Little House In Ise

On Monday, the last of the summer rank tests were completed [ed: turns out they were not the last for the summer]. Doshu called an end to class at what would normally have been the halfway point. We bowed out and Doshu left. Seki, Kobayashi and Irie Shihan came in and the doors were closed. Irie Sensei called the names of those taking tests. They lined up on the mat from lowest rank on the far right to highest on the far left. The rest of us stayed off the mat.

Seki sensei, sat to the left of the Shomen and Kobayashi and Irie sensei sat to the right. When each group of students testing were called up, they sat to the right of and perpendicular to shomen, facing Seki sensei. Uke lined up on the left side of shomen. There were three people testing for 4th kyu, two testing for 2nd kyu, one testing for shodan (初段), two testing for nidan (弐段) and one testing for sandan (三段). One of the sensei to the right called, “Shomen rei” (正面礼 : bow to the front), “otagai rei” (お互い礼: bow to each other) and the tests began.

The shodan test was very basic. Standard techniques (ikyou to yonkyou, shihonage, kotegaeshi, kaetennage, tenchinage, etc) and attacks were called and most were standing variations with only a little hanmi handachi (半身半立ち) thrown in. Three tanto tori variations were requested and jiyuwaza was called for katate-tori and shomen uchi. There was no randori for the shodan and no koshinage required.

The student testing for shodan was the second foreigner that day and he seemed to understand the Japanese that was being spoken around him. For people who do not speak Japanese but are still interested in testing at Honbu, the sensei were calling techniques using terminology that is familiar to anyone who has been studying Aikido long enough to be interested in testing at Honbu.

For the nidan tests, two uke were called (I volunteered). One uke ran through the same paces as the shodan student though with a lot more hanmi handachi and longer jiyu-waza sections. When the uke were breathing hard the seconds were called in and we attacked with knives. The tanto-tori portion was also pretty short with only three variations requested. At that point, we switched to two-person randori starting with the both uke holding the the nidan candidate’s arms in _firm_ morote tori. It was fun!

This was the sandan candidate’s second attempt at this test. For his test, three uke were called and the presiding teachers called every standard technique in the book — all from hanmi handachi. The guy looked as though he was about 40 and was quite stout as well. He was blowing hard by the time the first uke was discarded as being worn-out. The second was told to strike and whole lot of jiyu-waza followed. The third uke was finally called in for sword and staff take-away (standing). They then did randori starting with two uke holding his arms and the third in a light choke (collar grab really) from behind. The main comment that the teachers made was that breath is such an essential part of the martial arts that even when exhausted and blowing wind, the tester should try to hide it.

Tech Note:
This may be standard and I have just been missing it. Hanmi handachi katatetori shihonage (半身半立ち片手取り四方投げ) was performed on the knees at all times but hanmi handachi ryotetori shihonage (半身半立ち両手取り四方投げ) ended with nage in a standing position.