Monday July 4

After breakfast, Joe B. and I took Lorie to the airport since she could only stay a week with us. She was very nervous about flying by herself home but we talked her through the itinerary, custom stops and so on. After seeing Lorie on the plane, Joe took me to the Seaman’s club at Naha’s port. After lunch, he took me to meet Izumi Hisashi Sensei, 6^th dan, who was shibu-cho of the Koza Butokukan. Izumi Sensei owns the White River Photo Studio on Chuo Park Avenue near BC street in Koza and his wife owns the hair salon in the same building. We talked for a long time about karate and although he was very friendly, he seemed quite hesitant that Gibu Sensei would accept us. He invited us to come to his dojo on Wednesday since the hombu was closed on that day. We said goodbye and I headed back to the hotel to get some rest before we trained at the hombu that evening.

We arrived at the So-Hombu at 6:00 and as I walked up the stairs, I heard this pounding coming from inside the dojo. I peeked around the corner and saw Gibu Sensei punching the sunabukuro(square sand bag) with both hands.  He was deep in concentration and had a rhythm going with the bag. I waited for him to finish and then apologized for being so early. He invited us all in and we quickly got changed. We all wore white belts on this trip and when he saw this , he asked me where my black belt was. I responded “gomibako ni”( in the trashcan). He said it was okay to wear it and again I refused. He then asked me why and I said that it said Shorinkan on it. He responded that he didn’t mind and I said “I mind” and bowed respectfully. I told him we were all beginners in his dojo and were happy to wear a white belt.

We took a group picture of our first official training and then presented him with gifts. He asked me to translate who each person was and what the gifts were. He also asked me to write everyone’s name in katakana so that he could remember each person by their name. This was very different from what I had seen in other Okinawan teachers that seemed to care more about the money they were getting from foreign dojos for training on the island-if you could call it that. I had been on two trips previously and every single visit to the dojo involved doing nothing but starting class with kihon kata,, ending with gojushiho and then going home.  Gibu Sensei asked for no money for our training, wanted to know something personal about each person’s life and family and trained us personally. This was the Okinawan Sensei that I had dreamed of and the training that we all needed.

Tuesday July 5

We all took our time getting up today. Dave was really nice and took our gi’s up to do laundry while some of us remain horizontal on the mats. We were all very tired and very sore and decided to take it easy today. We walked around Gate 2 Street and found a nice little restaurant to have lunch. After returning to the hotel, we ended up taking a nap for about 4 hours-longer than we planned but I guess we needed it.

We packed up and headed to the Hombu dojo. Hanshi let us in and after we were changed into our dogi, he explained all of the pictures and certificates hanging in the dojo. It was interesting to see the history of the Butokukan dojo and those who had trained with him. For instance, Gibo Giyu, 9^th dan/Hanshi in Shorinkan was a student of Gibu Sensei and is present in the many group pictures in the dojo. Sensei led us in all of the warm-ups and stretching and then it was time for kumite. The kids did iri-kumi together and then with Makoto Gibu Sensei.  Most of us sparred with each other and I got the opportunity to spar with Makoto Gibu Sensei. This was a very rewarding experience as he was a master technician and it was a good exchange-although he could of killed me at any moment.  I was one of the most enjoyable kumite bouts I can ever remember.

I returned to the hotel and had the guys meet me at Sushi Yoshi to tell them the good news and the information from dinner. We had a quick meal and then headed back to call it a night. (almost)

Our room phone rang at 3:30 in the morning and I grabbed it, not knowing what time it was or what was going on. The front desk clerk was trying to explain something to me and then I heard a familiar voice on the end say “John Spence, this is Neil, I am coming up.” It was my good friend Neil Stolsmark, who had taken a taxi from Naha to our hotel with a student of his named Jason and my friend Carel vd Westhuizen from South Africa. They all came to Okinawa with Pat Haley to train at Nakazato Sensei’s dojo and there was a large group from the US and South Africa. They found the patio and were in rare form. It was great to see Neil and Carel and we all crawled out of bed while Neil sent Jason to find as much beer as possible out of the vending machines. Stolsmark Sensei is one of the funniest individuals that I have ever met and we hooted and roared on our porch until 5:30 when they decided to take a taxi back to Naha.

Wednesday July 6

We all nursed our Stolsmark hangover by sleeping in and getting up to have a casual lunch. We met Takamiyagi Sensei at his dojo at 3 because he had arranged an appointment for us at Hokama Tetsuhiro’s Okinawa Karate and Kobudo Museum in Nishihara.  When we were with the Shorinkan, we were not allowed to go to see this museum while we were on Okinawa, as were also not allowed to go see other people’s dojos(even to just take pictures) so this was an opportunity that we were very excited about.

I glanced down next to his desk and saw a number of wooden kanban with his calligraphy on them. When I asked him about them, he said that they were for sale and would could any that we would like-FOR TEN BUCKS!!! My jaw hit the floor and we immediately started to go through them until Takamiyagi Sensei stopped us on one beautiful piece and said that it was the one that we should get and hang at the dojo. He said, “this best suits you and your students.” Hokama had brushed “ichi go, ichi ee” which means that treat every encounter with each other as special. Very similar to icharaba chode in uchinaguchi (Okinawa language) which means once we meet we will always be family. We were very excited to have a Hokama piece but also to have had an eighth dan personally pick it out for us.

Thursday July 7

Today was a day to finish up any shopping that we might have to do and pick up orders a Shureido. We drove down to Shureido and after we were shopping for a bit, one of the attendants told me that Izumi Sensei had just called and asked that everyone in our group pick out a t-shirt as a gift from him! We waited around for Carel from South Africa and his group but they never showed so we headed down to Kokusai Dori to do some shopping. We met Joe Botulinski at Camp Foster around 11:30 and were able to eat lunch and send some things home via military mail. We returned to the hotel room and were lazy for most of the afternoon, catching up on entries in our diaries. I sewed my new Butokukan patch from Hanshi Gibu on my gi top and was excited to wear it in his dojo for the first time.

We arrived at the hombu dojo and in all of my excitement, I left my gi top at the hotel so I had to sprint back in the van to get it. We went through all of the Butokukan kobudo syllabus:3 sai, 1 tonfa, 3 bo, eku, and 2 nunchaku. Gibu Sensei told me that a lot of Nakazato Sensei’s kobudo were developed in the 70's and 80’s and that he never learned the “new” kata, in fact, we he began karate, there was only one bo kata and one sai kata in the Shorinkan.(Kinjo Kenpo, Hanshi/9^th dan Shorinkan told me the same thing) We returned to Koza and to the usual place for dinner.

Friday July 8

I woke up and left for the airport to pick up my host family from Chiba Prefecture, the Kojimas, who I had stayed with when I spent a month in mainland Japan on a Fulbright Teacher Program in 2003. We had arranged to meet in Okinawa since their son had finished with High School entrance exams and they needed a long-overdue vacation. What better place than Okinawa! On my way there, I stopped by the Sunmarine hotel in Aja to pick up some things that Carel had brought me from South Africa and to hopefully see Pat Haley, but they had left already so I continued to the airport. I met the Kojimas and helped them put everything into van for the ride to Koza. They had not eaten so we stopped in Chatan at “Bikkuri Donkey”(surprised donkey) restaurant that specialized in something similar to Texas Chicken Fried Steak.

After checking in at the hotel, we caught up on each other’s lives and then we went back to our rooms for a nap(these were becoming quite common). We all left for the dojo for the final workout of the trip and I introduced the Kojimas to Hanshi Gibu.

However, one of the frustrating things about going to the old Shorinkan camps was that the kata would change each year. Hand positions would change, new rhythms or stances were being added every time a class was led by a different instructor, and of course, ludicrous, personal explanations of bunkai from people that were never personally shown these from anyone on Okinawa.  The common thing about kata that was repeated to was “we just got back from Okinawa and this is the way they are doing it now.” 

When Gibu Sensei was correcting our kata or kobudo kata, he would ask about a hand position or movement and then ask who taught us that. He would then look at me like something was terribly wrong. He remarked a number of times that he had practiced these kata since he was a teenager and Nakazato Sensei had NEVER changed them.(except for the high shuto hand position). He also said that he was still friends with his old Okinawan dojo mates in the Shorinkan and they did not practice the kata or kobudo the way people were being shown in the US.  His observation was that people in the US were modifying kata for tournament competition and it was disgraceful that things were being altered from their original form.

We continued through the kata until Gibu Sensei was comfortable that we had a grasp on the improvements to our kata and that we had enough to work on until we saw him next. He was very specific in his charge of us to commit to memory the changes that needed to occur in the kata so that we would be preserving his heritage that he received from his teacher. He also did not want to overload us with too many corrections because we would not remember them all.

Saturday July 9

The Kojimas wanted to go to the beach and so we all packed up and headed for Sunset Beach since it was closest. It was a hazy summer day with a lot of wind and low visibility but a typical day where not-so-bright gaijiin will not worry about the sunblock and end up in a world of pain. I learned my lesson through someone else’s stupidity when we were in Okinawa in 2002. A person that was on the trip was warned by an Okinawa about the importance of sunblock, not suntan lotion at San San Beach. This person ignored him saying “I’m from California, I live in the sun.” Well by the next day, this person’s skin was coming off in layers, their tongue was swollen, their lips were swollen and peeling in layers and they could barely move. Dear readers, the Okinawa sun is unlike any place you will experience and it is dangerous. Over here in the states, they tell you that you should turn over every 20 minutes-over in Okinawa, it should be about every 8 minutes and with 50 sunblock.

We packed everything up and went down to the lobby to get ready for the airport. Izumi Sensei showed up with a bag of gifts for everyone and we chatted a bit before leaving for the airport. In true Okinawan kindness, Izumi Sensei waited on the street corner and waved until we were out of sight. Gibu Sensei and Makoto Gibu met us at the airport and the Kojimas tagged along even though they were staying another week on vacation. It was a very emotional goodbye as this was an amazing trip and a start of a new life for the dojo. We could not have been more fortunate to be accepted by Gibu Sensei and will never forget his kindness.