Thank you for your interest in Samurai Swordsmanship Dojo, Gotokukan Imafuji Dojo!
Please watch the video or you can read the script below.
Hi. My name is Hiro Imafuij. Let me introduce myself a little bit.
I was born and raised in Japan and started kendo when I was 7 in 1980. I have been doing kendo for about 34 years now. Currently hold 6-dan, that is equivalent to 6 degree black belt.
I am currently in charge of instructing kendo at Gotokukan Kendo Dojo in Indianapolis on Tuesday and Thursday.
I belong to East Central US Kendo Federation, All US Kendo Federation and International Kendo Federation.
Also I am the head coach of ECUSKF for All US Kendo Championship 2014. What that means is that I’ll be training the ECUSKF representatives to fight in the championship.
My kendo history. I learned kendo from great teachers, late Tsurumaru sensei, 9-dan, late Murayama sensei, he won a few 8-dan championships and Miyazaki sensei, 7-dan who was a trained by 10-dan, 9-dan and 8-dans in the past. He also was a shihan, the main instructor of a Japanese university kendo club and the club achieved excellent results in many tournaments. These teachers were my main teachers back then.
I lived in New Zealand for 6 years, Guatemala for 2 years and now in US. I’ve been in US since 2004.
New Zealand was the place I started instructing kendo to non-Japanese people. So I have New Zealand accent. Guatemala was the second place to teach kendo and now US. Oh, I should mention that I have some kendo websites to promote kendo to all over the world.
Now let’s talk about what you can learn from me.
Kendo, iaido and the philosophy and teachings of samurai swordsmanship. Kendo is very unusual martial arts and it is very hard to find a place to learn kendo in Indiana. Practicing is one thing but to be able to instruct kendo, it takes years of experience of instructing.
Even though kendo has been becoming more popular internationally, the teaching methods are made for Japanese people. Since I have instructing kendo outside Japan more than 20 years since 1993, I know what works for non-Japanese kendo practitioners.
It is important for you to learn the kendo movements correctly so you can learn and understand the samurai philosophy and teachings correctly.
Why Kendo and Iaido? Usually kendo uses bokuto, wooden sword, and shinai, bamboo sword. With bokuto, we learn cultural and historical aspects of kendo as well as techniques. And with bamboo sword, we can train actual techniques and also we can train ourselves physically and mentally.
Now I do not stop there. I would like to teach you how to draw a sword as well. It is called Iaido. In old days, kendo was a part of samurai training. Iaido is basically solo training of forms. But they should be learned together to complete the way of the sword.
It is also important to learn the teachings of samurai. Learning only how to use a sword and how to hit each other will not complete the way of the sword. We have the teachings from those samurai who fought for their lives. More importantly, to understand the teachings fully, we must train the complete way of the sword.
So if you like the idea and you want to learn the complete way of the sword, please visit our dojo in Indianapolis or you can contact me if you are around Anderson, IN.
If you are too far away from us, visit Kendo-Guide.Com. It is my site giving you all the info you need.
Thank you and see you soon!