Today was a perfect day for the 93rd annual National Cherry Blossom Festival in our nation’s Capital. Our group, the Capital Area Budokai, put on a martial arts demonstration in downtown Washington D.C. for the festival. The skies were blue, the blossoms were at their peak, our stage had a great view of the Capitol, and lots of people came out to see us.
Here are a few photos from the demo. Note that though my wife took lots of great pictures, by the time we went on, the sun had moved us into shadows. Thus, I had to wrangle with the brightness and contrast in the pictures to make them even partially visible.
The intro however was in bright sunlight. Here you can get a feel for the crowds, the stage, and the stage floor – it was a squishy gym mat that soaked up the sun’s rays. Also, note that this image shows things as they should be: the jo player standing over the defeated swordsman:
For the tanjo set, here I am doing Kote Migi:
followed by Sutemi. Note that I got a good strong block on my opponent’s strike, though I really should have caught both elbows:
For the jo set, here is the group at the beginning of Tachi Otoshi. Note how small the stage is: I had to pull a lot of my suigetsu strikes to prevent my opponent from sailing off the stage:
In the first part of Tachi Otoshi, I strike at my opponent’s head: luckily (for him) he was able to block my strike:
He tried to counter by striking my neck, but the photo shows me just before my kuritsuke catches his tsuka for a block:
All in all it was a fun demonstration and a lot of people got to see some traditional Japanese martial arts. Maybe next year, if the stage is a little higher (so more people can see) and a little larger (so we can move around without worrying about falling off), it will be even better.
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