Later this year, Sensei Peter and I reach one of the major milestones in life as one matures – we become eligible for Medicare, haha! Truthfully, as federal retirees, we already have medical coverage via FEHB, so it’s not as exciting a milestone as…say, finally qualifying for purchase of a Zippy’s  Restaurant card!!  (Where your sensei’s gather after Saturday training to er…discuss martial arts history and um…secret karate techniques 🙂  Yeah, there’s gotta be a few benefits we can glean from getting old. Actually, for us men of Japanese ancestry, one of the big milestones is the Kanreki (celebrating one’s 60th birthday), which was a few years ago for us.  My wife and I were talking about how this appears to be a dying tradition among us sansei (not sensei 😉 and I rarely have attended one since my dad’s generation hit this hallowed mark some 30+ years ago.  Fortunately for me, I have a wife and kids who are among the best party and entertainment gurus around and they threw the old man a big one at the Hawaii Prince golf course back in 2011. My favorite memory of the festivities was when my daughter did a masterful impression [...]

“Hey! Adrienne!”  Catchy title and song, but today’s note is probably not about what you’re thinking it’s about, haha.  I did want to expound a little on developing one’s eye, and the tiger mon is an iconic one that is universally recognized as a symbol of the Shotokan style of Karate-Do, so the title is still fitting.  One of Master Funakoshi’s early supporters in spreading the Okinawan art in Japan was a famous artist, Hoan Kosugi.  He encouraged the Founder to write a book on Karate-Do and promised to design an appropriate cover for the book. The tiger symbol was the result.  Why a tiger?  I’ve heard several different stories: one was that the Founder used to walk up a winding mountain trail on Mount Torao, so called due to its resemblance to an undulating tiger tail; another was that the book was to be a master text for Karate-Do, therefore, a Tora No Maki and a clever pun on the word Tora.  In any case, this enduring image has represented our art across the globe, from its earliest days. Speaking of art, there is a college degree that not too many people possess.  Did you ever hear of a [...]

This past Saturday, we had a really great potluck immediately following training.  It was an informal little gathering such as we haven’t had in years, and was due to the planning and hard work of Sensei Trish and Roxanne.  Each of the five sensei’s were able to attend, along with Sempai’s Dave, Kevin and Robert (Sempai James and Helen had a conflicting engagement). Predictably, the black belts all congregated on one end of the long tables while the rest of the group filled in the other end.  If we were on a ship, we’d probably have tilted one way and capsized :0…haha.  The good food and small talk made for a very relaxing and enjoyable time and without their gi’s and belts, the senior members actually looked like the regular folk that they are.  The sunny, cool weather and nice ambiance of the new enclosed area at the center combined for a perfect setting. The anagram game and like-a-charade game (drawing pictures or using play-doh) to figure out the underlying karate terms proved to be difficult, fun, and “untilted” the ship by mixing all of our club members together.  Craftily designed by our potluck planners, the activities served to bring [...]