By Cecilia Ramos Sensei, Grass Valley Aikikai
Our Grass Valley Aikikai Mountain Weapons Seminar with Elmer Tancinco Sensei, on July 23rd has come and gone. Resting afterwards and reflecting back on the experience, my mind is flooded with images and emotions. As the host I should show humble modesty, but it was a grand seminar!
I bought my home on 10 acres in the Sierra Nevadas in 2004, and from that time until now I have dreamed of having an outdoor weapons seminar. At long last the stars have aligned and it has come to pass! It was an experiment, I didn’t know if it would work out. I worried people would find it too hot, too dirty, too buggy, or too far to drive. I was prepared to have it be just a handful of my own students and Tancinco Sensei. Instead we had 36 people training, plus 9 more friends and family joined us for dinner. Judging by everyone’s faces and comments as they trained and then partied, and by all the Facebook posts afterward, the experiment was a success! Obviously, we will have to do it again! In retrospect we will have to rename this seminar the First Annual Mountain Weapons Seminar!
We had students come from Alameda Aikikai, Hayward Aikikai, Eastshore Aikikai, Aikido Institute of San Francisco, Davis Aikikai, plus Daniel Acosta Sensei from Mexico and Brian Batchley, formerly from Ventura Aikikai and now at-large in Paradise, California. Lizzy Lynn Shihan, my dear friend, came too and lent her support. I was dumbfounded when sneaky Alex Peterson Sensei and his sidekick Karen Kalliel Sensei showed up unannounced to surprise me, having conspired with my students at summer camp. What a wonderful surprise it was!
There was an element of stress for our family in preparing because we had decided to repair our pond. The pond was there when I bought the house. Originally it was a spring fed creek. A former owner dug it into a pond but didn’t do it right. It was pretty from a distance, but up close it was a mess, and it leaked. The project originally had nothing to do with the seminar, but the seminar date had already been set when we realized that we were in a position to finally rebuild the pond. Fred (my sweetheart and the cook) determined that it could get done before the seminar, rather than waiting until after. Naturally the project expanded and we kept adding things, like the Fred Flintstone outdoor kitchen, the terrace, the beach, and the wood chips! As the seminar date approached, we stayed calm, on course, and yet I am amazed that it came together in time. Many thanks to Fred’s son Forest (also the cook) and to my student, Kyle Comte, who labored like convicts in the hot sun moving rocks, and of course to Fred himself who was the chief architect and laborer! We have learned some lessons and it will continue to evolve. Obviously there will have to be an outdoor foot shower, after everyone was gone the house was full of sand!
The aspect of the seminar that had to do with the training itself was Tancinco Sensei’s department. Of course, I knew he would do a great job, that’s why I invited him, but in my opinion, he seemed to rise to a new level. His teaching was so clear, so martial, funny at times, and kind. I could see every student pulled forward in their practice. With first the bokken and later the jyo, he started with basics, then took everyone into deeper forms. JD Sandoval Sensei graciously served on the uke side, and between the two of them, it was something to witness. Here in Northern California we are very lucky to have instructors of such caliber.
After the last class people swam in the pond, and dined outside. Later, those who could stay late sat up by a campfire. Tancico Sensei slept in a tent by the pond and Acosta Sensei slept under the stars. The next day he told me he had been a little cold, but said he had adjusted the blankets and was OK. That was when I realized I had forgotten to give him a sleeping bag! The two (very thin) blankets that he used, were to have protected the bottom of the tent (that he didn’t use). He is a pretty tough guy to sleep out like that. Sandoval Sensei, Bernadette, their two girls, and little dog took the attic. Lizzy Lynn Shihan was in the living room. Antonio and Joshua were outside in their RV. So it was a darn full house! Just what I like – having a lot of aikido people all together. It was like summer camp for 24 hours at my home – heavenly.
A wholehearted thank you to everyone who came. You made a dream come true for me, and now I can look forward to sharing the mountains with all of you for the rest of my life. Next year I hope even more Birankai students can come and continue our martial development, exploring our weapons curriculum, fighting the mountain. Work like this, through each of us, will make Birankai strong.
