Alexander C. Bennett has two PHDs in Human Studies and Sciences
from the University of Canterbury and Kyoto University.
He holds the ranks of 7th dan Kyoshi in Kendo, 5th dan in Iaido and Naginata,
3rd Dan in Jukendo and Tankendo.
He is professor at Kansai University of both Kendo and Japanese Culture and History,
vice-president of the International Naginata Federation, Member of the international committee of the
All Japan Kendo Federation, director at the Japanese Academy of Budo, cofounder of the
Kendo World Magazine, and author of several books in English and Japanese.
This series starts with Alex's first visit to Japan, his first encounter with Kendo,
and what put him on the tracks that lead him where he is now, 30 years later.
When I went back to New Zealand after a year, admittedly, it's like: "Ah phew!"
"I don't have to do Kendo today."
Because there is none, well there was none in Christchurch and so I'm:
"Ah, too bad."
"Oh." But it was a great experience and I got my Shodan, yeah!
So I could show my friends my Shodan certificate, which…
In Kendo we don't have belts but it was so what like a black belt.
And so it was a souvenir for me.
I thought it was a good, it was a great experience.
But then what I found, after about 2 or 3 months after returning back to New Zealand,
is that I started getting the shakes.
Okay? So like cold turkey.
Every time I saw a piece of wood or an umbrella somewhere, I started picking it up
and I started doing a bit of Suburi and I just wanted to get back into it, get back into the fray.
And like I said there was no clubs that I could go to.
So it's like: "Jee!"
"What do I do?".
So there was a martial arts shop in Christchurch, where I come from,
and the guy who runs the martial arts shop, this guy called Graham Spanks,
and he's a former New Zealand representative for Judo.
And I went in and saw him and said: "Look I've just come back from Japan."
"I spent a year there and I did Kendo."
"I was just wondering if..."
"Is there a club in Christchurch that I can go to?".
And he said: "No, no there's not but..."
"You know there is a..."
"I get a lot of people coming in and asking the same thing so I've got their phone numbers,
and I'll give them to you if you want to ring them up."
"Why don't you start a club?"
And I's: "Yeah why not?"
I thought stupidly, you know, in my naive 18 year old sort of ignorance as it were.
But I guess what he was aiming for is if he could get a Kendo club started in Christchurch,
he could sell Kendo equipment as well.
So he had a business aspect lined up so he gave me the numbers of a few people
I rang them up and we got together.
The two people that came had virtually no Kendo experience before,
but they'd a little bit and so I was...
Even though I was younger than both of them,
I was basically thrusted to the role of instructor.
I shudder when I think about the sort of things that I did back then.
I had absolutely no idea.
All I'd done was a year of getting my, you know, butt kicked in Japan and so...
So that's all I know how to do, get my butt kicked and kick a bit of butt
with no sort of real rational behind it.
It's just like go untill you drop.
I had no idea about the sort of Budo philosophy or Budo ideals.
I'd been through it and if it was explained to me I could sort of match it up
but I had no idea how to teach that sort of thing.
I mean, let's face it, I was only 18 years old.
And Sano-sensei would always talk about the mental or the spiritual aspects of Kendo training
after we finished training but I had no idea what he was talking about.
My Japanese wasn't really good enough.
I'd pick up a few words here and there: Bushido bla bla bla, Kokoro bla bla bla,
that sort of thing.
So for me it was a purely physical exercise and that...
Well I knew there was more to it but I didn't know how to express that except other than,
you know, other than putting people through their paces and hopefully they'll get it too.
It was just so wrong, but anyway... Great chill, when rumours started spreading around Christchurch
that a Kendo club had started up, we've got a lot of people who came from other martial arts
like Judo and Karate and Aikido because they're interested in Budo,
and they'd been doing it for a few years, and they figured that, well, Kendo is...
I mean you just have to look at it, you know, it's like pretty close to
samurai sort of thing, right?
And they're obviously interested in swords and they figured that they could get a different outlook.
And so they would come and they'd join the club and they'd ask me all sorts of questions
about Bushido and thus state the other thing.
And I just had no idea.
And so after that, I decided: "Well, if people are going to come to this club, I suppose
I'd better go back to Japan and actually study Kendo a little bit more in-depth
and find out about this Budo philosophy, all the spirit of Bushido that everybody keeps talking about."
I mean, in those days, we're talking about the late 80s, there were very few sort of books
that I could read that would, sort of, guide me, you know, in the right direction.
I mean, there were translations of things, like Miyamoto Musashi's "Gorin no Sho" and so on…
But I mean no Nitobe Inazo's, you know, book on Bushido.
But it doesn't really help you, sort of, contextualize Budo and the techniques on what you're doing.
You've got to have a lot of experience first before you can start putting all into place
and I had nobody to guide me except one book.
And you'll probably laugh at this but it's...
It was useful.
Have you ever heard of Yoshikawa Eiji's "Musashi"?
Yeah, that's a novel, okay?
It's basically, historically, you know, it's totally, yeah, fictional really.
Well mostly.
It was well written and it's also really well translated to the English version.
You know, I didn't read the Japanese I read the English one.
It's a great story about Miyamoto Musashi, you know, seeking something, some kind of enlightenment
through his Musha Shugyo, his pilgrimage through the country, walking,
seeking jewels and fights to test himself and to try and discover the meaning of life, the universe
and everything, right?
And it was an inspirational story and it sort of occurred to me: "Ah cool!"
"This Musha Shugyo thing that's traveling and studying the martial arts! It's pretty, pretty neat actually."
"I might do that!"
And that's what brought me back to Japan a second time,
apart from a girlfriend also she was quite cute.
But that's another story.
But I came back because I wanted to do the martial arts properly.
I wanted to understand what it's all about because I knew, when I got back to New Zealand,
because of all these people that were coming to the club, that I'd only really scratched the surface.
And I knew that I really knew nothing.
And so at that time, in Chiba, maybe you've heard...
I'm pretty sure you've heard of it: the International Budo University, right?
I guess it's pretty famous around the world now.
They didn't have a course for foreigners at the time.
They do now, but in those days they didn't.
This was 1989.
"Was it an international university?" "It was International, yeah."
International Budo University and they didn't have a course but I went there and they said:
"Hey we'll give you a scholarship!"
And I was like: "That's cool!".
So I was there for...
How long was it?
About eight or nine months and everyday just Kendo, Kendo, Kendo.
It was amazing because, just for the Kendo club alone, there were, there's two massive, massive dojos.
The number of students in the Kendo club back then was 500 people.
All of the sensei were really famous, you know: Komorizono-sensei, Oka Kenjiro-sensei
and so on...
And all these really famous guys, amazing!
And, so I would go to class and listen to the lectures on Budo history and the professors were really helpful.
They liked having me there so they would really help me a lot to understand what was going on.
They'd give me remedial lessons.
And then students also, they were really kind, they would,
if I had time they would take me into the dojo and they'd help,
they'd go through the Kata with me or they'd teach me some of their secret techniques and so on...
And so it was really a beautiful time, you know, just…
All I did was Kendo, every day, and unfortunately that came to an end
when my scholarship ran out, and my visa was running out too.
And I was going to have to go back to New Zealand, which I really didn't want to do
because I was really getting into it big-time, you know, taking it to a completely new level.
And then I got contacted out of the blue by somebody who works for the Nippon Budokan
which is like the umbrella organization for, you know, the martial arts in Japan.
And through the Nippon Budokan I was introduced to the All Japan Naginata Federation
and they were in the process of trying to establish an International Naginata Federation in 1990.
But they needed somebody who could work in the office of the Naginata Federation
to keep, you know, liaise with the representatives from, you know, overseas federations
and also translate basic texts or textbooks on Naginata history and techniques and so on...
But they didn't have much money to pay this person but they would provide a place to live,
they would provide all the food and right next to the office
and the dormitory where I was staying was a 300 year old dojo called Shubukan.
And in the Shubukan, every day, they practice Naginata of course, Kendo and Iaido.
So I'd be training in all of these three martial arts every day, while working at the
All Japan Naginata Federation and training every day in these three martial arts.
And the sensei they were amazing like there was,
for Kendo there was Muriyama Kensuke-sensei, and Tsurumaru Juichi-sensei who became a 9th dan,
Naginata there was people like Tokunaga-sensei and Mitamura-sensei who just, you know...
Anybody who does Naginata knows these very famous teachers and in Iaido it was Iwata-sensei
where I learned Hoki Ryu
Oh it was heaven!
It really was, it was like if you're into Budo and, you know,
you're all about this Miyamoto Musashi sort of Musha Shugyo thing, then this was...
This was it! I was living the dream!
So that experience at the Naginata Federation also, sort of,
gave me opportunities to try different Budo other than Kendo.
But I could see very clearly how it sort of all, sort of connected.
And after one year the International Naginata Federation was established it was launched
and then I went back to New Zealand because I discovered what I wanted to do,
and that was: I wanted to study the history of Japan formally.
In the next episode Alex will reveal why he decided to study Japanese History and Bushido
and tell us about the difficulties he encountered on the way to his first PHD.
I was thinking about joining the Air Force, all sorts of things, right?
Bushido is a little bit a pseudo academic.
We do proper history, none of this, you know, Bushido crap.
So it's the first book that uses the word Bushido.
And that sort of took me to a completely new level of understanding
Stay tuned for our next episode on Seido's Channel.
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