Kangeiko is a special martial arts tradition in Japan. It is a week of "Winter" training. Winter training is a traditional way for martial artists to hone their fighting spirit, by purifying the mind and overcoming hardship. In Japan, this may involve outdoor training or opening the windows during class (both of which are impractical here). Our Kangeiko was over two days commencing with a four hour session Saturday and a three hour session Sunday.

Sensei Steve Bishop took both training sessions assisted by his wife and Sensei Chapman, which he started in very different way to that we have all become accustomed to. This was to clean the floor with an old tenegui. This for us beginners was confusing at first, some of us did consider if this was some kendo initiation, but sensei Bishop bringing in a bucket of warm water and some old tenegui soon diminished any doubts of this being a practical joke.

We all lined up at one end of the dojo on hands and knees with tenegui in hands ready to shuffle up the dojo. “Hajime” was the call and everybody’s competitive edge took over, including sensei Bishop and it became a race and part of the warm up to get to the other end of the dojo.

Sensei Bishop followed cleaning the floor with a thorough warm up and the with various exercises breaking technique down to individual technique such as semi, fumi-komi, men strikes then cote strikes and finally tenuchi. These techniques were then all combined, some of which sunk in some of which did not. The biggest problem most of the lower grades, including myself found was maintaining maai. This is very important and if incorrect seems to draw us into a slashing frenzy which doesn’t resemble kendo. We then practised some uchi comi geiko with Sensei Bishop beating out the combinations on wooden sticks, which I found hard to hear due to the cracking of the shinais’, (well that’s my excuse). This was then followed by ji-geiko where everybody had the opportunity to fence everybody else. Sensei Bishop, Sensei Chapman, Sensei O’Donnell and Sensei Smith then fought each other which was very good to watch and left us all in no mind that we have a long path to follow. This ended the kendo and it was time to eat.

We all made our way to the local Chinese restaurant for an enjoyable meal together with a few drinks. It was great weekend of training followed by a chance to sit down and talk together and I feel it also gave us a start to a good year of training. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Sensei and everybody else for an enjoyable weekend of kendo

Gary Archer
Kashi No Ki Kenyu Kai