WHO ARE WE Shorinji Kempo in Oviedo

In those initial years the group will go growing little to little, in spite of the difficulties of promotion, until culminating in an important date as is that of June 1, 1994, when José Manuel Llaneza Faedo and Luis Miguel Fernández González obtain the 1st Dan, event of a double significance because they are the first Shorinji Kempo black belts in Asturias and both carry, since then, the daily responsibility of trainings on account of José Antonio Martín returning to Seville. Some time before the dojo had been established in the Gymnasium Arenas, at Torrelavega Avenue.

In this new phase the kenshis of Oviedo Branch have followed profited from a constant recycling and knowledge enlargement due to the study and to the investigation by own initiative, and also, largely, because of the periodic celebration in our city of technical weekend seminars where we advance in the instruction and check and correct we learned, possible due to both José Antonio Martín and Alberto Casado (5th Dan) haven't had objection to travel since Seville with such motive. More concretely it is on Mr Casado, our Representative Branch Master besides Sevilla-Linde Branch Master, on whom has fallen this task in the last years, to the extent of that his travels to our city have become practically seasonal. Other masters from whose teaching and advice we have had the opportunity to profit in Oviedo in several occasions have been Kili Diaz (6th Dan) and Eduardo Narro (5th Dan).

On the other hand, the Branch has always been represented in the national training camps that at least with an annual periodicity have come happening in distinct places of our geography and that in several opportunities have counted on the presence and teachings of Sensei Aosaka, delegate of WSKO (World Shorinji Kempo Organization) in Europe.

These activities, in addition to the use of the normal channels of communication and the trips of the Ovetense responsible to the meetings of the FESK (Spanish Shorinji Kempo Federation), enable the continuous contact of the Oviedo Branch with the reality of the Spanish Shorinji Kempo Federation and of WSKO, organization-mother of which all the branches depend directly as local ramifications.

Out of the previous thing, an episode of certain fame, on account of the unusual cover it obtained from the local media, was the celebration of the II Martial Arts Festival “City of Oviedo” (Bibi Cecchini Memorial) April 17, 1999, in which besides other disciplines an exhibition of Shorinji Kempo could be seen, with very good reception by the audience, to charge of the masters coming from the Hombu Dojo, Mr Hiroyuki Kuwahara (7th Dan), Mr Tadashi Sasaki (7th Dan), Mr Shogo Fujii (5th Dan) and Mr Motohiro Fukabatake (5th Dan), who executed diverse demonstrations of technical work and embu.

By delegation of the Spanish Shorinji Kempo Federation some members of our Branch had responded to receive the four masters, taking place a pleasant and relaxed encounter. Besides, in the very little time off that the tight agenda of the Festival granted their guests, the Ovetense kenshis had opportunity of consulting some technical particularities that the masters explained kindly with the aid of practical demonstrations of evident ability. Later, from San Sebastián, the leaders of the FESK, Mr Aquilino Díaz (President) and Mr Eduardo Narro (Member), could greet to the Japanese masters in name of all the Spanish Shorinji Kempo.

The following year, for the first time since their foundation, our Branch received from the Spanish Shorinji Kempo Federation the assignment of organizing in this city the National Gasshuku 2000, one of those meetings or training camps that, with an annual periodicity, occur in different places of our geography. As result, more than eighty practitioners of ten branches and groups of all Spain had occasion of gathering in Oviedo the days 29 and 30 of April 2000, according to a program consisting of ten hours of extensive travel through the practical and theoretical aspects of our art conducted by the most qualified instructors, without we are forgetting of course the indispensable activities of contact and entertainment and with the end of a brotherhood supper that gathered more than a hundred persons, comprising the recorded kenshis and their companions. According to generalized opinion both the school program and the play one were settled with great success.

Since 2002 Manuel García (2nd Dan) takes charge of the trainings at the Arenas Sport Center, in its new location of Comandante Janáriz street. Another recent landmark of great importance for our branch -and in general for the Shorinji Kempo in our country- has been the appointment of Alberto Casado as President of the Spanish Shorinji Kempo Federation in the beginning of 2006.

In 2007, the FESK delegated again in the Oviedo Branch the responsibility to organize the Spanish National Training Camp "Oviedo 2007", that took place in the facilities of the Palacio de Granda School on April, days 29 and 30. This time the meeting was in addition typified as Study Session, given as head instructor by WSKO Director Aosaka Hiroshi Sensei. To this event they came 135 kenshis from the whole Spain, including in addition the outstanding presence of 16 Portuguese kenshis , who formed a delegation of the Portuguese Federation led by its President, Mr. José António da Silva Araújo. After the Study Session it was held the National Embukai 2007, in which  they participated Portuguese and Spanish kenshis and which, in its competition section, would serve like first stage of the selective process for the Spanish kenshis that would participate in the European Embukai that would take place in Norcia (Italy). The national meeting "Oviedo 2007" finally culminated in the traditional formal dinner in the restaurant El Llagar de Colloto, beginning with a festive Asturian atmosphere and ending with a very funny ball that would make less sad the goodbye and would leave in all the presents the yearning of a soon new meeting.

After the summer of 2007, for the first time in almost twenty years, a second group was constituted in our branch, while the one of the Arenas Sport Center stays. The new dojo is located in the Gimnasio Muñiz, in our Asturian capital city, and the instructor of this one is Juan José Romero (1º Dan). Since the first moment the new group has a good number of kenshis and an excellent public hold that allows think that the growth of Shorinji Kempo in Oviedo is on the right track.
 

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