Yumi no Kami

Literally means Turtle in the Sea. This phrase is the inspiration for this post. On wednesday, I brought in my new timbei for the Head Sensei to see. Timbei is a turtle shield that, when paired with a short spear, becomes the least known okinawan weapon. It is this reason why I decided I needed to learn it. Its so rare that only 1 kata exists, and I'm not a fan of watching things die out like the dodo bird. So, this will be my weapon of choice, and I'm gonna make my own kata and kumitachi for it. Quite a few people were interested in the shield, so I had to explain it about 6 times. Wheezy kid held it, stared at it blankly, and said "Do you punch it?!" Bendy-chan looked like he had 3 heads and just replied..."Yaaa, go ahead and do that."

Tournament did not go well for me at all. Got 4th in empty hand, and didn't place in the others. It would seem that I got screwed over in pretty much every single event that I was a part of. It wasn't too good. Still a green belt in karate, and i'm sorta ok with that. Its a lot of stuff, and I would like to get ranked, but I don't think it will happen for a while. Besides, I'd rather get good at this shield then be ranked right now.

Aiki was awesome. Besides Bendy-chan and Goth Kid, I was the most experienced. And for the first time, Bailout was enjoyable to work with. She was very humble in the fact that she admitted to being scared of being thrown and doing a corner roll. I figure now, I don't look at her as a sensei in that class. She is a beginner...more so then I am. So, I felt the need to baby step her back into her rolls; letting her down slowly so she could control her fall. Whether it helped or not is another story, but I felt that as the "experienced" one, it was my place to do so. Bendy-chan blasted Spam in aiki for saying he was a brown belt in Iai, trying to correct Bendy-chan because she thought he was a brown belt in Aiki and was in the wrong spot of the line. Bendy-chan didn't get it, and Spam and I fixed the line as it was meant to be. No harm, no foul, I suppose.

I'm looking forward to working with my shield and spear. Gonna acquire a foam version to practice sparring. We'll see how that goes.