Some time ago, when I was still with my old group, I had to deal with a bad-tempered junior student (he was junior in rank, but actually quite a bit older than me). Whenever the yudanshakai made a decision he didn't like (as he frequently missed the meetings), he would specifically come to me to express his displeasure. One time he even called me at home about some dojo issue that had upset him. He started yelling at me over the phone. I politely told him we could talk about the issue after okeiko that week if he still wanted to, and hung up on him.
I can take some consolation, I suppose, for realizing this stuff does not just apply to me - this being NYC, and everyone being so packed in all the time, every now and then I can't help but overhear a conversation where some guy is yelling at his wife/girlfriend over his cell phone. I always have the same mental response, beamed out to the woman at the other end of the line: Just hang up! Hang up! though I never stuck around long enough to see if my wish came true.
Recently, I had to ream someone out for misbehaving at an official function. Even though the guy was a relatively new student (about 1 year), he had been carefully coached about how to behave before the event, and even reminded during it. He had assured me that the event was too important for him to mess up! But things got out of hand anyway. And his behavior was brought to my attention by a couple of my own sempai at the event (just when I thought I could actually relax). So I had to read him the riot act, which I did before the following day's training. Being me, I was not loud, but I was very clear, telling him he had royally screwed up, and I was expecting the subsequent days of training to be screw up free.
At first, he was polite and apologetic, but it did not take long for him to get sulky and start offering excuses, whining about how no one cared about "his side of the story." I told him, essentially that he was right - no one did care, and he should just suck it up. A mistake was made, and it was over, and if he was going to behave from that moment on, we could just forget it (at least for the time). But no, it wasn't over for him, and even the day after the event I had to hear about how at least some of the reprimand was somehow not justified, on the basis of his excuse. In other words, he was taking issue with being dressed down for misbehavior that he committed himself, after having been warned that certain behaviors at the event were not acceptable.
So here's my thought: if I had been a male teacher reprimanding a male student, would I have gotten that response? Or would I have gotten a "Yes sir. Sorry sir," instead? I brought this up to one of my male colleagues of many years' standing. He said I should not suspend the guy yet, but consider him to be on probation. Given his character generally, as I now understand it, I doubt that he has the guts to stick out training much longer anyway.
My teacher used to say that you have three times to see the Buddha. This guy's count stands at two.
Monday, February 18, 2013
Tuesday, February 5, 2013
The women warriors
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Women were members of the samurai class. They did, as far as we know, train with a variety of weapons. A samurai woman, when she got married, would have someone in the wedding procession (assuming she was high-enough ranked to have one) carry her naginata for her as she went to her new husband's home. There are many true stories about incidents of women fighting to avenge their parents or husband or to defend their mistress in case of danger. In kabuki, there are many stories of this type that made their way to the stage, and were based on real incidents. We should try to remember that the Western idea of Japanese women represents more of our Victorian sensibilities, followed by everyone's current cultural and political ideas. While women were apparently taught to fight, the idea that any of them would lead troops into battle is not likely. We have some legends, and they may have some facts behind them (we don't know) but simply looking at the historical military records in Japan shows that it was not a normal thing. There is a famous passage in Yoshitsune Senbon Zakura about Shizuka, Yoshitsune's lover, having a maid strap on her armor, taking her naginata from its place and running out into the night to stop a fight between Yoshitsune's retainers and those of his brother Yoritomo, before things got serious. No one thought this idea was ridiculous, so it suggests it was not an impossible thing to have happen. Obviously this photo has to be late Edo (or even newer than that) because photos were not around much before 1850. The technology was developed around 1826 but was not practical for a long time. There was also a tradition in Japan for people in later times to put on their father's or grandfather's armor and pose for a portrait, though it was usually guys who did so. This woman is wearing a chrysanthemum, and that suggests to me that she was taking part in some ceremony. It is possible she is wearing a male relative's armor as part of some ceremony honoring him, if there was no son or other male relative to take part in it. It's also possible, of course, that the ceremony was honoring HER in some way. Still, it's an interesting photo and I would love to know more about it.
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I could have added in some other true incidents, like the story of the two women who avenged their father's death at the hands of a corrupt official. This vendetta has been said to be the first time someone used a kusarigama as a weapon (her sister is generally depicted in woodblock prints with a naginata. The corrupt official is depicted as someone who doesn't stand a chance). There is also the play Kagamiyama, which depicts another true story of a maid of the samurai class who avenged her mistress' death by killing an evil lady-in-waiting in a fight. I have seen this play, and there are only fight scenes by women in it, as I recall.
Of course, kabuki actors were, and are, men. But in the writings of early women role-players, they note that fighting while appearing feminine for the audience was difficult, but all the same, a female role player must show she can wield her weapon, "better than a man can." They are not talking about comedies, they are talking about dramas depicting actual incidents. And that women characters needed verisimilitude in their handling of weapons, just like the male role-players did.
I was looking for the above photo (since things get buried quickly on FB) so I put "woman warrior images" in bing, because I thought it would save some time. I got things like this:
Cute, yes? I almost don't know where to start, but let's just say that this is much more the image of a 12-year-old boy's fantasy than any serious warrior, like the ones I am talking about. To be honest, in the raft of similar images, one could also find a chaste depiction of Joan of Arc, and one or two photos of female budoka - out of hundreds (thousands?) of images available. A search for "Images of Warriors" brings up mostly men (and some women who look like our friend here). The guys are mostly in the same goofy mode, but fully-clothed, and of course, showing some sense that they might actually be capable of doing something, even if only in action hero style (there were also a lot of film stills from the 70's film "The Warriors," but I digress).
A few weeks ago, also on FB, one of my male friends found a young woman's blog in which she wrote about her daily harrassment by men as she went virtually everywhere. He and some of my other male FB friends expressed shock - shock, I tell you. My reaction was, well, duh. We don't talk about it because it never does us any good. One of the good things about being slightly older is that the harrassment becomes more like being discounted, or ignored, or minimized, rather than being threatened with, say, sexual violence on a daily basis. Still irritating, but I can get past it more easily.
One of my martial arts colleagues, years ago, remarked, sort of off-handedly, "I don't know any other women who do what you do." If you ever wonder why you can't get more women into your budo practice, take a good look at the above image. Maybe they're just mad.
Friday, January 25, 2013
Dress up. Show up. Shut Up.
...or, the most difficult aspect of budo training.
What is the most difficult aspect? Learning how to handle complicated weapons in intricate ways, laced with deep understanding of the physical, aesthetic and philosophical underpinnings? Learning whole stacks of ryuha? Reading deep and obscure histories in hopes of finding clues to the origin of your style? Writing about it? Teaching it?
Nope. None of the above. The most difficult part of learning a ryuha is -
People.
Let's not even go into the intricacies of dealing with a practice that originated in a foreign culture over 400 years ago. No one doubts that cultural differences are a problem; and if they say it's easily overcomable, they are either naive or lying. But that is not what I mean. I mean differences right here, in the US, where we presumably have language and at least a few cultural factors in common. In spite of those similarities (or maybe even because of them), miscommunication abounds. One would think greater access to written words (in the form of email, text, webpages, and yes, blogs) would make everything crystal clear. Not hardly. In fact, I would say the overdependence on writing things to each other rather than speaking or even meeting face-to-face is a big factor in miscommunication. And once it's out there (especially electronically) it's out there, doing its bit to undermine trust, cause confusion or even make the writer look like an idiot - forever.
After all, a complicated kata may take a very long time to learn. Weeks, maybe, in the case of short, iai kata, on a technical level (the deeper meaning level takes as long - as it takes). But the practitioner has an assurance, at least, that if she sticks to the practice long enough, she will eventually understand what she is doing, and why. With humans, not so much. Even if you know someone well, it's always like starting from Square One. And no matter how many kata you know, one poor choice of phrase can set back a relationship, and it can take a long time to recover.
Human relations are why every now and then I meet a real budo ronin - someone who has a lot of experience, but no home dojo. It's why federations rise, break apart, and occasionally come back together. It's why ryuha engender "offshoots." And it's why online budo fora can sometimes become flamepits, and why I avoid them now altogether.
The title of this post is actually a quote from a co-worker at my day job. She has adopted it as a strategy for surviving her daughter's wedding, set to take place this summer. I like this idea, so I intend to use it from now on. No more lore, no more advice. Opinions? Yes, but here only. Put on the gi. Go to the training. Don't say anything.
Don't get me wrong. Budo is impossible without people - people to practice with, people to learn from. I have had some of the best times in my life with budoka, and some of them are more like family than friends (meant in both the good and bad senses). I have also had my heart broken and been flamed; but I have also been raised up and brushed off by my budo colleagues. I owe them more collectively, as a group, than anyone else in my life, for much of the good stuff that happens. But if there is any theme that runs through this entire blog, it is caution with regard to the human element of budo. It's the source of great richness, but with some occasional muck attached.
What is the most difficult aspect? Learning how to handle complicated weapons in intricate ways, laced with deep understanding of the physical, aesthetic and philosophical underpinnings? Learning whole stacks of ryuha? Reading deep and obscure histories in hopes of finding clues to the origin of your style? Writing about it? Teaching it?
Nope. None of the above. The most difficult part of learning a ryuha is -
People.
Let's not even go into the intricacies of dealing with a practice that originated in a foreign culture over 400 years ago. No one doubts that cultural differences are a problem; and if they say it's easily overcomable, they are either naive or lying. But that is not what I mean. I mean differences right here, in the US, where we presumably have language and at least a few cultural factors in common. In spite of those similarities (or maybe even because of them), miscommunication abounds. One would think greater access to written words (in the form of email, text, webpages, and yes, blogs) would make everything crystal clear. Not hardly. In fact, I would say the overdependence on writing things to each other rather than speaking or even meeting face-to-face is a big factor in miscommunication. And once it's out there (especially electronically) it's out there, doing its bit to undermine trust, cause confusion or even make the writer look like an idiot - forever.
After all, a complicated kata may take a very long time to learn. Weeks, maybe, in the case of short, iai kata, on a technical level (the deeper meaning level takes as long - as it takes). But the practitioner has an assurance, at least, that if she sticks to the practice long enough, she will eventually understand what she is doing, and why. With humans, not so much. Even if you know someone well, it's always like starting from Square One. And no matter how many kata you know, one poor choice of phrase can set back a relationship, and it can take a long time to recover.
Human relations are why every now and then I meet a real budo ronin - someone who has a lot of experience, but no home dojo. It's why federations rise, break apart, and occasionally come back together. It's why ryuha engender "offshoots." And it's why online budo fora can sometimes become flamepits, and why I avoid them now altogether.
The title of this post is actually a quote from a co-worker at my day job. She has adopted it as a strategy for surviving her daughter's wedding, set to take place this summer. I like this idea, so I intend to use it from now on. No more lore, no more advice. Opinions? Yes, but here only. Put on the gi. Go to the training. Don't say anything.
Don't get me wrong. Budo is impossible without people - people to practice with, people to learn from. I have had some of the best times in my life with budoka, and some of them are more like family than friends (meant in both the good and bad senses). I have also had my heart broken and been flamed; but I have also been raised up and brushed off by my budo colleagues. I owe them more collectively, as a group, than anyone else in my life, for much of the good stuff that happens. But if there is any theme that runs through this entire blog, it is caution with regard to the human element of budo. It's the source of great richness, but with some occasional muck attached.
Tuesday, January 22, 2013
What is a master teacher?
I have been asking myself lately, what is a master teacher?
Last week, I received several emails from a prospective student who was interested in our koryu jodo practice. I answered several of his questions about where our fledgling group was situated in the jodo continuum that exists in the US Northeast. Not the very, very bottom, but not that high up, either. We are well-connected to people higher up the ladder both here and in Japan. For a group that has only been in existence for 10 months, we are doing quite well, I think, according to my feeling and the feeling of the upper-ranked people we work with on a regular basis. Still, Prospective Student wanted to know if I had a beginning certificate of rank. I said, truthfully, not yet, though it was a matter of time and personal application on my part, both of which were being supplied. But the email struck me as weird. The rank he was asking about was not a teaching rank, and it was not very clear to me whether he actually knew that (it was sort of like asking a karate teacher if (s)he is a shodan). I suggested, not that politely, that maybe our little group was not advanced enough for him. End of conversation.
On the way home, it reminded me of a tv ad long, long ago, in which Abraham Lincoln goes to an employment agency. The counselor asks him about his education, and Lincoln replies, "Well, I've done a lot of reading and studying." Lincoln can't get anywhere without a high school diploma. The ad ends as the counselor asks him if he has a chauffer's license.
To be honest, I can't remember the point of the ad overall, but the image of an embarrassed Lincoln, playing with his watch chain and looking at the floor, has stayed with me, obviously. Whatever the ad's actual final pitch, the overall sense was that NOT having a piece of paper does not necessarily make you unfit to do something.
The idea that someone has been through a battery of qualifying tests through a qualified body, whether a group of yudansha or a dissertation committee, is intended to assure students that the rank-holder has at least a technical grasp of the material to be taught. However, if the rank-holder has no experience as a teacher, it is entirely possible that his/her ability to communicate could be severely lacking, making whatever material to be conveyed incomprehensible. A person can be a good technician and not a good teacher. Moreover, if the rank-holder only understands technique on a physical level, without any underlying understanding of the principle, as the person's physical gifts decline, so will his ability to convey even what he used to know. If observation is any guide, the students' gifts will start to decline along with that of the person teaching. That is why university teachers keep reaching for different aspects of their practice - in order to deepen their understanding, both to satisfy their own curiosity and that of their students.
Then there is honorary rank. Honorary budo ranks are given sometimes out of politeness, or even to attract attention to a dojo or ryuha. My teacher and I were once talking about a famous writer who was a godan in kendo. "He wasn't that good," my teacher said, "but he was famous so they made him godan." In the best-case scenario, the honorary rank-holder probably does not even consider himself sufficiently qualified to teach, but others may disagree. If, in fact, the person received the honorary rank in Japan and then returned home, who among his juniors or new students here would know the difference? At universities, famous people are given honorary doctorates from time to time, but no one thinks that person should outline courses for the following year's curriculum. It surprises me sometimes that US budoka aren't more curious - they might see that the emperor's clothes are not what they appear.
On the other hand, of course, are the people like me who, after many years of informal practice, are finally, if belatedly, moving along a path to systematic improvement in an art form in which I have long had an interest. I have a wealth of experience as a teacher in general, and as a budo teacher in particular. Our jodo class is a workshop of like-minded people who need others to practice with. We don't pretend to be experts because we aren't; and we are having a lot of fun learning together with expert guidance.
So, I hope the prospective student finds the qualified teacher he is looking for. That teacher may be expensive, or difficult, or may take advantage of students (I am being hypothetical here), or even fake! but if he has a certificate, why, he must be right.
Last week, I received several emails from a prospective student who was interested in our koryu jodo practice. I answered several of his questions about where our fledgling group was situated in the jodo continuum that exists in the US Northeast. Not the very, very bottom, but not that high up, either. We are well-connected to people higher up the ladder both here and in Japan. For a group that has only been in existence for 10 months, we are doing quite well, I think, according to my feeling and the feeling of the upper-ranked people we work with on a regular basis. Still, Prospective Student wanted to know if I had a beginning certificate of rank. I said, truthfully, not yet, though it was a matter of time and personal application on my part, both of which were being supplied. But the email struck me as weird. The rank he was asking about was not a teaching rank, and it was not very clear to me whether he actually knew that (it was sort of like asking a karate teacher if (s)he is a shodan). I suggested, not that politely, that maybe our little group was not advanced enough for him. End of conversation.
On the way home, it reminded me of a tv ad long, long ago, in which Abraham Lincoln goes to an employment agency. The counselor asks him about his education, and Lincoln replies, "Well, I've done a lot of reading and studying." Lincoln can't get anywhere without a high school diploma. The ad ends as the counselor asks him if he has a chauffer's license.
To be honest, I can't remember the point of the ad overall, but the image of an embarrassed Lincoln, playing with his watch chain and looking at the floor, has stayed with me, obviously. Whatever the ad's actual final pitch, the overall sense was that NOT having a piece of paper does not necessarily make you unfit to do something.
The idea that someone has been through a battery of qualifying tests through a qualified body, whether a group of yudansha or a dissertation committee, is intended to assure students that the rank-holder has at least a technical grasp of the material to be taught. However, if the rank-holder has no experience as a teacher, it is entirely possible that his/her ability to communicate could be severely lacking, making whatever material to be conveyed incomprehensible. A person can be a good technician and not a good teacher. Moreover, if the rank-holder only understands technique on a physical level, without any underlying understanding of the principle, as the person's physical gifts decline, so will his ability to convey even what he used to know. If observation is any guide, the students' gifts will start to decline along with that of the person teaching. That is why university teachers keep reaching for different aspects of their practice - in order to deepen their understanding, both to satisfy their own curiosity and that of their students.
Then there is honorary rank. Honorary budo ranks are given sometimes out of politeness, or even to attract attention to a dojo or ryuha. My teacher and I were once talking about a famous writer who was a godan in kendo. "He wasn't that good," my teacher said, "but he was famous so they made him godan." In the best-case scenario, the honorary rank-holder probably does not even consider himself sufficiently qualified to teach, but others may disagree. If, in fact, the person received the honorary rank in Japan and then returned home, who among his juniors or new students here would know the difference? At universities, famous people are given honorary doctorates from time to time, but no one thinks that person should outline courses for the following year's curriculum. It surprises me sometimes that US budoka aren't more curious - they might see that the emperor's clothes are not what they appear.
On the other hand, of course, are the people like me who, after many years of informal practice, are finally, if belatedly, moving along a path to systematic improvement in an art form in which I have long had an interest. I have a wealth of experience as a teacher in general, and as a budo teacher in particular. Our jodo class is a workshop of like-minded people who need others to practice with. We don't pretend to be experts because we aren't; and we are having a lot of fun learning together with expert guidance.
So, I hope the prospective student finds the qualified teacher he is looking for. That teacher may be expensive, or difficult, or may take advantage of students (I am being hypothetical here), or even fake! but if he has a certificate, why, he must be right.
Tuesday, January 8, 2013
The wrong fit - revised
I got an email via FB the other week from a colleague. He said:
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Maybe you could help me to help a karate student in need. I received this message from this student :
"I actually had to leave my dojo because of bad coach behavior. I'd been studying at a dojo for years, but the instructor changed during that time. I've seen him say while walking through his dojo that "the master walks among the slaves" and watched as he publicly badmouthed another school to the class. He blackened my eye on purpose and berated me for my having made an honest mistake while sparring (he felt my hook was too quick), and made a public joke at my expense to the effect that my wife and I haven't [had] children. I left the school, even though other students swear by this guy and have nothing but good things to say about him. I need any advice about how to try and motivate myself to get back out there and try again... I keep trying to rally myself, but I just can't bring myself to get back to a school. I'm also just curious why so many other people seemed to benefit from this instructor, whereas I was singled out. Any advice is appreciated. "
I gave the young man whatever advice I could--comments he seemed to appreciate. But even though I think I have motivated him to start training again, he cannot find a dojo that he has confidence in. Do you know any karate sensei that you could recommend?
Thanks for any help you can give.
---------------------
An abusive teacher, or just the wrong fit? I responded to my colleague's inquiry, but I keep thinking about this student and what had happened to him. At first, of course, it is easy to decide that any teacher who would single out and humiliate a student, let alone intentionally injure him, must simply be an abusive, power-mongering freak, right? Right? Until I get to the part about the fact that the other students "swear by this guy." What is really going on here?
I have been around enough dojo of varying stripes and in various locations to speculate. I have been developing a theory around the idea that, unlike the laws of physics, when it comes to dojo, like attracts like. A thugly teacher will attract thugly students. An arrogant teacher will attract people who are likewise. A thoughtful person will (hopefully) attract thoughtful people, etc. The rub comes when the potential students actually show up. Like in the story above, a thoughtful student will find himself in conflict with what I would call a thugly teacher. The fact that the other students "swore by this guy" meant one of two things: either that they have yet to fall afoul of the teacher, or they are just like him.
When there is a bad fit, the student usually loses. It is difficult to know what happened in this case, since the instructor seems to have started out as a fairly reasonable person and then his attitude changed. But perhaps that is not our concern here. What is the concern is that the teacher singled out the student who did not fit in with his new order, and embarked on a campaign to get rid of him. In all likelihood the teacher preferred another type of student - one less thoughtful, maybe, but most likely more like himself. In a perfect world, good teachers, whatever their personal issues or points of view, should be able to disseminate information to a wide range of students. Academia is built on this idea (or at least it was), and I think it can work sometimes, but in a martial arts studio, especially in the US, it does not. Most teachers have no training as actual teachers. For many, teaching is simply a power trip. I would even go further to say that most dojo in the US attract people with strong personalities, to say the least. Any student who can't accommodate himself to the teacher must look elsewhere.
The only exception I have found to the like-attracts-like in the dojo is that when the teacher is teaching the only game in town (a particular weapon, for example, or a particular cultural practice, like some forms of dance), it will attract a whole range of people who keep their personalities in check at least for a time in order to learn what they want of what the teacher is teaching. When that teacher dies or moves on, or when the students gain what they feel is enough expertise, the dynamic changes. The students who have been studying a style as an auxilliary practice go back to their home dojo and set up shop, and teach what they have learned "their way." My teacher used to send me to some of these places when I was a senior student to observe what was being taught. Sometimes the result was funny, and sometimes it was sad, or just wrong. Since none of the "teachers" involved had put in enough time to really understand our practice, it was rare that anyone had a good grip on what the practice actually was. In good cases, the "teacher" was perceptive enough to ask for help - sometimes - more or less (that's a subject for a post altogether). In other cases, there was a veneer of politeness overlaid by a sense that a threat was being perceived. My teacher, in his generosity, always felt we should try to help people with the idea of keeping them in the fold. This was not purely altruistic - my teacher worried about what they were actually teaching, and whether it accurately reflected his style or not. He was not only being caring, he was trying to protect his reputation!
There are some advantages for a teacher in the position of like-attracting-like. In my case, I have had what I would call thugly like students come in to see my classes. They know enough to take their shoes off, and within about 1/2 hour they leave. Some take exactly one class, which is all they need to do in order to figure out that I am not teaching how to go out and kill people with sticks or swords (it's in there, but that is not what the practice is about). I don't see them again, and I assume they will go on until they find someone they like better - more macho, less thoughtful - whatever.
So, what about the student who is trying to motivate himself to try again?
Even though what I do is at some remove from empty-hand practices, I actually did know someone I could recommend with some confidence. I told my correspondent that I was available if the student had any questions. I hope he decided to try again. When I endured a "changing of the guard" at my old place (which did not work out so well for me) I seriously considered taking up something else - taiji, or zumba maybe - something where I could still have some activity but just be the dumb kid in the back of the room. Though it took some time, deciding to make my own way has turned out to be one of the smarter things I have done, and I would not change that decision now even if I could. This is what I do. I still do it. And I hope the young man decides the same.
----------------------
Maybe you could help me to help a karate student in need. I received this message from this student :
"I actually had to leave my dojo because of bad coach behavior. I'd been studying at a dojo for years, but the instructor changed during that time. I've seen him say while walking through his dojo that "the master walks among the slaves" and watched as he publicly badmouthed another school to the class. He blackened my eye on purpose and berated me for my having made an honest mistake while sparring (he felt my hook was too quick), and made a public joke at my expense to the effect that my wife and I haven't [had] children. I left the school, even though other students swear by this guy and have nothing but good things to say about him. I need any advice about how to try and motivate myself to get back out there and try again... I keep trying to rally myself, but I just can't bring myself to get back to a school. I'm also just curious why so many other people seemed to benefit from this instructor, whereas I was singled out. Any advice is appreciated. "
I gave the young man whatever advice I could--comments he seemed to appreciate. But even though I think I have motivated him to start training again, he cannot find a dojo that he has confidence in. Do you know any karate sensei that you could recommend?
Thanks for any help you can give.
---------------------
An abusive teacher, or just the wrong fit? I responded to my colleague's inquiry, but I keep thinking about this student and what had happened to him. At first, of course, it is easy to decide that any teacher who would single out and humiliate a student, let alone intentionally injure him, must simply be an abusive, power-mongering freak, right? Right? Until I get to the part about the fact that the other students "swear by this guy." What is really going on here?
I have been around enough dojo of varying stripes and in various locations to speculate. I have been developing a theory around the idea that, unlike the laws of physics, when it comes to dojo, like attracts like. A thugly teacher will attract thugly students. An arrogant teacher will attract people who are likewise. A thoughtful person will (hopefully) attract thoughtful people, etc. The rub comes when the potential students actually show up. Like in the story above, a thoughtful student will find himself in conflict with what I would call a thugly teacher. The fact that the other students "swore by this guy" meant one of two things: either that they have yet to fall afoul of the teacher, or they are just like him.
When there is a bad fit, the student usually loses. It is difficult to know what happened in this case, since the instructor seems to have started out as a fairly reasonable person and then his attitude changed. But perhaps that is not our concern here. What is the concern is that the teacher singled out the student who did not fit in with his new order, and embarked on a campaign to get rid of him. In all likelihood the teacher preferred another type of student - one less thoughtful, maybe, but most likely more like himself. In a perfect world, good teachers, whatever their personal issues or points of view, should be able to disseminate information to a wide range of students. Academia is built on this idea (or at least it was), and I think it can work sometimes, but in a martial arts studio, especially in the US, it does not. Most teachers have no training as actual teachers. For many, teaching is simply a power trip. I would even go further to say that most dojo in the US attract people with strong personalities, to say the least. Any student who can't accommodate himself to the teacher must look elsewhere.
The only exception I have found to the like-attracts-like in the dojo is that when the teacher is teaching the only game in town (a particular weapon, for example, or a particular cultural practice, like some forms of dance), it will attract a whole range of people who keep their personalities in check at least for a time in order to learn what they want of what the teacher is teaching. When that teacher dies or moves on, or when the students gain what they feel is enough expertise, the dynamic changes. The students who have been studying a style as an auxilliary practice go back to their home dojo and set up shop, and teach what they have learned "their way." My teacher used to send me to some of these places when I was a senior student to observe what was being taught. Sometimes the result was funny, and sometimes it was sad, or just wrong. Since none of the "teachers" involved had put in enough time to really understand our practice, it was rare that anyone had a good grip on what the practice actually was. In good cases, the "teacher" was perceptive enough to ask for help - sometimes - more or less (that's a subject for a post altogether). In other cases, there was a veneer of politeness overlaid by a sense that a threat was being perceived. My teacher, in his generosity, always felt we should try to help people with the idea of keeping them in the fold. This was not purely altruistic - my teacher worried about what they were actually teaching, and whether it accurately reflected his style or not. He was not only being caring, he was trying to protect his reputation!
There are some advantages for a teacher in the position of like-attracting-like. In my case, I have had what I would call thugly like students come in to see my classes. They know enough to take their shoes off, and within about 1/2 hour they leave. Some take exactly one class, which is all they need to do in order to figure out that I am not teaching how to go out and kill people with sticks or swords (it's in there, but that is not what the practice is about). I don't see them again, and I assume they will go on until they find someone they like better - more macho, less thoughtful - whatever.
So, what about the student who is trying to motivate himself to try again?
Even though what I do is at some remove from empty-hand practices, I actually did know someone I could recommend with some confidence. I told my correspondent that I was available if the student had any questions. I hope he decided to try again. When I endured a "changing of the guard" at my old place (which did not work out so well for me) I seriously considered taking up something else - taiji, or zumba maybe - something where I could still have some activity but just be the dumb kid in the back of the room. Though it took some time, deciding to make my own way has turned out to be one of the smarter things I have done, and I would not change that decision now even if I could. This is what I do. I still do it. And I hope the young man decides the same.
Friday, January 4, 2013
On Awareness
My colleague, the Budo Bum, has written a very nice post (it is a pure wonder to me how he can stay so focussed all the time) on the nature of "bu", "do" and the place it has in his life. He notes that budo is a tool, not an end it itself, and that it is important to remember it as such. Nice post. I would like to pick out one of the aspects he brought up, because it is always relevant in NYC, but feels lately like it is more so.
In the past month, we have had two incidents where someone pushed another human being onto the subway tracks in front of a moving train. Both victims were killed, but the similarities go beyond that. In both cases, the victims (and I am not blaming them here, just stating apparent facts) were not paying attention to where they were. The subway is such a normal part of life here we forget how incredibly dangerous our daily commute actually is. The MTA even posts warnings: Subway tracks are dangerous. They have trains moving on them. The third rail is a live rail with hundreds of volts running through it. Yet, it is surprising how casual we all are about where we are.
Many years ago, during a similar spate of trouble in an admittedly more dangerous New York, my teacher pointedly reminded us to always be aware of our surroundings wherever we were. He was very specific about subway stations. Don't lean, he told us. Stand up. Keep your hands out of your pockets. If you are on a station platform with a wall, stand with your back against it so that no one can get behind you.
This almost seems like crazy, even paranoid, advice in what our mayor proudly refers to as the Safest Big City in America, but these and other, less-publicized incidents that happen here *every single day* should remind us that situations can change in a split second. Even before I started budo (I was a western style fencer), coming from a non-metropolitan area, I realized I needed two things in order to adapt to life here - a sense of calm, and a sense of awareness. As the Budo Bum pointed out, budo can give you these things, but you don't need to practice budo in order to cultivate them in yourself. So, extrapolating on my teacher's advice, here's some from me, just so I can feel like I said something:
- When waiting for the train, just wait. Don't text, don't read, just wait. Subway arrival times are now actually posted in many stations, so riders don't even have to lean over the platform and peer down the track to see if anything is coming (I never understood this idea anyway. Staring down the tunnel does not make the train come any faster, people).
- Follow sensei's advice and stand with your back to the wall, and take your hands out of your pockets fergodssake. Where do you think you are? One of the really unfortunate video clips of the first subway victim shows him arguing with his assailant right before he got pushed. He has his hands in his pockets, and he is standing with his back to the tracks.
-If you see someone acting strangely, move away from him or her. And pay attention to what that person is doing. The second victim turned his back on the person who suddenly pushed him on to the tracks. She had been previously pacing the platform, talking to herself. Even if he had not seen her earlier, it is generally wise not to stand in front of someone if you can help it. I stand behind people, if I can't just stand by myself. And they don't even notice me, which I find unsettling, but at least I don't mean anyone any harm.
Yes, yes, yes, NYC could make stations safer, but those safety measures would cost millions of dollars. And we need better mental health care. Don't hold your breath. Awareness is free, and for now, it has to do.
In the past month, we have had two incidents where someone pushed another human being onto the subway tracks in front of a moving train. Both victims were killed, but the similarities go beyond that. In both cases, the victims (and I am not blaming them here, just stating apparent facts) were not paying attention to where they were. The subway is such a normal part of life here we forget how incredibly dangerous our daily commute actually is. The MTA even posts warnings: Subway tracks are dangerous. They have trains moving on them. The third rail is a live rail with hundreds of volts running through it. Yet, it is surprising how casual we all are about where we are.
Many years ago, during a similar spate of trouble in an admittedly more dangerous New York, my teacher pointedly reminded us to always be aware of our surroundings wherever we were. He was very specific about subway stations. Don't lean, he told us. Stand up. Keep your hands out of your pockets. If you are on a station platform with a wall, stand with your back against it so that no one can get behind you.
This almost seems like crazy, even paranoid, advice in what our mayor proudly refers to as the Safest Big City in America, but these and other, less-publicized incidents that happen here *every single day* should remind us that situations can change in a split second. Even before I started budo (I was a western style fencer), coming from a non-metropolitan area, I realized I needed two things in order to adapt to life here - a sense of calm, and a sense of awareness. As the Budo Bum pointed out, budo can give you these things, but you don't need to practice budo in order to cultivate them in yourself. So, extrapolating on my teacher's advice, here's some from me, just so I can feel like I said something:
- When waiting for the train, just wait. Don't text, don't read, just wait. Subway arrival times are now actually posted in many stations, so riders don't even have to lean over the platform and peer down the track to see if anything is coming (I never understood this idea anyway. Staring down the tunnel does not make the train come any faster, people).
- Follow sensei's advice and stand with your back to the wall, and take your hands out of your pockets fergodssake. Where do you think you are? One of the really unfortunate video clips of the first subway victim shows him arguing with his assailant right before he got pushed. He has his hands in his pockets, and he is standing with his back to the tracks.
-If you see someone acting strangely, move away from him or her. And pay attention to what that person is doing. The second victim turned his back on the person who suddenly pushed him on to the tracks. She had been previously pacing the platform, talking to herself. Even if he had not seen her earlier, it is generally wise not to stand in front of someone if you can help it. I stand behind people, if I can't just stand by myself. And they don't even notice me, which I find unsettling, but at least I don't mean anyone any harm.
Yes, yes, yes, NYC could make stations safer, but those safety measures would cost millions of dollars. And we need better mental health care. Don't hold your breath. Awareness is free, and for now, it has to do.
Thursday, January 3, 2013
On Beate and India
So, yesterday, there was a substantially large obit in the NYT about Beate Gordon, who died a short while ago at 85. At the same time, there have been updates about the young Indian medical student who was gang-raped and so badly injured in the attack that she died. No big obit for her, because, aside from those few details and some info about the attack, we don't know who she was.
For some reason, these two stories have been going around in my head since yesterday.
Beate Gordon was a performing arts director first at Japan Society and later at Asia Society. I met her several times. She was a small woman with perfectly upright carriage. She wore her hair in a very tight bun, and spoke with that polished elocution that has become rarer and rarer, and always reminds me of Margaret Dumont, though, in Ms. Gordon's case (I never knew her well enough to call her by her first name), without the sense of humor.
The obit notes her postwar work in Japan, in particular writing the women's rights section of the new Japanese constitution, which was kept under wraps until her autobiography came out, many years later. I believe this is true, since I never remember hearing her talk about it, but I can tell you plainly she was a very proud and powerful woman with strong opinions about everything. She stepped on toes, too, but she ruled her world. She did.
In the discussion regarding the equal rights for women clause of the constitution, the obit notes (and I remember the reviews of her book noted it also, as well as interviews she gave at the time) that the US constitution does not have such a clause. We tried it - remember the ERA? - but not enough states voted to ratify it before the time allotted ran out, though we came irritatingly close. As women in the US watch repeated efforts to roll back our rights, I sometimes wonder if we had an equality of the sexes clause in our constitution whether those efforts could be dismissed out of hand. We don't have one, and they aren't dismissed out of hand. As tough as things can be in Japan for women, at least they have that.
With regard to the Indian rape case, I would like to say I am surprised, but I'm not. Women are continually subject to harrassment in India, though upper-class women suffer it less (and it is possible part of the shock here was that this woman was not poor). No ERA there either.
And foreign women are not exempt. I knew a woman who was on a tour bus in a rural area of India, who asked to stop to use the bathroom. She described her experience as having to walk to the restroom through a "gauntlet" of taunting, groping men. She said she was absolutely frightened, and angry at the tour guide for letting her go without an escort (she did not, until that moment, know she needed one). She told me she was afraid for a brief moment that she would never get out of the place and back to the bus. Some vacation (she later sued the tour organizers for that and a great number of other reasons, though I have no idea if the suit went anywhere).
The NYT, in some of its coverage of the protests in India, notes that many of the protesters are men, and that while some of them genuinely feel outrage and think women should be treated better, some are simply enjoying a chance to make noise. And the dearth of women at the protests is simply because they are afraid of being there without a male escort. They are afraid that the men protesting a gang rape will assault them. It's like a trip to Bizzaro World.
Further on that, someone (sorry, but I forget who) compiled rape stats around the world, in an article I read a couple of months ago. At least some of the studies asked men the reason why they raped someone. A surprising number in some areas said it was simply a sense of entitlement; i.e., a woman out alone was an invitation to assault. No biggie. She knew the rules, they figure, and she played. And she lost. Or whatever.
Cultural differences - not. And I deeply sympathize with the women's groups in India who have no less a task than trying to remake their society to simply respect them as human beings. Their experience shows that gender equality is not automatic, nor is it immutable. Beate Gordon took an opportunity to commit a radical act, which has somehow endured on paper if not always in fact. Here, we don't have an ERA. At this point, we don't even have a renewal of the Violence Against Women Act. But we do have the vote (since 1920! After virtually every other disenfranchised group got it before us). We should use it - while we still can.
For some reason, these two stories have been going around in my head since yesterday.
Beate Gordon was a performing arts director first at Japan Society and later at Asia Society. I met her several times. She was a small woman with perfectly upright carriage. She wore her hair in a very tight bun, and spoke with that polished elocution that has become rarer and rarer, and always reminds me of Margaret Dumont, though, in Ms. Gordon's case (I never knew her well enough to call her by her first name), without the sense of humor.
The obit notes her postwar work in Japan, in particular writing the women's rights section of the new Japanese constitution, which was kept under wraps until her autobiography came out, many years later. I believe this is true, since I never remember hearing her talk about it, but I can tell you plainly she was a very proud and powerful woman with strong opinions about everything. She stepped on toes, too, but she ruled her world. She did.
In the discussion regarding the equal rights for women clause of the constitution, the obit notes (and I remember the reviews of her book noted it also, as well as interviews she gave at the time) that the US constitution does not have such a clause. We tried it - remember the ERA? - but not enough states voted to ratify it before the time allotted ran out, though we came irritatingly close. As women in the US watch repeated efforts to roll back our rights, I sometimes wonder if we had an equality of the sexes clause in our constitution whether those efforts could be dismissed out of hand. We don't have one, and they aren't dismissed out of hand. As tough as things can be in Japan for women, at least they have that.
With regard to the Indian rape case, I would like to say I am surprised, but I'm not. Women are continually subject to harrassment in India, though upper-class women suffer it less (and it is possible part of the shock here was that this woman was not poor). No ERA there either.
And foreign women are not exempt. I knew a woman who was on a tour bus in a rural area of India, who asked to stop to use the bathroom. She described her experience as having to walk to the restroom through a "gauntlet" of taunting, groping men. She said she was absolutely frightened, and angry at the tour guide for letting her go without an escort (she did not, until that moment, know she needed one). She told me she was afraid for a brief moment that she would never get out of the place and back to the bus. Some vacation (she later sued the tour organizers for that and a great number of other reasons, though I have no idea if the suit went anywhere).
The NYT, in some of its coverage of the protests in India, notes that many of the protesters are men, and that while some of them genuinely feel outrage and think women should be treated better, some are simply enjoying a chance to make noise. And the dearth of women at the protests is simply because they are afraid of being there without a male escort. They are afraid that the men protesting a gang rape will assault them. It's like a trip to Bizzaro World.
Further on that, someone (sorry, but I forget who) compiled rape stats around the world, in an article I read a couple of months ago. At least some of the studies asked men the reason why they raped someone. A surprising number in some areas said it was simply a sense of entitlement; i.e., a woman out alone was an invitation to assault. No biggie. She knew the rules, they figure, and she played. And she lost. Or whatever.
Cultural differences - not. And I deeply sympathize with the women's groups in India who have no less a task than trying to remake their society to simply respect them as human beings. Their experience shows that gender equality is not automatic, nor is it immutable. Beate Gordon took an opportunity to commit a radical act, which has somehow endured on paper if not always in fact. Here, we don't have an ERA. At this point, we don't even have a renewal of the Violence Against Women Act. But we do have the vote (since 1920! After virtually every other disenfranchised group got it before us). We should use it - while we still can.
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