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Instructors Guests Promotion

TRIBUTE TO THE MEMORY OF

MASAHILO M. NAKAZONO SENSEI

United Kingdom Aikido Seminar

Neath Leisure Centre. Dyfed Road Neath. Wales. UK. October 27th 2007

By Jiro Nakazono

An Aikido Seminar entitled, TRIBUTE TO THE MEMORY OF MASAHILO M. NAKAZONO SENSEI, is going to take place on the 27th of October, 2007 at Neath Leisure Centre in the United Kingdom.  This event is jointly organized by Gwynne Jones Sensei of Shin-Gi-Tai Aikido Society and Henry Ellis and Derek Eastman Sensei’s of Ellis School of Traditional Aikido. Ellis Sensei, Eastman Sensei & Foster Sensei, who are the U.K. students of my Father, Masahilo M. Nakazono (1918-1994).  The event will compliment the great event held at the Crystal Palace Sports Center May 14th 2005, the KENSHIRO ABBE 50TH CELEBRATION.

Like the KENSHIRO ABBE 50TH CELEBRATION, I see this event as another celebration in honor of the British Pioneers in Budo and Aikido, who have greatly contributed to Budo and Aikido of today, not only in the U.K., but the whole of Europe.  I am coming to the event to honor these pioneers, to pay my respect to them. Aikido like any other Martial Arts is an art of expression of the ultimate human courage and bravery, in another word, heroism, in all life situations, but the art is nothing without the individual human beings who practice it. I was brought up by a Father who held ‘the Spirit of Budo’ very high in his life and Kenshiro Abbe Sensei was one of the heroes of my one and only true hero, my Father.

I was contacted by Henry Ellis Sensei in mid 2006, and when I found out he was one of the first and top students of Kenshiro Abbe Sensei. I immediately recalled the many stories my Father had told me in the 1960s’ about the brave and strong young Budo men in Great Britain.  I instantly felt as if he was a friend of over 40 years, for I had known about them since 1964, when as a child I moved to Marseilles, France, from Japan, to be with my Father. Ever since I came in touch with Ellis Sensei, he has taken me on a tour of  the British Budo and Aikido from its start to the present, in which I was shown the many scenes from the past in regards to my Father that I did not know.  I came to know about Derek Eastman Sensei and Haydn Foster Sensei, and the sponsorship support of Gwynne Jones Sensei. I was brought to this event, which is taking place thanks to the remaining Budo men who had pioneered the British Budo and Aikido since the 1950s.

I am coming to this extraordinary event with a spiritual treasure my Father had attained in the very end of his life, something he was searching for all of his life, which he called the Truth of Life.  It is the time which contains the resonance of the Origin of Life, and I am bringing it to you. 

‘Time’ is more spiritual than physical, but you will experience the time I will bring to you physically, mentally and emotionally as a distinct sense of happiness, peace and liberation. It will be a very distinct experience of something you have always known, as what you would call a joy of life. My Father was not the only one who searched for this ‘time,’ the founder of Aikido—O Sensei, incessantly prayed to Heaven for the blessing of his dear students and the whole world, which was to ask Heaven/the Origin Of Life, to grant to the entire world and humanity the time of salvage of all souls. I am bringing this ‘time’ to honor and to celebrate the individual pioneers of Budo and Aikido in the U.K. and Europe, and to share this precious legacy of my Father’s life long search for the Truth Of Life with all of you.

I began Aikido in 1964 under my father and I trained under many great teachers such as Noro Sensei, Tamura Sensei, Chiba Sensei, Asai Sensei, Ichimura Sensei and Tada Sensei (chronologically as I met them).  For a short time I did even train at Aikikai in Tokyo.  Recently I have also trained at Yamada Sensei and Imaizumi Sensei’s Dojo's in New York, and I consider myself very lucky to have had such great opportunities in the past.

Photos from the Swiss Event, held during the beginning of March, 2007.

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For more information and online booking.

http://www.nakazono.aberaikido.org.uk