Angry White Pyjamas

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I want to re-read and make some notes on a few different things they practiced or teaching techniques, some quotes from the senseis and bits of wisdom. I'm curious about Kancho's book and to learn more about O'Sensei's life. I love that the author used the real names of people, so you can look up Robert Mustard or Chida Sensei and learn about them. Robert Twigger is a British author who has been described as, 'a 19th Century adventurer trapped in the body of a 21st Century writer'. He attended Oxford University and later spent a year training at Martial Arts with the Tokyo Riot Police. He has won the Newdigate prize for poetry, the Somerset Maugham award for literature and the William Hill Sports Book of the Year award. There is noting interesting here in terms of literature beauty. As for the aikido, it focuses on the physical parts, and it fails to enlighten us even a bit because it aikido needs to be seen, not read. The spiritual part, which is what makes this sport distinct, is mentioned in passing and always about pain and death rather than channeling your energy. Communicates the existential purity of his elective regime with irrepressible passion ... it also has the unmistakable stamp of authentic experience ( Daily Telegraph) This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed.

Angry white pyjamas : a scrawny Oxford poet takes lessons Angry white pyjamas : a scrawny Oxford poet takes lessons

At more than one point throughout the year-long course that would change him from pondering intellectual to "bodyguard" for two elderly Japanese women, Twigger thought of quitting. So what kept him going--his friends in Fuji heights, Chris and Fat Frank? Sara, his Japanese girlfriend? A Zen belief in overcoming the will of the self? It was more to do with sheer grit and determination-- a refusal to be beaten. Angry White Pyjamas is a book written by Robert Twigger about his time in a one-year intensive program of studying Yoshinkan aikido.Adrift in Tokyo, translating obscene rap lyrics for giggling Japanese high school girls,, "thirtynothing" Robert Twigger comes to a revelation about himself: He has never been fit nor brave. Guided by his roommates, Fat Frank and Chris, he sets out to cleanse his body and mind. Not knowing his fist from his elbow, the author is drawn into the world of Japanese martial arts, joining the Tokyo Riot Police on their yearlong, brutally demanding course of budotraining, where any ascetic motivation soon comes up against bloodstained "white pyjamas" and fractured collarbones. In Angry White Pyjamas, Twigger blends, the ancient with the modern--the ultratraditionalism, ritual, and violence of the dojo (training academy) with the shopping malls, nightclubs, and scenes of everyday Tokyo life in the 1990s--to provide a brilliant, bizarre glimpse of life in contemporary Japan. A scrawny Oxford poet finds himself adrift in Tokyo and joins the formidable Yoshinkan Aikido Dojo where the Tokyo riot police learn their trade. Soon he finds himself immersed in an intensive course that teaches him about Japanese martial culture the hard way! Twigger takes one inside a course in which people train several hours every day for week after week. While it's been a while since I read it, I particularly remember the discussion of suwari gata (seated techniques) which are hell on the knees. Twigger talked about bleeding through one's pants legs until one's body learned to heal from the bottom up rather than scabbing over, as the scabs would constantly be upset.

Angry White Pyjamas: A Scrawny Oxford Poet Takes [PDF] [EPUB] Angry White Pyjamas: A Scrawny Oxford Poet Takes

Really great memoir of a year spent learning Aikido in a Tokyo dojo. Lots of interesting rumination on the philosophies of martial arts, the nature of Japanese culture, personal development through physical challenges and the like. Giggles and anecdotes aplenty alongside some real inspirational stuff. Ocr ABBYY FineReader 8.0 Ocr_converted abbyy-to-hocr 1.1.6 Ocr_module_version 0.0.13 Openlibrary OL7727576M Openlibrary_edition At this point, I've been practicing Aikido for a few years and related to what I was reading about. I could make comparisons to my own experience. I could appreciate the insight into Japanese perspective that Twigger offers, as well as some of what he learned about himself and Aikido. I sussed out more of what I liked about my current practice (Shimbokukai), and what would not appeal to me in Yoshinkan. It made me think about my Aikido, and the blend of what I'm learning with what I want to carry forward in my own practice and philosophy. At one point it looks at though an injury could get Twigger thrown off the course, but the death of the head of the Aikido school means a week with no training. An extremely interesting funeral follows where different factions of the school jostle for position as to who will be the head of the school in the future. Robert has published Real Men Eat Puffer Fish (2008), a humorous but comprehensive guide to frequently overlooked but not exclusively masculine pastimes, while his latest novel Dr. Ragab's Universal Language, was published to acclaim in July 2009. Robert now lives in Cairo, a move chronicled in his book Lost Oasis. He has lead several desert expeditions with 'The Explorer School'.I was recommended to read this book when I started Yoshinkan Aikido last year. Regardless of how interested in aikido you might be, this is an amusing, at times fascinating, depiction of Japanese martial arts culture from the perspective of an outsider. Yoshinkan Aikido is a pretty small world it seems, and some of the characters in this book, although sometimes given a kind of fear/awe-filled celebrity by Twigger, are likely to cross your path if you take up the art. Robert Mustard in particular tours quite a lot and attends seminars internationally. I especially loved this piece of wisdom from one sensei (I need to revisit the text to remind myself who said it - Paul, maybe?) (paraphrased) - he points out there is a triangle of things that work together that are the secret to aikido: Balance, Center, and Confidence. They each feed each other.