AUSKF Kendo Kamp: Day 2

Today ends the second day of the summer camp. I must say that it was an extremely fulfilling experience as I learned a lot today about myself and my performance of the basics. What I did realize was that it is easy to just do the basic stuff any old way in lieu of the more advanced things and forget to think about doing them. It was a nice way to look at things in a whole new perspective. Below are some specific notes that I mentally made throughout the day. After the group suburi practice, we were divided into groups based on rank. Since I was in the Kyu group, we touched on many basics from the importance of presenting yourself correctly to holing the shinai to some fumikomi.

• While swinging the shinai, it is important to remember to keep the sword alive. When the suburi is finished, don't just let it rest in position. Keep it strong and moving (only a little) to put some spirit into the shinai.
  
• For seiza, pay special attention that the back remains straight, no matter how tired you are. It is important that you don't show others how tired you are as it shows a sign of weakness. This is done by taking a half step back and lowering yourself down on your left knee followed by the right. That is when you flatten the top of your feet and sit down on top of them.
  
• When bowing after mokuso, keep the back and neck straight but also don't raise your butt in the process. The difference between bowing to the shomen and your opponent is in the deepness of the bow. The bow to the shomen is about 35 degrees while the bow to your opponent is about 15 degrees. Also, keep your eyes on your opponent at all times.
  
• In hayasuburi, the focus should be fast swings. You don't necessarily have to do shomen while doing hayasuburi. But don't forget that each swing should be strong.
  
• The wrists should be turned in while in kamae. This makes it easier to extend the left arm when swinging. Also, one way to gauge the distance between hands on the tsuka is to put the tip of the tsuka on the inside of your elbow and grab the tsuka with your hand. The position of the hand is where the right hand should be.
  

There was much more to be remembered, but it's getting late and I must rest for day three of the seminar. Besides, there was way too many points to remember that whole day so it's unrealistic to catch them all long enough to write them down.