{"id":1528,"date":"2010-07-07T16:33:15","date_gmt":"2010-07-07T21:33:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.aikidocenterofjacksonville.com\/blog\/?p=1528"},"modified":"2010-07-10T13:48:43","modified_gmt":"2010-07-10T18:48:43","slug":"an-interview-with-sensei-part-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aikidocenterofjacksonville.com\/blog\/2010\/07\/an-interview-with-sensei-part-1\/","title":{"rendered":"An Interview With Sensei, Part 1"},"content":{"rendered":"

Editors Note: This is the first in a\u00a0three part\u00a0interview with Seabolt Sensei, chief instructor at the Aikido Center of Jacksonville<\/a>. The full interview can be found under the Sensei<\/a> tag.<\/span><\/p>\n

Jerry:<\/em> When did you start training?<\/p>\n

Sensei:<\/em> In Aikido? I began in 1996 with Chris Rozette. I had actually tried a little Hapkido before joining the dojo. And later on, when I wanted to try grappling, I enrolled in San-Jitsu for a bit.<\/p>\n

What I wanted back then was to learn a martial art. A coworker had taken some Aikido lessons\u00a0with Curtis Rosiek, who started\u00a0our school. He suggested I give it a try.<\/p>\n

Jerry:<\/em> What was the school like in the early days?<\/p>\n

Sensei:<\/em> For me, it was incredible. Back then we were training in a dance studio. But it didn’t matter! I just loved training. Chris and I would travel to every seminar we could. I probably attended a seminar every three weeks or so my first two years. I wanted to learn everything.<\/p>\n

Jerry:<\/em> What seminars did you go to?<\/p>\n

Sensei:<\/em> [Laughs] Every one I could! Boston, Montreal, Atlanta, New York, Fort Lauderdale…<\/p>\n

Jerry:<\/em> OK. How many students were in the school back then?<\/p>\n

Sensei:<\/em> Around six to eight, on average. After Chris left, our black belts were Mike [Sands] and Brett Jackson.<\/p>\n

New York Aikikai<\/strong><\/p>\n

Jerry:<\/em> Tell me how you first met Yamada Sensei.<\/p>\n

Sensei:<\/em> I first met Sensei in Atlanta, at Dogwood Aikikai. Yamada and Kanai Sensei were teaching. I had asked Chris to make the introduction, because I knew I wanted to train in New York. Chris introduced me to Edwin, who was a deshi in New York. Edwin then introduced me to Sensei.<\/p>\n

Jerry:<\/em> And then you stayed in New York?<\/p>\n

Sensei:<\/em> Well, the first time I went to New York, I stayed for one week. This was in December 1996. I then went back in April 1997, and stayed for five weeks.<\/p>\n

Jerry:<\/em> What was it like for you in New York?<\/p>\n

Sensei:<\/em> It was amazing. I was in awe of everyone. You have to remember, when I first went, I was just a 4th kyu. I was 35 years old. I worked out a lot with the deshis, who were in their early twenties, and male.<\/p>\n

The talent there\u00a0is unbelievable. Not just the instructors, but\u00a0the students as well.\u00a0When I\u00a0first went, I didn’t want the deshis to think\u00a0 I was a wimp.\u00a0I wanted to be tough, so I trained hard. I would take, on average, three classes a day, and on Tuesdays I would take five. And of course I would never miss class when Yamada or Sugano Sensei was teaching.<\/p>\n

Soft Ukemi<\/strong><\/p>\n

Jerry:<\/em> Is that where you learned soft ukemi?<\/p>\n

Sensei:<\/em> I was\u00a0first introduced to soft ukemi through Joey Turner. But yes, my real education was in New York,\u00a0with Donovan Waite Sensei and his students.<\/p>\n

Jerry:<\/em> It must have been thrilling learning a new way to take ukemi.<\/p>\n

Sensei:<\/em> It was. I was so excited about all the new things I had learned. I couldn’t wait to bring it back with me.<\/p>\n

Jerry:<\/em> What happened when you did return?<\/p>\n

Sensei:<\/em> [Laughs] Well…It was difficult.<\/p>\n

Let’s just say that my reception wasn’t all positive. The ukemi I was taught was different than what my fellow students had been practicing here. It was something new and different. Some even refused to learn it.<\/p>\n

Jerry:<\/em> A lot has changed though, right?<\/p>\n

Sensei:<\/em> Yes. Now, soft ukemi, the kind I learned from Waite Sensei and his students, is very common. But when\u00a0I first brought it back\u00a0to Jacksonville, that wasn’t the case.<\/p>\n

I’m happy that it’s become a standard type of ukemi here locally.<\/p>\n

To Be Continued…<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Editors Note: This is the first in a\u00a0three part\u00a0interview with Seabolt Sensei, chief instructor at the Aikido Center of Jacksonville. The full interview can be found under the Sensei tag. Jerry: When did you start […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4998,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[26,6,15,25,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1528","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-dojo","category-jerry","category-new-york-aikikai","category-sensei","category-ukemi"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aikidocenterofjacksonville.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1528","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aikidocenterofjacksonville.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aikidocenterofjacksonville.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aikidocenterofjacksonville.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aikidocenterofjacksonville.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1528"}],"version-history":[{"count":24,"href":"https:\/\/www.aikidocenterofjacksonville.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1528\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1720,"href":"https:\/\/www.aikidocenterofjacksonville.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1528\/revisions\/1720"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aikidocenterofjacksonville.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4998"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aikidocenterofjacksonville.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1528"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aikidocenterofjacksonville.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1528"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aikidocenterofjacksonville.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1528"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}