Chatter Of The Squirrel

Shorinji: Tsubame Gaeshi

Tsubame means swift, as in, the bird.

Speed is essential in the technique, the block & counter needs to be done in one swooping motion.

Hiraki gamae. Offence: gyaku jodan zuki.

Stance is open and faces opponent. Uchi uke the incoming punch, revolving the upper body around the attack and forward, not just striking out with the blocking arm.

After the uke, weight should be leaning far forwards, as the blocking arm swings around into a shuto, and pushes/cuts FORWARDS at the opponent’s neck. Pushing him backwards, opening his belly to a gyaku zuki.

The renhanko then gets messy with some odd footwork. >.<

Enbu-Kai

Kempo: Uchi-Uke, Tenshin Geri, Jujinuki

Revisited some old techniques for basic practice.

Just when I thought I’m done with the Uchi-uke after becoming 3rd kyu, I find out that I’m still doing so many things wrong.

Was paired up with the visiting Tai sensei from Japan, and he gave me a lot of pointers, despite the language barrier.

i) Hit the attacking arm hard. But without extending the forearm away from the body. Aim to hit the attacking arm with the part of the forearm close to the elbow. Hit with just enough force that it throws the attacker’s facing just a little off centre and expose his kidneys.

ii) Stance: rest just slightly more on the back leg than the leading leg. That puts your head a little back, giving your body more room to manuever to avoid the incoming blow, while maintaining a good upright posture.

iii) After the uchi-uke, when you throw the punch, make sure your stance is right. Too used to practice situations where you merely demonstrate the end of the technique with a tap to the ribs. In combat situations, this punch should be delivered with force. Thus your feet needs to be lined up, body crouched, shoulder lined up to deliver the strongest force possible to the target. Practise and self examination to get this down right. All the manuevering/theory becomes pretty pointless if you can’t deliver an effective punch.

Tenshin Geri

Very new to this technique, so probably am still doing everything wrong. Also a bit mixed up with Han Tenshin Geri.

Jujinuki :

Another technique to break an opponent’s hold on the arm, as illustrated on the linked site. It can be finished in one of two ways, with an upright posture, and smack the freed hand into the opponent’s nose, or break away while in a crouch, and finish with an attack on the groin.

Jujigote :

Starts the same as the Jujinuki. Opponent grabs your fore-arm, but this time you use your free hand to clasp/hook his hand onto your arm, fix it there, while you perform the rest of the jujinuki. This should bend the opponent’s attacking arm into an S shape. After that, it’s a ’simple’ matter of rotating the opponent’s palm.

A few notes: ‘rotate’ the palm. Do not push/pull it. Keep the S shape, and rotate along the median plane of the opponent’s body.

When done right, this twists the arm tendons in a manner that it does not want to go. But only when the arm is held in an S shape.

Kempo: Brown belt. Woot!!

Been one and a half month since my blood-loss incident, and I figure I should be in decent enough shape to get back in action.

It was only a short absence, and it almost felt like I had to start again near the beginning. All my leg muscles have lost some of its stretch, and it’ll probably take a few weeks to stretch them out again. Also getting breathless rather quickly. And muscles aching after the 3hr practice.

Still, am enjoying the adrenaline again, and missed the workout.

I finally got my brown belt and 3rd Kyu certificate from passing the grading exam in September. And while I was gone, a number of other fellow white belts have also moved up to brown.

There’s a new Japanese black belt I’ve not met before. Presumably a visiting sensei. Kids crowd around him during breaks to watch his magic tricks. I also received about a half hour instruction with him. Can’t understand when he’s explaining in Japanese, but was able to assimilate the demonstrations easily enough…

He showed us that on top of the Koho (hard techniques) and Juho (soft techniques), there’s also Seiho (acu-pressure points). And that was very enlightening, as well as painful. Am still a little out of my depth when he started demonstrating a few pain compliance techniques, but I think I can remember one of them at least.

San Kyu Kenshi

Had my first grading exam, and passed it.

Despite the long long list of techniques in the 3rd kyu syllabus, and the complexity and intricacies of each and every technique… the exam only explicitly tests 5 goho and 5 juho tecnhiques. And the exam questions don’t change and are made available since day one of me joining.

So, yar… Just need to practise these few techs well.

Assisting me in the test was a Jap girl. Need a dummy to perform the various locks and throws on.

My goho was alright. My juho was passable. My Ukemi (tumbles) was disastrous, since we’ve never practised it since May, I think… But the test was lenient, I guess…

So, yay!! I’m 3rd kyu! On schedule with Jee sensei’s expectations when he was back in KL for a couple of months from UK.

Shoto Geri
- kick with heel
- keep body straight as much as possible, minimise lean
- turn hip forward to generate the force of the kick
- twist on ball of grounded foot, turning heel towards direction of kick

Uchi uke Shoto geri
- begin stance with slight forward lean and weight on forward foot. This gives u more room to duck when you lean back to avoid a punch.
- after avoiding, bring forward arm in uchi uke, and knock the attacker’s hand away with the momentum generated from the hips as you turn your body away so that your side is now towards the opponent. The forward foot also slides towards the back pivoting foot.
- now you’re in the position to shotogeri to the side