Week 3: On aikido shirts and tai no henko

Since this weekend is aikido weekend, I think it is appropriate to wear one of my many aikido shirts. I already wore my dojo shirt yesterday (a regular part of my rotation). Since I went to Aikido of San Leandro today, I chose their 20^th anniversary shirt. I thought that this would go well with my gi (fondly called my angry white pajamas)… Well, any t-shirt goes well with my white gi. Think of it as dressing for spring every time I go to the dojo, even if it is in the middle of winter. Thank goodness I live in California.

I’ve been practicing aikido for almost 10 years, so I have collected a good number of T-shirts. This one is one of my favorites not because it has O-sensei, Morehei Ueshiba, the founder of aikido, sitting solemnly on the front of the shirt, but mostly because it tells a story at the back of the shirt. Story tells that under 1 sensei (teacher) and 20 years, how many uchideshis (live-in students), dan promotions (blackbelt tests), classes, and tai no henkos in San Leandro Dojo. … wait, Tai no – what?

Tai no henko is almost always the first technique every class.  The footwork and turning in tai-no-henko the most basic movements that we do in aikido. That is why we start class with it. I also use it as a temparature check: How am I feeling today? How am I receiving my partner’s input? How am I attacking today? How do I like being attacked today? That technique, like all others, can take a long time to master: it has so many levels of complexity and subtleties.

I hope that my dojo can last 20 years, just like San Leandro. We are just a little over 10 years old, but we have a good solid foundation. In a few years, we can have a 20^th anniversary shirt too.

For more info on aikido, check out aikiweb.com. For our dojo in California, check out our website at aikido-hikaridojo.com