Tokyo! (Part 2)

Let The Training Begin!

I ended off my last post with arriving in Tokyo and settling into the hostel. After a good night's sleep I was ready to start the day and start training. In preparation for the trip I made a spreadsheet of all the classes and places I wanted to go train at while visiting. My goal was to hit as much as I could while still being able to site see. In the previous trips I didn't do much site seeing, being more centered on training as much as I could, but this trip was different. There's too much to see in Tokyo to pass it up, it was my duty to get out there and try to see what I could while I visited and not lose too much training time. I was going to need the spreadsheet to keep track of time and plan my days out efficiently if I wanted this to work. And it did work well, even if I didn't get to all the classes, the balance of sight seeing and training was kept the entire trip.

One of the rough drafts of the schedule. I printed a few copies to make notes and changes on while traveling.

Even with the spreadsheet to keep a schedule and the screenshots of maps to mark my way to and from, there was still the matter of getting oriented to the city. I had planned to make it out to an early class and in my haste thought I knew the city layout a bit more than I did. I woke up, grabbed some breakfast and started on my way...only to spend a good hour getting lost before making it back to the hostel. I was feeling down for missing the first class of the trip and a little ego hurt from not learning my way around as easily as I thought. After taking some time to make sure I was oriented to the city I spent the morning walking around the hostel area to get used to where I'd be grabbing the transit. After being sure of my way around there I then went off to walk around Shinjuku station, the biggest station in Tokyo and the center point for all my traveling that week. With something like 26 different exits and probably half a dozen or more train transfers there was a lot to get familiar with. After walking around the area for an hour or so I was comfortable enough to know where I had to go for the limited places I was planning on going. Now it was time to head to my first class!

Paraestra Tokyo

My first class ended up being one of my most amazing experiences to date, although this week reshaped the top 10 everyday. It was at Paraestra Tokyo, Yuki Nakai's own gym. Yuki is the co-founder of the Paraestra brand as well as a shooto (MMA) and BJJ legend, it was quite the honour to be training at his place. The small gym, which is basically just a room with a padded false floating floor, is located in a basement of other rented loft rooms, there was a dance studio next door. I'm happy the days of the little sticker on the mailbox being the only sign to find it, as told in Christian Graugart's book, are over or I might never have found the place. Although there may be some signs up now, finding the place was still pretty tricky. The place doesn't come up on Google maps for some reason so you need the actual address to look it up for directions. I showed up early, as I like to do with all my classes, and waited in the stairway, taking some pictures of the signs while I did. Showing up early is something I found that is not done by many people in Tokyo, or showing up on time even. I'm sure as I travel around the world more I'll see more of the 'on my own time' sense of timing. I'll probably stick to my usual punctuality, extra time to chill is never a bad thing. So as I'm sitting on in the stairwell I hear footsteps and look up to see Yuki himself walking down, mail in hand "Hi, I'm Yuki!" he greets me warmly with a handshake. When I told him about our e-mail exchange and my visit he seemed really happy to have me come by. I was pretty excited to be on his mats, and having my first class in Tokyo.

Hanging outside in the stairwell to Paraestra Tokyo, waiting for Yuki Nakai

It was an open mat class and I was told many people from all over come to have a few rolls, I was not lied to in the least. At first there was only Yuki and I warming up and stretching out, having me wondering if I'd have an impromptu private class, I wish, but then slowly more people started showing up and it got busy pretty fast. There were all sorts of black belts showing up; old guys who've been training forever and are far more capable than their appearances give them credit for, athletic, competitive black belts that could break me before breaking a sweat, including World's light featherweight champion Rikako Yuasa, and of course the Judo guys, some were even on the National Judo team. I will admit, I didn't roll with many of them, I was in too much awe watching everyone roll to get the nerve to ask them to a match. That's an uncommon thing for me, usually I'm the first to ask higher belts for a match, that's how you learn the cool stuff after all, right? I was there for 3 hours and when I left it was still going strong, apparently the open mats can last for quite some time I'm told and I don't doubt that. It's a very relaxed environment, with Yuki watching all the matches and commenting on them as he walks around, randomly shadow boxing at times. I swear he gets more enjoyment watching everyone roll than the people actually rolling, not that there's any shortage of fun being had.

Aaron, the fellow BJJ Globetrotter who told me to come out to Yuki's and gave me the address, showed up a little later. I actually never really looked his profile on Facebook so I was going out on a limb and introducing myself the only other white guy there, assuming it was him. Luckily it was, although it would have been a great ice breaker to meet someone new if it wasn't. We chatted a bit and he told me a lot of Tokyo and the Jiu Jitsu life in the city, with some insights on other clubs, and pointing out who's who at the open mat. He was very helpful and it was great to have someone to talk to who had been living there for while, a kind of inside man as it were. I never got to roll with him on the first day but we did roll later on.

Me and Aaron, the BJJ Globetrotter connection, great guy.

I was interested to see how rolling with people in Tokyo would be, would it be faster? Harder? Or light and easy? Would the rich martial arts history of the country play into it? I had all sorts of questions in my head on my way to Tokyo and as the week went on more of them were answered. At this first class I quickly saw that the kind etiquette and good manners of the Japanese culture also carried into martial arts. I've never been asked to roll so politely before; a bow, a smile and asking me, usually in Japanese but you could understand by the demeanor and hand gesture, sometimes in English "next match please?" How can you say no?! I also quickly found the answer to the "Does Judo play into their game?" as I was thrown down quite a lot. Even their controlling positions were very judo-like, if that makes any sense. Lots of emphasis on side control, mount and back, very little on half guard and deep half, luckily I've been working on my half guard game, it saved my life. It was an eye opening experience, I very quickly knew I had made the right choice taking the chance to come all this way to train in a foreign place with a room full strangers in an art we both shared a passion for. I couldn't wait to meet more people as the week went on.

Axis Jiu Jitsu Academy

With my first taste of rolling in Tokyo I was ready to check out another club, and after a gi change and a quick meal I was on my way. The next place was on the schedule was the Axis Academy, I read somewhere it's one of the best places to train at, and it's definitely the nicest place I've ever been to so far with it's glistening mats, glass wall and sharp looking lobby. They are of Rickson Gracie Jiu Jitsu so I was hoping to see some Gracie self defence techniques, or maybe some similar moves to the curriculum I train under at my home club, being that we are of team Pedro Sauer. I was not disappointed. We started off with some self defence techniques as a warm up and I was excited to see if there were any new notes to them or a slight difference to how they do the technique. That's something I've really grown to look forward to, seeing familiar techniques taught by a new person in a new place. I find it's really interesting to see what little differences they have in how they teach the technique; maybe there will be a tip or point that just brings it all together for me and makes it my new favourite move. From a learning point of view, that is one cool thing I look forward to whenever I visit a new club. After the warm up we worked on some cool armbar and armbar defence counter techniques, my partner spoke practically no English but that didn't stop us from training and having fun. I've said this before on my Facebook page: Jiu Jitsu, and martial arts in general, is a language, pure and simple. There's no other way I could travel half way around the world and train with people who I share no common spoken language with and still be able to understand each other, train together, have fun and become friends. I trained with the same partner for the class, each making gestures to the other to communicate who's turn it was next to rep the move, or to help in the technique by moving each other's limbs in the right way. We both would have a little laugh when the other totally messed up the technique and reset for a do-over. It was a cool experience drilling in that way.

We ended classes off with some rolling, and man do the guys at Axis ever roll hard! The first round I thought maybe the guy had it out for me, or had a bit of 'got to show the new guy' ego going on, even though he was really nice when we talked. I sat out the next round and noticed how everyone rolled, he didn't have it out for me, they just usually go really hard on each other. This is something I knew I would see as I traveled, some places go harder than others, some places really like to grind it out. I can't say I'm a fan of going hard all the time, but I totally understand the different philosophies behind both rolling hard and rolling light. For me, as an injury prevention thing as I travel, or just in general since I need to keep mobile and healthy for work, I prefer to roll light most of the time unless I'm training for a competition. This is nothing against the people at Axis at all, it's just an observation I've notice while out traveling and training. Needless to say I got smashed that night as I had a few more rolls and worked on defending and riding out the grind. In between matches the guys were really kind, one gentleman and I talked about how much he loved my light weight travel gi and wanted to get a rip stop gi some day, and also he loved my batman rash guard, the man obviously has good taste!

I wish a had a picture of the place or the class but being tired I totally goofed and forgot to take any, sorry.

Tri-Force Shinjuku

I got back to the hostel late and it was past midnight by the time I finally got the gis washed and notes of the day's adventures made before heading to bed. After running around the city and training for over 4 hours in 2 different clubs on my first day, I slept quite well that night. The next day it was a new club and some new adventures. One place that got back to me pretty quickly and that I'd seen good reviews for was the Tri-Force Jiu Jitsu Academy. There's 3 branches, one in Shinjuku, and in Osaka, with the HQ in Ikebukuro. The head instructor, Mitsuyoshi Hayakawa, is an accomplished competitor and friendly guy, but as he runs the HQ in Ikebukuro I didn't get to meet him until later. Today I was training at the Shinjuku branch, run by Koji Shibamoto, another accomplished competitor who is not only friendly but very fit and has the scariest looking cauliflower ears I've ever seen. I made it early for the noon time class with time to fill in the usual paperwork before stepping on the mats. I never tire of filling out paperwork every time I show up to a new club, it's a sign of a well run place, in my eyes.

Koji Shibamoto, the Head instructor at the Shinjuku club, and I.

Class was fun, with some great warm up movements before drilling some solid techniques. Everyone was very polite and friendly and some spoke a little English, one in particular, Daisuke, actually used to live near by my current home of Victoria BC and played hockey in Canada, small world! Daisuke is a rather stalky guy and looks pretty mean, especially with his star stamped gold tooth, but he was really friendly and helpful while training and rolling. He's an MMA fighter with lots of experience and it shows when you roll with him. I've never rolled with someone who can just lie there and smile at me while I attempt a head and arm choke, and still not be able to tap them. Daisuke and I chatted a lot and agreed to meet back that evening for the night classes. I was looking forward to training with him again and meeting more of the Tri-Force members, they were all pretty nice people to be around and train with, the place had a very inviting atmosphere.

The noon time class at Tri-Force Shinjuku, good times!

After Class I quickly dropped my gi off at the hostel and set off for an afternoon adventure: checking out the Anime district in Akihabara. I'll fill you in on that and my other adventures like walking around the Imperial Palace and the gardens, crossing the Shibuya scramble, shopping in Harajuku, and more, another time. First, let's get through all the training!

I made it back to Tri-Force for the evening class and while warming up met Mitsuhiro, a really friendly Jiu Jitsu guy who was really happy to have me visiting. He spoke English very well and was really interested in what I've been able to do and see so far and what I planned on doing while in Tokyo. He and I trained together for class, going over some great armbar/triangle/omoplata flow drills. He is pretty small, being about half my weight, literally, so there were a lot of jokes about the size difference as we trained. In fact, Mitsuhiro and I got along about as well as if we were old training buddies, keeping it light and playful the whole time, it was a very fun class. There was open mat after class and Daisuke and made in back for some rolling after spending the time after the noon time class training in MMA else where. Together there was lots of sweat, taps and laughs. I truly feel like I made some good friends that night, in fact we still keep in contact on Facebook.  

I made some great friends that day, can't wait to see them on the mats again in the future!

The next day I had planned to make it out to Carpe Diem, another club I read good things about, like Tri-Force they also have a few branches around the city. I had originally planned to make it to two of the branches and have another long day of training, but I woke up pretty tired and sore, the cost of a good day of training the day before. I decided if I was to be able to get out there and see the places I wanted to see I'd need to have a day to explore. Carpe Diem was the only place not to get back to me so I wasn't too clear if I would even be welcome, although everything I read pointed to yes. Still, if I was going to miss a place, I'd be happier it being a place I didn't already tell them I'm be dropping by. I hate breaking my word. So with that I took some time to make up a plan to see some sites and do some shopping, by the end of the day I was just as tired from walking around all day as if I had just trained a few hours. I made sure to take the time to stretch out during the day and keep hydrated, taking a pause from the mats was no excuse for slipping on keeping healthy. It only takes one day of not stretching or drinking enough water to cause you to cramp up and pull something, and there goes the whole trip. Anyway, It was a good rest day that ended with me getting most of my Christmas shopping done.

Spending The Day At Yuki's

It was Thursday now, I had three more days to train and today I was spending the day at Yuki's, a total of 5 hours on the mats, I was really sore and quite tired by the end but it was so worth it. The noon time class started out with Yuki teaching a small class some gems on armbar from guard, some of which I even got on video, and then after an hour of drilling we went into rolling. Yuki had us doing some positional rolling at first. 3 minute rounds where one person starts in guard with the object to break guard, or sweep, and get to a dominant position, mount, side control or take back. Once someone got to that point reset, same person in guard, until the end of the 3 minutes, then switch. it was a lot of fun, and to me hit home the importance of finishing the sweep or guard break/pass with a position. you can pass guard all day long but if you're skills on position are lacking you're just going to end up back in guard having to pass again, or worse, swept.

Yuki teaching us some great tips to the armbar/triangle/omoplata flow.

The evening class was another open mat, starting slowly again. At first Yuki had me drill through all the techniques we did during the noon time class as a review, then him and I went through some other cool flow options he didn't show at class. After that he looked around and saw that there was only a few people still warming up and looked at me "Want to roll?" What?! Would I?! I am always honoured to be able to roll with the head instructor where ever I go as I understand that they have many reasons to why they can't, or don't have to, roll with a visiting lower belt, health issues, busy running the club, etc. The same for any black belt really, it's only for the love of the art that any black belts needs to roll with any visiting lower belt and totally up to them to decline any requests to roll. That's not to say I believe in the right to ego with rank but rather the right to choose who to roll with, although I'm sure we will all agree it's best to roll with everyone when ever you can, because it's just more fun. So anyway, I was quite excited and honored to roll with Yuki Nakai and really wish I got someone to record it so I can relive that amazing experience over and over. The amount of skill was awesome, he moved in ways I still don't understand, like magic. There was no force, no apparent pressure, just one minute I'm in his guard the next he's in side control and I can't move. It was an awesome 6 minutes.

Yuki Nakai, such a laid back cool guy.

People started to show up and the non stop rolling commenced.  The great thing about the open mats at Yuki's is that there's always such a great amount of talent there you can just sit back and take a break and watch the show. At one point I watching black belts work on take downs and some pretty brutal throws, it was captivating, I hadn't noticed how long I was watching until Aaron asked me if I was done training. Anther time I got lucky with a counter and ended up taking a black belts back. I wasn't able to capitalize on it but the whole 30 seconds I had him there trying to work on a submission I could hear Yuki and others saying "Mr. Canada" I don't know if there was an inside joke or if they were just impressed, but I couldn't help but laugh. In fact I laughed a lot during this trip. I was on such a high from traveling and experiencing everything I was in a good mood all the time. Judo guy throws me on my head,? Have a laugh. I get swept into really bad situation? Have a laugh. see the submission coming a mile away and still get caught with it? Have a laugh! I think that might have been key to making friends. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience and so when someone got me in a submission I'd smile and laugh to myself for being caught, that kind of attitude is infectious. More times than not, whoever I was rolling with would be smiling by the end too. Just because we're trying to kill each other doesn't mean we have to always be so serious. As the open mat went on I tried to keep up and roll as much as I could but by the end I was just getting smashed and too tired to continue.

The Kodokan Institute

The entrance to the Kodokan, they have an cool sign on the side of the building but I couldn't get a good pic.

The next day I planned to visit the Kodokan, the world headquarters and birthplace of Judo. Well, first I was going to go to the Tri-Force HQ noon time class then Kodokan and end it with the evening class back at the Tri-Force HQ in Ikebukuro again. Having been rung through with 5 hours of training the day before I skipped the morning class and did some site seeing instead. I got a little turned around in the subways and I got to the Kodokan later than I wanted to. Originally when planning out this I had been in correspondence with someone at the Kodokan and also another judo club who was helping me with information to taking part in a class at Kodokan. With how tired and sore I was, I was really glad I never got the classes sorted out. Watching the classes warm up was enough for me, I don't think I could take all those falls in my current state. I was hoping to get to work on some kata but if I had to go through their intense 30 minute minimum warm up I'm glad I decided to sit up in the stands and watch instead. The building is pretty intense, its a big square 8 floor structure with the first floor being the gift shop, the second and third floors being the museum, and the fourth is administration. The fifth and sixth floors are the dorms for students or international visitors and the seventh floor is entirely a matted area, where all the training is held. The eighth floor is a balcony that looks over the mats, the thing looks very cool and straight out of a movie. There's easily enough mat space for four different classes to take place at once. I was disappointed that the museum closed so early and I had missed my chance to check it out, but I made up for it by buying a lot of cool gear from the gift shop. When I got to the eighth floor and took a seat the women's class, maybe the national Judo team, was warming up while a kids class was starting on the opposite side. I watched both classes train, it was really impressive. The kids moved like ninjas in their technique, none of them were over 10 years old and I'm sure that within another 10 years some of them are going to be world and/or Olympic champions. The women were doing a judo styled ground game, almost like BJJ but with a few differences on what moves they used or where their emphasis was for certain positions, very hard to explain. In any case they were all very serious, there was no talking, no breaks and no going light on each other, it was an intense class to watch. I took some pictures and later wished I had taken some video of the really smart set ups and chains I saw. I still remember them in my head, I'll have to try them out before I forget. After an hour there it was time to head out and grab some food before hitting up class at the Tri-Force HQ.

A few shots of the classes training, awesome stuff.

Tri-Force HQ In Ikebukuro

I arrived to the HQ a little late, which as most people seem to be on their own time, wasn't a problem. I finally met the head instructor, Mitsuyoshi Hayakawa, but only briefly as he was busy in the office, but not too busy to take a pic with us after class. Once I changed I jumped right into class and worked on some good attacks from side control, meeting two individuals who were really nice but very quiet, probably because they didn't speak much English. After class there was some open mat time, my friend from the other Tri-Force club, Daisuke, dropped by and we had a few rounds with him showing to cool tips to me and one of the guys I was training with in between. I wish I was able to make it out earlier to get more training in and be able to meet more of the class but it was a choice between food or class, and food is the one thing that wins over training. The HQ club itself is a nicely situated place, on a busy street in Ikebukuro. Both Tri-Force places had the same white walls and blue mats motive, with the Tri-Force logo on a wall, and they both had the welcoming atmosphere. At an hour and a half it was my shortest training session but it was still time well spent.

My new brother Daisuke, head instructor Mitsuyoshi and a training partner whose name I didn't catch.

One Last Open Mat Session

It was now Saturday afternoon. I was leaving Sunday afternoon and was going to spend some of time finishing shopping and catching some sites before leaving, but I had time to fit in one more open mat session at Yuki's. It was a rather slow open mat, Yuki himself wasn't there and there were only maybe a dozen people. The usual character's of Aaron, Rikako, and this amazing black belt who destroys everyone whose name escapes me, and a few other familiar faces were all there rolling and training. There was also another Globetrotter who had just shown up to town. He was a Black Belt, from England I believe, and he was really excited to get out and see and train in Tokyo, it was looking at myself a week ago. We took the train back to Shinjuku station together and chatted about our experiences traveling and training, it was great to hear from someone else doing the same thing. Lots of great things were said about the BJJ Globetrotter network in Europe, it made me really excited to get out there traveling and meet all the great people out there. I wish I wrote down his name or at least took a picture together so I could post it and find it online, I must've been really tired to miss that opportunity. Once we got to the station I passed on what I had gained in terms of reading the maps and getting around the city, I hope it helped him at least a little.

On my way out from one of Yuki's open mat sessions, I rolled with that giant behind me to the left, I got flattened but it was still a fun experience.

And with that I had one more evening and a morning to get there and see what I could of the city and do some last bit of shopping. I'll cover all that in the next post, with lots of pictures to come with the stories!