if we lose a shiai, we have to commit seppuku. But it's ok, cos not one of us has lost a shinken shobu yet.

I've yet to learn my "top-secret" waza, but when I do I cant wait to tell everyone about it!

[Yiu Fai]

Pardon my double post, but after have to say this thread has made for some classic reading, thanks Anjin-San!