Is a cigar just a cigar?

[Van Canna]

I find it utterly comical to question the 'claw' ....the gripping strength that develops from years of jars training.

Maybe attending a seminar by Shinjo sensei, and asking for a demonstration 'grab'

[JimHawkins]

Who 'questioned' the claw?

"The claw" is a main technique in seizing, which is a staple of many connected methods of CMA, like crane, eagle claw, mantis, etc...

[jorvik]

where do you think Uechi got it from?........Oh yeah I was forgetting, Uechi senior didn't go to China according to Bill

[Van Canna]

Jim,

Perhaps I misunderstood your reference to the claw…let’s see…if I did I stand corrected.

But in my post I stated: > I find it utterly comical to question the 'claw' ....the gripping strength that develops from years of jars training. <

I meant to say that to criticize the gripping strength and the resultant claw strength applications that come from it…is ridiculous…as one way to test that…is to practice this type of training in Uechi and or to ask for a demo by a well trained ‘jar’ practitioner.

You posted

No waukes with the jars? No thrusts? Hard to believe... A huge jar is just a huge jar...

But bushikens for the jar? That training and more is also used extensively in more than one style of CMA white crane for one..

It is normally used to train a claw type grab--part of SCMA known as *seizing*, where the claw 'grab' controls but also destroys tissue and tendens, etc... I've had it done to me and even done lightly in sparring it can draw blood.. (not for grabbing gi sleeves either )

I didn't think the bushiken resembled that kind of claw grab...

Again, that seems as a critique of the Uechi training system, where you have no experience in the style. No offense intended…it is just the way it is.

Bill responded

First, it isn't bushiken. It is boshiken. Boshi = thumb, ken = fist.

Second... You spend a lot of time telling us how we should be practicing Uechi style, and yet this most basic element of training of Kanbun's art is foreign to you? I find this revealing at best.

Furthermore, it also demonstrates your general disdain for the topic of this thread. Remember the thread? I talked about the dual nature (yin/yang) of the boshiken very early on. It is BOTH grabbing and thrusting weapon - as are many Uechi Ryu tools. Freezing your brain on it being only one kind of tool will literally restrict you from half the art. People who do so demonstrate the need for the approach to our material that is the topic of this thread.

As I tell my students, the original name Kanbun gave the art (pangainoon) means more than the literal half hard, half soft. It speaks to a yin/yang duality in the approach to the material, methods, and mindset.

The Discovery Channel's special on martial arts has a piece on Shinjo Narahiro doing jar training. The methods are well documented. With the right video equipment, you'll be able to see the boshiken grab on the lips of the jars. That is the one and only way Uechi practitioners (who have been properly instructed) grab the jar in this training.

I also recommend you looking at Uechi Kanei's big blue book. In it are very large and very well done pictures of the boshiken from a number of different angles. And the correct spelling (in hiragana) is also there.

- Bill

Jorvik you posted

where do you think Uechi got it from?........Oh yeah I was forgetting, Uechi senior didn't go to China according to Bill

I am not sure I understand this comment, Ray…but yes…I agree…Uechi did get it from China…but what’s this got to do with a Uechi ‘jar’ practitioner…not developing the ‘claw power’ Jim seems to imply?


Again, I may have misunderstood the reference...if so then I stand corrected.

[Bill Glasheen]

Oh yeah I was forgetting, Uechi senior didn't go to China according to Bill

Perhaps you should read a little more carefully, Ray. I can't type slower so you need to read slower.

If this helps...

"Uechi Ryu" means "Uechi's style."

"Uechi" can mean many things. "Uechi" is a family name "Uechi" is also used to refer to that man's style.

OK?

Now... Try rereading my post which I reposted below for you. And note the double entendre in my response to you. It was not unintended. And multiple meanings after all is the very topic of this thread.

- Bill

Well isn't Uechi Chinese ?

Uechi was born and bred Okinawan.

Bob Campbell describes it best when he says "Uechi Ryu is a Chinese style in Okinawan clothes." That is what it is.

Uechi Ryu is the collection of Kanbun Uechi's experiences in both Okinawa and China, combined with the material added by his son and his committee.

Currently there are no weapon forms that are "Uechi" weapon forms. But many Uechi masters (e.g. Gushi, Yonamine, Thompson, etc.) are also either kobudo masters or practitioners. That's a little of this and a little of that. Many (including and especially Yonamine) have adapted the kobudo forms so that they use the same fundamentals as Uechi karate. Two specific examples are Hamahiga no tonfa and Tzukenshitahaku no sai. They are both very, very old forms. But I learned them from Uechi masters, and my execution has a distinctly "Uechi" flavor.

- Bill

[MikeK]

What was the original point of this thread?

[Bill Glasheen]

Van

If I have misrepresented either Uechi Kanbun's ethnicity or the collective origins of the style now referred to as Uechi Ryu, please correct me.

Thanks.

- Bill

[Van Canna]

You are correct 100% _Bill.

[Bill Glasheen]

What was the original point of this thread?

Certainly not to have to deal with trolls. But "it" happens.

Sometimes individuals disagree with an idea you are trying to present because it conflicts with their own existing paradigm(s). That disagreement can be up front in a civil discussion, or it can take the shape of thread hijacking and ad hominem attacks. (FWIW, I've already deleted 3 posts.)

The point of the thread is to discuss the idea that martial movement - particularly as practiced in Sanchin kata - can sometimes be very general, and have many disparate applications.

Sometimes a circle - as practice in Sanchin kata - is just a circle. In application you can use that same circle either to intercept or to attack. Or sometimes if you are an advanced martial artist in technique and mindset, you can do all at the same time.

Sometimes an elbow - as practiced in Seisan kata - is just an elbow. In application you can use that same elbow to thrust, to strike, to throw someone, to block, or as a lateral vascular neck restraint.

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. And simetimes it's a sexual reference per Freudian theory of psychosexual development.

Mike, this way of viewing martial movement REALLY bothers some people. It conflicts with a more concrete paradigm of kata practice and application. Some like to have a one-to-one correspondence between a move in a kata and a very specific application. If I decide I want to use my elbow as a block, I'm doing Wing Chun. If I decide I want to do my elbow as a throw, I'm doing aikido. If I decide I want to use my elbow as a lateral vascular neck restraint, I'm doing jiujitsu. I'm not supposed to do that! I've violated some unspoken martial rule. I need to separate my Uechi from my aikido from my Wing Chun from my FMA from my JJ.

Some folks forget that the orignial martial art of Okinawa was tegumi. Are Okinawan kata really only about kicking, striking, and blocking? And when it comes to blocking, is that really what the choreographers of Okinawan kata wanted us to think about when doing the classic chudan uke? I provided a reference that challenged that idea.

Patrick McCarthy inspired me to continue my thinking along these lines. He told me (in person) that he views kata as the study of martial movement. I happen to like that thinking, and I embrace it. I didn't get the idea from him, but he helped me crystalize it. That thinking helps me take my life experiences in martial arts, and stick them to the martial mnemonics of kata.

I've used the expression "squint your eyes" to describe using mechanics learned in one venue to see those same mechanics in another. In Photography and the Art of Seeing, Freeman Patterson challenges the photographic artist to see the world around them differently. He uses the expression "Thinking Sideways." The camera doesn't lie; it sees what it sees. But if you the artist are creative about how you use that camera, then the lens can reflect reality in ways that others never imagined.

I've tried using the concept of art and abstraction to help concrete thinkers break through the shackles of a more limited way of viewing the tools of their craft.

I've brought in references that discuss why we call what we do a martial ART. And that relates to the topic of this thread.

Did I answer your question, Mike?

- Bill

[JimHawkins]

Jim,

Perhaps I misunderstood your reference to the claw…let’s see…if I did I stand corrected.

But in my post I stated: > I find it utterly comical to question the 'claw' ....the gripping strength that develops from years of jars training. <

I meant to say that to criticize the gripping strength and the resultant claw strength applications that come from it…is ridiculous…as one way to test that…is to practice this type of training in Uechi and or to ask for a demo by a well trained ‘jar’ practitioner.

You posted

No waukes with the jars? No thrusts? Hard to believe... A huge jar is just a huge jar...

But bushikens for the jar? That training and more is also used extensively in more than one style of CMA white crane for one..

It is normally used to train a claw type grab--part of SCMA known as *seizing*, where the claw 'grab' controls but also destroys tissue and tendens, etc... I've had it done to me and even done lightly in sparring it can draw blood.. (not for grabbing gi sleeves either )

I didn't think the bushiken resembled that kind of claw grab...

Again, that seems as a critique of the Uechi training system, where you have no experience in the style. No offense intended…it is just the way it is.

Bill responded

First, it isn't bushiken. It is boshiken. Boshi = thumb, ken = fist.

Second... You spend a lot of time telling us how we should be practicing Uechi style, and yet this most basic element of training of Kanbun's art is foreign to you? I find this revealing at best.

Furthermore, it also demonstrates your general disdain for the topic of this thread. Remember the thread? I talked about the dual nature (yin/yang) of the boshiken very early on. It is BOTH grabbing and thrusting weapon - as are many Uechi Ryu tools. Freezing your brain on it being only one kind of tool will literally restrict you from half the art. People who do so demonstrate the need for the approach to our material that is the topic of this thread.

As I tell my students, the original name Kanbun gave the art (pangainoon) means more than the literal half hard, half soft. It speaks to a yin/yang duality in the approach to the material, methods, and mindset.

The Discovery Channel's special on martial arts has a piece on Shinjo Narahiro doing jar training. The methods are well documented. With the right video equipment, you'll be able to see the boshiken grab on the lips of the jars. That is the one and only way Uechi practitioners (who have been properly instructed) grab the jar in this training.

I also recommend you looking at Uechi Kanei's big blue book. In it are very large and very well done pictures of the boshiken from a number of different angles. And the correct spelling (in hiragana) is also there.

- Bill

Jorvik you posted

where do you think Uechi got it from?........Oh yeah I was forgetting, Uechi senior didn't go to China according to Bill

I am not sure I understand this comment, Ray…but yes…I agree…Uechi did get it from China…but what’s this got to do with a Uechi ‘jar’ practitioner…not developing the ‘claw power’ Jim seems to imply?


Again, I may have misunderstood the reference...if so then I stand corrected.

I don't know about no experience... The first form I ever learned was sanchin from an instructor with Uechi lineage... Perhaps minimal would be more accurate...

If you look to what I referred to in my post you'll see Bill was comparing said jar training to doing form work et al...and the ongoing relationship and comparisons made in this thread about forms vs function.

No, the jar training is not done as a form (wauke reference), nor COULD it be done so--and nor would it be needed to--that was the point.

This in no reasonable way IMO constitutes trolling, rather continued disagreement on Bill's cigar thesis, which he so readily is willing to label as trolling in response ...

[Van Canna]

I don't know about no experience... The first form I ever learned was sanchin from an instructor with Uechi lineage... Perhaps minimal would be more accurate...

OK. Minimal to me is the same as no experience when you start to criticize the Uechi Style.

After about twenty years or so of practice…then maybe. And this applies to any style. The understanding and proficiency only comes with long years of dedicated training. It was Tomoyose sensei who stated to me personally that one needs at least ten years of non stop training in all aspects of the style to get a smattering of knowledge.

Most of the seniors on these forums have 30 or more years of Uechi training they have put to a test in one way or another.

No, the jar training is not done as a form (wauke reference), nor COULD it be done so--and nor would it be needed to--that was the point.

OK. Then I stand corrected.

[Bill Glasheen]

No, the jar training is not done as a form (wauke reference), nor COULD it be done so--and nor would it be needed to--that was the point.

Please get the DVDs on the Discovery Channel special on martial arts. In it you will see Shinjo Narahiro doing jar training as a form.

I did something very similar last night in class. But the damn jars are too expensive. I paid hundreds of bucks for 5 pairs of jars, and the damn dog bumped into one of them and broke it. Now I have 4.5 pair.

The Okinawans are creative folk. They use what they have. A stick can be used to carry buckets of manure out to the fields. Or... A wooden dowel can be used as the handle of a fish net. Or... A scythe can be used to reap the harvest. Or...

Jars can be used to hold your rice. Or...

Those dumbbells on the side of my classroom can be used to do dumbbell curls. Or...

Imagine us doing Narahiro's form (yes, it was a form) with dumbbells instead of rice jars. (The labels showing the weight has a nice lip where the boshiken thumb can go. ) Did we violate one of the ten Uechi commandments?

Is it against the Uechi commandments to "do it" with large protein powder jars filled with something heavy?

So... Did we do a form last night? Or was it just an exercise? Or was it all wrong because we weren't using rice vases with a "Ue" symbol on the side?

Did "it" suddenly not become a form because I've modified it? I've added these moves and removed those?

Is imagination such a terrible thing?

- Bill

[Van Canna]

True. Shinjo sensei does in fact practice jars as a kata within Uechi, obviously with different lines of force and directions...nevertheless ....a kata by definition.

So what defines Kata?

[Bill Glasheen]

Most of the seniors on these forums have 30 or more years of Uechi training they have put to a test in one way or another..

And with some of us in the 30-year club, the best learning began after the initial learning ended. I know all the exercises, forms, and partner routines. I know Uechi and a few other Japanese words now. I have this material down.

And then someone (ahem... Van? ) has the temerity to expand his horizons and bring new ways of thinking about violence to my world. He shakes my belief systems. Damn!! Now I need to use my brain and engage in a paradigm shift.

Or maybe I can just stick with my belief systems. After all my teacher told me blah blah blah..... So it must be true!!



- Bill

P.S. That teacher is a fictitious one. George doesn't fall into that category. That damn George... Always bringing "outsiders" to our camps. What is he thinking???

[Bill Glasheen]

True. Shinjo sensei does in fact practice jars as a kata within Uechi, obviously with different lines of force and directions...nevertheless ....a kata by definition.

So what defines Kata?

My Goju teacher showed me how to use the chisi in my Goju Sanchin.



Was I doing Sanchin, or was I doing an exercise?

Is Sanchin a kata if - as I sometimes claim - it's a study of movement rather than a study of a fight?

- Bill