First posting!

Hello all! Welcome to the first posting of my budo journal! This is a personal journal of my own thoughts, musings, experiences, gripes and so on involving my journey in the fascinating world of Bujinkan Budo Taijutsu.

I have been training in the martial arts for over 20 years. I started in the early '80's in boxing, then went to kickboxing, then karate and jujutsu. It wasn't until the late 80' when I discovered the Bujinkan martial arts through a series of books I found in a local book store. I immediately wrote the author and received an immediate reply, directing me to persons I could study under and materials to help me in my own personal training. A friend and I started training every day with what guidance we could get from those materials and teaching. We would often travel several hours to train all day with our teacher, then come back with the information to continue on our own until we could make another trip down. This usually involved one trip per month and was quite a challenge for us, since we were young guys with little money.

Finally, we both got our black belts in the mid-90's and began breaking out to train with other Bujinkan teachers. Eventually, my friend moved to Oregon and I moved to the California capital, Sacramento. I met many fellow Bujinkan students there and we became a collective group of friends, training and learning from each other. I found that Bujinkan teachers were becoming easier to find and visit and my own growth began to soar because of it.

I have now finally reached the rank of Yondan (4th degree black belt) and cannot reach the next level unless I travel to Japan to train and be tested by either Soke Hatsumi (our grandmaster) or one of his selected Shihan (master teachers). Unfortunately, I have not been able to afford the money or the time commitment to make the journey, as so many others have, and it has caused me great frustration. I have watched so many of my friends make Japan trips and they are all now very high ranked because of their opportunity to be able to train with Soke and the Japanese Shihan over there. Meanwhile, I keep training on what I know, picking up lessons brought back by these guys from their most recent trips to Japan.

Good news, however! Finally, after all this time, I am able to make the voyage to Japan! If all goes according to plan, I will be going over in June of this year! I will have a friend with me, who has been there a few times already and knows how to get around. We will be sharing a small apartment with another Bujinkan friend only minutes from Soke's dojo (school). I will be able to train up to 3 times per day for the entire week I will be there! The other guys are staying for 2 weeks, but I cannot take so much time off from work and be away from my family. But, a week is still a week!

I currently run a small training group out of the Intel Corporation in Folsom (the city, not the prison!). I was offered this opportunity by an Israeli Bujinkan friend who was over here on a work VISA for a couple years working for Intel. He originally came from Haifa and was sent over here on a temporary work assignment through the Intel global corporation. While here, he found us at our old school we used to train at. He and I became instant friends, having so much in common and enjoying training together. When his assignment was finished and he had to go back to Israel, he arranged for me to take over his Bujinkan class he started at the Folsom Intel facility. The class was for Intel employees only and had a solid base of students (about 20). The Intel facility hosted a very large fitness center within its complex, with a full gym, aerobics room, and multipurpose room with fold-out mats. It was the perfect location for training, so I gladly took over his class.

Now, the class is going strong, with an average attendance between 5 to 10 students who show up regularly. I have 3 shodans and several lesser rankings amongst my group and they are an awesome group of people to train with! I am honored to have them consider me their teacher and I have committed to keeping the class going so we can all train together.

My friends in Sacramento all have their own dojos and training groups now. The largest dojo is the Sacramento Bujinkan Dojo, which is headed by a 10th degree black belt (Judan) and several lesser dan (black belt) rankings. It is a great dojo, with regular seminars happening all the time.

Ok, that's good enough for a start. More coming soon!