Higuchi: A visit from a Master
By Paul Sexton
Shihan Higuchi arrived Friday, April 28, 2001 and jumped right into a black belt grading the next day at Cameron Recreation Centre.
He stayed with Sameshima Sensei for the first few nights and they visited Victoria, where they enjoyed a horse-drawn carriage ride and went sightseeing.
The first training session was at Aldergrove Secondary on Monday night. The following day, Ray, Adrian and Mr. Ojiro (Tony's Dad) took Mr. Higuchi to see the sights of Vancouver and to a Chinese food restaurant for lunch. That night training was at Abbotsford dojo.
Mr. Higuchi stayed in Chilliwack with me that night. The next day, we went to Harrison to enjoy the hot springs and lunch at the hotel. Wednesday night training was at Vancouver dojo. Afterwards, everyone went out for Chinese food. Mr. Higuchi stayed overnight with Tom Sakamoto and the two of them did a couple of rounds of golf on Thursday.
Thursday night training was at Burnaby South dojo. On Friday, Andrew Statz took him golfing again and that evening the executive and technical committee took him out for Japanese food at Isami Sushi in Metrotown.
On Saturday, Mr. Higuchi did a demonstration of the kata Unsu at the Shiai and left for Japan later that morning. He was able to get away because it was Golden Week in Japan, which is a week-long holiday there.
During his discussions with the executive and technical committee, Mr. Higuchi talked about the concept of karate involving three main aspects that are equally important:
• budo (the way of karate, which emphasizes realistic self-defense techniques and mind set)
• tournaments; and
• the karate student.
All three are necessary and no one part of the triangle should be emphasized too much to the detriment of the others.
In my opinion, there is a danger for those clubs that emphasize tournaments too much. If they practice tournament fighting exclusively, they can become flashy tag players and lose track of what is realistic and effective in a real confrontation.