Daigo Newsletter

This section is to feature a student

in the Dojo. Sometimes, we only

know each other in our brief time

at the school but there is more to

all of us than those few hours each

week.

A student picked randomly is

asked a series of questions and

their responses are recorded and

featured here as a way to learn

more about them. Have fun read-

ing.

Name: Gary Baziuk

Age: 57

Place of Birth: Lethbridge, AB

Horoscope: Sagittarius

Height: 5’9”

Weight: 185 lbs

Marital Status: Married with chil-

dren

Where did you grow up?

Edmonton, AB

What did you want to be when

you grew up? Doctor or Computer

Programmer

Job Title:

Processing Geophysicist

Dream Job: World Dictator for

Life

Hobbies: Martial Arts, Board

Game Enthusiast, Hockey

Goal in martial arts? Keep Learn-

ing Martial Arts

Coolest thing you learned/saw in

martial arts? Kogoroshi

Favorite Movie: Oh Brother,

Where Arte Thou?

Favorite Music: Classical

Favorite Food: Kielbasa and

Perogies

Favorite Drink: Iced Tea

If you could change one thing in

the world? Get rid of greed and

limit the amount of money any

one person can make

If you could live anywhere in the

world? Calgary, AB

Most interesting person you ever

met? Wayne Gretzky

Most interesting thing ever done?

Scuba Diving in Australia, Black

water rafting in New Zealand

Best advice? Don’t sweat the small

stuff, enjoy life, and manage your

resources well

Thx Gary!

Student Bio—Gary Baziuk

So our new youth season has started with

some improvements. Really just a return

to the way things were done before.

This year, we reintroduced a separate

youth only class time to provide more

focus to the youth program and achieve

greater results.

We have also added 2 full time Assistant

Instructors specifically for the youth

program; Rich O’Neill and Dennis

Kroepfl. Both have committed them-

selves to helping the youth increase their

skills in a safe and friendly environment..

After reviewing last year, I made note of a

few things that I wanted to really spend

some time on and see it produce better

results. Notably, fitness and coordination

skills, along with the regular syllabus. We

want to help the youth become stronger,

faster, and with excellent body awareness

and coordination. So we have added a

number of drills and exercises from the

Ninpo training syllabus as well as incor-

porated football type drills as they tend to

focus on agility, balance, and power and

use the legs and core very much the same

as in martial arts. Already I am seeing

improvement in the youth and we will

continue to spend some class time on

these things.

We have some new faces at the Dojo and

these students are already doing well in

class. Welcome! We didn't get much

response from the advertising that we

spent so the program remains undersized

and running in a deficit. This unfortu-

nately hasn't changed in many years but

hopefully students will help bring aware-

ness to our program and introduce new

students to the school. Remember that

we pay a finder’s fee to students who

bring in new people to the school.

Lastly, gradings are already on my mind

as students are excelling in their classes

and picked up right where they left off at

the end of last season. I wish them the

best moving forward.

Welcome Back, Welcome to the Dojo, & Gradings Upcoming

Genbukan Daigo Dojo

October 2014

Summary

Student Bio

Welcome Back and

Gradings

The costs of training

What is a Ryu Ha?

Ninpo vs Ninjutsu

Bottle Drive Update

Study Notes etc

Report Cards

Written by:

Alan Scofield

The Costs of Training

The costs of training in this martial art. Some costs are set out by Soke Tanemura in Japan and some are the result of what the costs of running the

Dojo are. I wanted to take some time to write about it so students understand why and what.

Let’s start with training fees. These are the yearly, half year, or quarterly fees students pay to train in the Dojo. These fees go directly to the costs of

having the Dojo as a place to train. They include the following: Rental space (lease), Accountant, Lawyer, Business License, GST, Insurance, Mainte-

nance costs, Instructor Licenses, Office expenses and supplies, Website, Advertising, and so on. Most of these items are generally fixed and so we

have a cost simply to exist in Calgary. That cost is then broken out over the student body as a whole to come up with the costs of training at the

school.

My goal has always been to lower the costs of training but this can only be done in one of two ways: Lower the costs of functioning which we are

about as low as we can go, OR increase student size to such a point that the individual cost can be lowered. This is where my focus is and where I

hope yours is too. Calgary is an expensive place to live. Last I checked, it was ranked third most expensive city in Canada to live in. So training fees

can be a real hit to any budget. This is why I must do as much as I can to increase enrollment in the school. By doing so, I make the lives of each

student within it easier. Your help in this matter is most appreciated and important. Ultimately you can help yourself by helping the school as a whole.

Lower training fees, more students to train with, more friends to know, more people to help. These are just some of the benefits of increasing the

enrollment in the school. On top of this, the school also pays a finder’s fee to students who bring in new students to the school. The finder’s fee is

based on if that student signs up to our program for 5 months (youth) or 6 months (adult). The bonus we pay back to the introducer is $50 for a new

youth and $100 for a new adult. We also have Student Member business cards for people to hand out and we can email a variety of posters/billets/

handouts for students to post at school, at work, in lunch rooms, community centers, etc. I hope you will help me build the school.

Moving on the Annual Memberships…

Annual Memberships are in essence a stipend paid back to Soke Tanemura to train in his martial art. It is his techniques, his worldwide organization,

his efforts and guidance. Each student thanks him for the opportunity to train each year by sending in their renewal fee. The fee goes to keeping that

student’s ranks and certifications on record at Honbu Dojo in Saitama Japan. These ranks are recognized world wide and allow access to seminars,

other dojos when travelling, and access to Soke’s teachings through books, cds, etc. A student also receives his patches and welcome letters when

sending in his first membership forms. These take a long time to arrive so one must be patient about that. The current renewal fees for youth are $50

USD in a US money order to Troy Wideman (The Shibu Cho of Canada). Adult costs are $60 USD. The Shibu Cho must then collect all together and

send all country students fees to Soke. These are due Feb 1st of each year. A student may not renew their membership if they are training with a

teacher.

Grading Fees:

This is the cost of testing. A student, when ready to test will be invited to do so at a set date. The student does not have to test but cannot move for-

ward without testing. The cost of testing is also set forth by Soke. It is rank dependant. That is to say that at certain higher levels, the costs of testing

increase. At present, the average youth student pays $30 USD in a US money order payable to Troy Wideman and a $5 cash CDN fee to the Dojo.

The average adult cost is $50 USD and $5 cash CDN to the Dojo. These increase at the 3rd kyu rank, Shodan rank, and then above. My current costs

to test are minimum $250 USD for example. Paying for testing does not guarantee to pass. If a student is unable to demonstrate

the syllabus sufficiently, they are invited back to test at a later date but with no further cost to testing. The fee is held until such

time as the student passes the test.

Daigo Newsletter

Genbukan Daigo Dojo

What is a Ryu Ha? (pronounced: Roo Hah)

A Ryu Ha is very special. It is the full secret scrolls for a particular style or way of fighting to achieve victory. There are no real Ryu Ha from people who lost. It is those whose style or method brought about victory that wrote down their techniques and passed them on for others to follow. These skills continued to work and so the Ryu Ha became known and followed by more people. There is only one true Grandmaster of a Ryu Ha, but there can be many masters.

Ryu Ha are ways of fighting or special knowledge. There are Ryu Ha for how to build a castle or defend a castle against attack; Ryu Ha for how to disguise oneself, special medicines, explosives/poisons, battlefield weapons such as the Bisento, and on and on.

Once a person has become a master of the style, he can then add changes to the style based on his own life experiences and thus keep the techniques current with modern weapons and society as a whole. This ensures that real martial arts never dies and is a living thing. When a master adds or changes something within the Ryu, he must always remember to teach the full sylla-bus as is and then make note of any changes he has made so that students know the “default” ways and also anything new. For example: There is a style called Koto Ryu Koppo Jutsu. This is the Ryu Ha name. Soke Tanemura is the Grandmaster of this style. But he has also added to it things that either work better or are more modern applications. For these additions, he makes the following change: Koto Ryu Koppo Jutsu Tanemura Ha. This then tells any student that these items are added above and beyond the regular full scroll as additions.

Clear as mud? Good :)

The opportunity to learn a Ryu Ha is a big deal in a dedicated martial artist’s life. They have spent years working on fundamentals within the Ninpo and Jujutsu syllabus and then have an opportunity to increase their understanding by getting to learn a portion of the higher level teachings contained within a specific Ryu Ha. Ryu Ha are commonly divided into many sections starting with a Kirigami section, then Shoden Menkyo and so on up to full mastership (Menkyo Kaiden). It is common for this to take 20 years of study and earning the right to learn further levels within the Ryu Ha. Teachers often are working on many Ryu Ha simultaneously over many years. Testing is a matter of being in the right place at the right time and so many teachers know Ryu Ha but do not carry the rank associated with it because the opportunity to test their knowledge didn't come up. Patience and Persistence!

The Genbukan syllabus is massive. It is equivalent to taking every course in every field in an entire university to the master level. The Ninpo and Jujut-su syllabus are fundamentals found within all the Ryu Ha collectively. Soke spent time to develop the curriculum so that any student no matter age or ability can learn effective and real self defence. The techniques are taken from parts of various Ryu Ha that Soke is Grandmaster of. He has over 50 Ryu Ha under his belt. This is an incredible achievement and shows his true skill and dedication. There is no one in the world with such knowledge as him!

Ninpo vs Ninjutsu

Two words that most people associate as the same, but are vastly different.

First let me say that we often use the term Ninjutsu in our advertis-ing. We do this because very few people know what Ninpo is, much less how to pronounce it ( Nin—Poh—not Poo). Ninjutsu is more well known as a term and so we use this term simply due to social conventions.

We do not teach Ninjutsu. Ninjutsu is, in essence, a set of tech-niques with no spiritual guidance, moral compass, nor commit-ment to peace and compassion. It is a set of martial skills whose sole purpose is to cause harm. This is often portrayed in Ninja movies as people who act as assassins and criminals.

Ninpo is a way of living. A way of pursuing peace through self defence. The training within the curriculum is designed in a way to develop the body as well as the mind and the spirit within each person. This phrase has unfortunately become a marketing tool for so many things that teach none of what they claim to teach.

The symbol in Japanese writing for Po relates to Spirituality. This does not mean religion. Religion is a man made construct. Spiritu-ality is what every human has within them as they are born to this world. It is their own personal connection with nature and the Universe. It is what is felt in the heart when one looks out across a still lake during a sunrise, or feels the scented breeze pass by them within a forest. It can be looking up at the stars at night and realiz-ing how small we really are. It is a connection and an appreciation for life in all it’s wonderment.

There is a term in Japanese called Satori. This is an overwhelming feeling of goodness within one’s heart at the appreciation for na-ture and the connection to it. This can come at any time but only when the heart is open and the mind is quiet. It is so strong that it can stop a person in their tracks, have their jaw drop; It can fill them with a deep feeling of love suddenly but not a love like with another person. Something deeper; Something within us all. It can make you hug a tree in the middle of winter, or simply sit still so as not to disturb a beautiful deer walking through a meadow. It is a joy with nature and a feeling of freedom and oneness. It is without all of the modern society’s noise and falseness.

In Ninpo, one is learning self defence. The physical side is what a person sees, but what is happening within them is of even more importance. It is cultivation of the spirit. A sharpening of the blade. In life, as goodness grows, evil is always attacking in one form or another. It never rests. The stronger the goodness, the greater the attack. It is because of this that we must train. We must train ourselves so that we can withstand life’s difficulties. We must be strong enough to keep going when everything says stop. Only a strong spirit can do this and so the syllabus creates the environ-ment in which to grow and strengthen ourselves while always maintaining peace and compassion within our hearts.

Ninpo is very deep and only Soke can truly express it’s wonders and importance. I hope I have done some small justice to it in this short essay and inspired students to renew their dedication to this martial art. As we grow in our hearts, we send forth that goodness to the world and the universe. We must keep sending good into the world and not give in to evil things and evil pursuits. Regular training encourages this growth and spirit and reminds us of what is truly important.

DRCA Bottle Drive efforts Update

The Bottle Drive Project is moving along. The DRCA posts an ad each month in

their community newsletter to encourage people to drop off their bottles to the

DRCA. Dennis and Shaun have done a great job of picking them up after class and

bringing them to the depot to exchange. Thus far, the DRCA has made about $800

towards their DROOS program, and the Dojo has made $200. It isn't much but

hopefully over a year, it will add up. The Dojo spent that money on 2 new heavy-

weight training uniforms for Dennis and Shaun as a thank you for their continued

efforts. The DRCA is very happy with our help.

2223 146 Ave SE — DRCA Community Centre

www.calgaryninja.com

Don’t forget to check the online schedule before

you leave for class!!

dents will look to you for help in their studies. A student with more

rank should know all of the cumulative syllabus they have learned and

tested. They should be experts at what they know. To me, it is dis-

tressing to see senior ranks that do not know their syllabus. I do not

have that luxury and do not accept that anyone else thinks they do. A

student can do what they want but if they want to actually be able to

defend themselves, they better be practicing—practicing everything

they have learned—again and again so they never forget.

This is what I am currently working on for example:

4th Dan Ninpo 2nd Dan Jujutsu Chugoku Kenpo

Togakure Ryu Shinden Fudo Ryu Daken Taijutsu Goshin Jutsu

Japanese Vocabulary for all notes in every set of syllabus Conversational Japanese via Rosetta Stone

Hontai Kijin Chosui Ryu Kukishinden Daken Taijutsu Hontai Takagi Yoshin Ryu

Koto Ryu Koppo Jutsu Bojutsu, Hanbojutsu, Bikenjutsu Gikan Ryu Koppo Jutsu

Genbukan Yoga Shinden Tatara Ryu

Tenshin Hyoho Kukishin Ryu Jujutsu Koryu Karate Gyokko Ryu Kosshi Jutsu

So, in short, notes are your reference tool for growth in your martial

arts and are essential for long term success in this pursuit.

Notes. Super important. Enough said. However I will explain why here.

At first, note taking is a tiresome long process that rarely expresses the

real nature of any particular technique. Just as the student is new to the

martial art, so too are they to note taking in this fashion. Suffice it to say

you will get better at note taking as you advance. But still this does not

address why it is important. Notes are your way of instantly accessing

anything that you have learned in class. It is your Wiki. Your internet

search on “How to…”. As you progress in this martial art, there will be

more and more techniques to remember and practice. By having accurate

notes, a student can quickly look them over and remember exactly how to

do a particular technique. This will not help you in a fight! - Please wait a

minute while I review my notes before we start fighting…

By having good notes, you have the means with which to practice correct-

ly everything you have learned. Through practice, your body will learn

what it needs. In times of crisis, your body will do what it has been

trained to do. And so, good notes, and regular training and practice give

you the means with which to defend yourself. This is why they are im-

portant.

It is also very important as you advance in your ranks because other stu-

Study Notes etc

403 816 3474

calgaryninja@shaw.ca

www.calgaryninja.com

The Daigo Dojo is a member of the Genbukan

World Ninpo Bugei Federation—GWNBF

Genbukan Daigo Dojo

November Report Cards

Just a note that the November report cards will be coming out mid November. We will do student photos again and have them included

in the report card.

As the student progresses, so do the expectations the Dojo has on their level of proficiency in each category. If there is a small dip in one

area, it may be that there are higher expectations now. As always, if parents have questions about the report cards, you can send me an

email or better chat on the phone. Either way, it is simply a general report on what we see at the Dojo regarding the individual student

and is only meant to help guide efforts always forward, always for the better.