Monthly Archives: March 2021

The first posture of “Tsuken Sunakake no Ueku”

Among the 1935 Okinawan photos presented by the Ashi Shinbun Digital website are a few that show the use of the Ueku (paddle) as a means of transport fish and utensils. The posture is almost the same as the first … Continue reading

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Traditional Ryūkyū kumi-odori, karate … 165 prewar Okinawan photographs discovered (3)

Traditional “Kumi-odori” of the kingdom era presented to the younger brother of Shōwa Emperor (Hirohito) Among the Okinawa-related photographs found this time in the Asahi Shimbun Osaka Headquarters, there was a photograph of the traditional Kabuki drama “Kumi-odori” of the … Continue reading

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Traditional Ryūkyū kumi-odori, karate … 165 prewar Okinawan photographs discovered (2)

Okinawa Karate, not to be defeated by discrimination A strong-muscled man receives a thrust from a big man wearing a haramaki (bellyband). The photo is considered to have been taken around 1933 at the Ōsaka City Sports Ground (the current … Continue reading

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Traditional Ryūkyū kumi-odori, karate … 165 prewar Okinawan photographs discovered (1)

165 photographs of people and landscapes of Okinawa before the war were discovered at the headquarter of the Asahi Shimbun newspaper in Ōsaka City. Previously, a negative of Okinawa in 1935 was found also at the Asahi Shimbun and introduced … Continue reading

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ON THE COMBINATION OF NAGASHI-UKE AND GYAKU-UCHI

In colloquial Japanese, “gyaku-uchi” 逆打ち refers to “to pilger along the 88 stations of the Shikoku Pilgrimage in opposite direction, i.e. from point 88 to point 1” (from Ōkuboji in Sanuki, Kagawa Prefecture to the Ryōzenji in Naruto, Tokushima Prefecture). … Continue reading

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The Issue of Varying Combinations in Taira-lineage Saijutsu

In the Saijutsu kata of Taira-lineage are often found longer combinations which are almost the same, but which almost always slightly vary. This is a real issue for practitioners, particularly during the first years. I have been asked how to … Continue reading

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Kyan Chōtoku and Chan-no-Bōjutsu

(By Kyuna Chōkō 喜友名朝孝, in “Okinawa Karate Kobudo Jiten,” 2008, translation Andreas Quast) When I was a child, I used to go to the house of Kyan Chōtoku (Chan nu Tanmē, meaning senior-citizen Kyan from the samure class) together with … Continue reading

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