Post here if you wish you'd done JMA in high school

[ichibyoshi]

Some off you may know from other parts of this forum that I am currently teaching kendo at my high school in Melbourne, Australia. I teach it to years 8, 9 & 10 as part of the daytime school curriculum, which seems to be a pretty rare occurence outside Japan.

Now I'm pretty sure most of the regular posters and lurkers here would give their eye teeth to have been able to study their respective MAs in high school.

So to give them an idea of the opportunity they're getting, please add a post below if you think it would have been cool to study your MA in high school. Hopefully we'll get lots of responses from people all around the world that my students can then come and check out.

Stories, personal reflections, etc also welcome.

TIA

b

[kenkyusha]

In some ways, I'm glad that I didn't have the opportunity to do so. Had I continued doing Aikido, my parents would have had to honor the bargain we struck (they would send me to be an uchideshi @Aikikai Hombu or Iwama)...

In retrospect, I can see myself as a 23 or 25-year old freshly-minted sandan or yondan, (being an insufferable git) thinking that the world revolved around my undefeatable waza (because I learned in the homeland of budo)... reality is better. YMMV.

Be well,
Jigme

[gmanry]

I do wish I had been introduced to budo in highschool. I did practice olympic style TKD, and that was informative in some ways. However, if I had been smarter I would have taken judo.

Back then there was very little authentic iaido or other Japanese sword arts. Really all there was to do was TKD. Still, I would be a little further along now than I am. Not much though, because I don't think I really started to really figure anything out until my mid-twenties. Up until then it was natural athleticism and blind luck!

[Joshua Lerner]

I started aikido when I was in 8th grade, but I'm glad it wasn't connected to school. I was too old for the kids class, so I started in the adults class. Spending my formative years developing social skills and physical confidence around adults in the dojo was probably one of the best things I could have done.

I spent one summer in Japan during high school and got to practice kendo with the high school kendo team, but that is a very different experience than what I think you are talking about. Anyone in the US teaching kendo like that in a public school would be arrested for abuse.

[ichibyoshi]

Originally Posted by Joshua Lerner

...Anyone in the US teaching kendo like that in a public school would be arrested for abuse...

You're not kidding either...

b