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| Minnesota Adventure... Had a good visit to Minnesota last month. Went to see Robert, man of Steele. He has moved up to Yankee land where it is hotter and muggier than here. What's with that? I bet I lost a few pounds. Anyway, his dojo was sponsoring a "Samurai Weekend" or something like that. The location was a rec center a few miles from the Chikara Dojo. They had judo, kendo, karate, a Samurai weapons class and our very own Robert who has a Toyama Ryu class. The Judo class had their own students show up, no one showed up for the kendo class, no one showed up for the Samurai weapons class. But Robert had 10 attendees! Not bad. So Robert started with a really cool lec- ture about Toyama Ryu, which I learned a thing or two from. Then straight into training. We ran two hours with Robert instructing and me participating. Man that was nice. For once no one was looking at me! Yup, I like that. Anyway, Robert has a nice commanding voice and kept the troops in line and interested. At no time did the class drag on. Well done! In the afternoon at the cutting class, several Aikido students attended. They got to cut for the first time. I think they were stoked. Robert's daughter, Aria, who is sure growing up, also attended the classes. She is quite good. Robert did somegood cutting and I did my usual 50% bullshit. All in all, a very good seminar. The next day, we met at Chikara Dojo,(hey, what does that mean?) with two of his best students and trained for about two hours. The dojo is in a mixed yuppie/slum area where I imagine they have a lot of excitement late at night. A wonderful old building where the dojo is upstairs. The next day we went to the zoo and watched a couple of Gorilla's throwing dirt at each other and an Orangutan waltzing around with a giant bucket on her head. Funny as hell. Anyway, thanks to Roberto, his chick Holly (who must know everything in the world) and Aria, future Toyama star. Bob Elder |
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