Gotta love my group...

The dynamics of my group is funny. They are all employees at the Intel facility I teach at, so most of them come straight after work. As a corporation, Intel is a strong company and one of the leaders in the technological market, being responsible for micro chips, processors and many other important computer technologies sold around the world. But, as common with the industry, they fluctuate constantly between volume spikes and dips. With that, so does their staffing numbers. When that happens, it has a profound effect on my class. This may mean layoffs, which could cause me to lose students. But, since most of my students have seniority with the company, it usually means longer work hours as duties are added on to make up for the personnel "adjustments".

When these things happen, I'm lucky to get a handful of students show up and new enrollments drop to nothing. At times, there have been only a couple of us training. At the height of the employement surge, I've had over 15 in attendance before. So, consistency has always been a challenge.

Last night was no exception.

I have some who have stopped coming, for reasons associated with late meetings and work projects. I also have a couple who are out of town on business related reasons. Yet another is dealing with sick children. So, in a nutshell, last nights class brought out only one person. This person is one of my shodans and also is a yondan in Shotokan Karate (no easy achievement!). Even though it was just the two of us, our time together was anything but disappointing.

I was able to review what we did at Alex's, since he was one of my guys who also came to that training. Because the lower body alignment for Shotokan is different than what we use in the Bujinkan, that became the focus of my work with him. We did many drills with the Rokushakubo, with the attention being paid to the correct postures and movement of the legs and upper torso. I was able to really pinpoint small corrections and fine tuning of things and very soon he was showing great progress in breaking old habits. He had some questions in difficulties he was having with some of the posturing and I was able to answer them in a way that made sense to him.

Eventually, we were doing some great kata drills with each other, which involved striking, blocking and countering against either our Rokushakubo or Bokken (sword). Because of the attention we were able to spend on the little details, the kata had sufficient power, flow and balance. Our Rokushakubo staves were smoking from the various blocked strikes and such! I saw great improvements in his use of the knees and the dynamics of moving in strong kamae. The confidence in his performance was evident as he could 'feel' the kata come alive and the Rokushakubo become a natural extension of himself. Even though there is still some fine tuning that still need developing, he is off to a great start.

We trained solidly for 2 hours and I was surprised how quickly the time went. By the end, we were both sweaty, tired and satisfied with the results of our training together.

So, even though everybody else missed class for various reasons, I felt this class was one of the most important classes I had taught. I don't think I could have made the same progress with him while working with everybody else, too. It was time well spent, in my opinion.

I know he felt the same way.

Next week, we will continue on the same path of developing a strong foundation in the Rokushakubo staff - regardless of how many can manage to attend. Soon, however, I will start focusing on the thrusting techniques, in preparation for our transfer to Sojutsu - or spear combat.

In my opinion, both Bojutsu and Sojutsu should be learned together. In real combat, the likelihood of your spear tip being broken or hacked off is quite high. In those circumstances, your spear now becomes a staff - or Rokushakubo. On the flip side, if you are wielding a Rokushakubo or any long staff, the likelihood of your staff being broken or hacked is high. This will probably result in your staff having a sharp end - thus becoming a kind of spear. So, by learning both skills, you are better prepared to adapt to whatever kind of weapon you suddenly end up with at any given moment.

Stay tuned for more soon...