Tokyo Budo-kan, Ayase

The tournament has taken place over two days. Saturday and Sunday this weekend. A lot of karate-ka, even if Kazutaka-Sensei said there were fewer than usual.

Lovely to see the kids, and fantastic to make some new friends. Us scary, big foreigners drew a lot of attention, but Grandmaster himself expressed his gratitude about our presence.

The kids did great. And it is fantastic to have something to reach for: Seeing how they behaved gave us a lot of inspiration concerning our own club. And also, girls of Tendo: If you want, you can get your black belts with pink embroidery when you do your dan-grades! =P

The first day was qualifying rounds and there was a lot of fun katas to see. The mood in the Budo-kan was one of anticipation and joy.

After the rounds, there were speeches and gifts being handed over to Grandmaster, since he's turning 80 this year. Øistein Riber and Knut Langsrud handed over the gifts from the Norwegian and Swedish associations. Tendo gave grandmaster Aquavit. Got to keep some traditions I guess :D

Lots of kids, lots of adults!

We also bought a lot of loot, and met Kazutaka-senseis sister. She ran the Wado-shop at the event, and we all spent a bit of money... Who knows what kind of fun stuff you'll be getting at grading if you do a great job ;)
Kazutaka's sister also got some Norwegian chocolate from us!

Tachidori with Grandmaster and Kazutaka-Sensei

I will make a blog post about meeting new friends, but I'll say this for now: Norwegian chocolate is popular with Japanese kids =)

After the competition, we went for Indian Curry (yes, really), and to the sky tree!

The second day at the Budo-kan was great fun for us. But perhaps most fun for a small group of us... Kazutaka-Sensei informed us on saturday that there would be a short 20 minute session with grandmaster in the Budo-kan. It was to be a short class, quite informal - And we were all invited to partake!!


As Sunday came, only Kawai-San and Neko-San decided to bring gi's. (And also Knut and Bodil from Sweden) Other came to regret their decimation to NOT bring theirs. Kuma-San punches me whenever I bring that up... I have promised to remind him regularly in the future, he has promised to hate me for it :p

Our new friends.

Warm up with Kazutaka- Sensei

Pinan Godan

Donning a gi at the Buydo-kan, and joining in got a LOT of looks from the locals. I have never in my life felt so included and alienated at the same time. The official photographers had a field day, and I'm guessing I'm going to be featured in the Gaijin-weekly column in some paper...

I was also asked to pose for pictures with some of the kids, and they all thought it super fun that Fredrik and I trained with them. There was also a lot of pointing and thumbs up in the audience.

Oh, I just need to mention: The class didn't last 20 minutes. It was 45. Fourty-five glorious minutes. I'm extatic. Kuma-san hates me.. I should stop now....

/Kristian