We
are standing shoulder-to-shoulder on a busy corner,
looking out at the four lanes of traffic buzzing by;
a tall, pale-faced North American next to a short, sun-braised
Okinawan. A young islander in blue jeans rushes past
us without making eye contact. She is wearing a sky-blue,
fitted t-shirt and printed on the back in sparkling
pink letters are the words, "THIS NEW INTERNATIONALL
LIVING IS MY FUTTURE."
The
smaller man continues with his rich description, "Do
you see here? This is where the line used to be, the
boundary that divided the Okinawans from the American
soldiers on the other side." There was no gate or wall
or any other kind of barrier, but as he explained, most
people just didn't cross it. "And in the early days
it didn't stop there, because the whites and the blacks
were also divided down their own half of town. This
place got wild sometimes on weekends, they called it
the Four Corners, and the tougher guys met for street
fights at night, right here in this intersection."
Okinawa City and Gushikawa City are still divided by
the same road today, although the highway numbers have
changed and most of the meaning that was inherent in
the old nicknames has faded over time, like the weathered
Coca Cola signs that face out towards the road in this
dusty old district. Nowadays most of the younger locals
and the American recruits don't know much if anything
of the old colorful history, and will probably never
take an interest in the stories of Okinawa's past. Which
is one of the reasons why I am standing here on this
windy curb, starting to sunburn while slouching overtop
a stocky Okinawan thirty-five years my senior. The clapping
sound of the man's flip-flop sandals offsets with the
squishy, out-of-place sounds of my new running shoes
as we wander further down the road. The boundary might
still exist today since there aren't any foreigners
in sight on this side of town, except for the odd stray
serviceman.
Kotaro Iha Sensei is one of the most recognized and
reputable modern-day masters of Okinawan weaponry, the
ancient art of kobudo. He has trained in the martial
arts for almost fifty years, swinging around six-foot
wooden staffs, short sickles, nunchaku and a host of
other deadly weapons nearly every day of his adult life,
sometimes three or four times a day. His legion of students
are as likely to have come from Amsterdam or Sydney
or Michigan as they are from his own quiet neighbourhood
of Taba, now a part of Gushikawa, the same town where
he grew up admiring the powerful almost mythical instructors
of the generation before him. Even his dojo, a comfortable
training hall with every modern convenience, is over
thirty years old, reminding me that my seventeen years
of training in Okinawan karate only scratches the surface
of what there is to be learned here in the birthplace
of so many of the martial arts. "Let's go. It's time
to eat. Follow me." Iha Sensei speaks slowly to me and
in short bursts of simple Japanese, with the odd word
of old Okinawan dialect spicing up his guiding speech.
His use of staccato commands, like his rapid gesticulations
with his hands and his firm correction of my frequent
mistakes, is just the kind of treatment I expected from
such a man of the martial arts. What I haven't anticipated
are the welcome glimpses into the other side of his
martial arts and his personality, softer, humbler images
that will emerge as tiny cracks in his stony facade
and will eventually characterize most of what he teaches
me during my week on Okinawa.
The little toddler sitting next to me babbles on in
kid speak while staring right through me with the biggest,
brownest eyes I have ever seen in Japan. Her older sister
sings a tune from one of the Disney movies, a movie
that is her namesake and which she adores as much as
any other all-American four-year-old girl. And at the
wheel of the compact, reddish-brown station wagon is
their father Zane, an eighteen-year veteran and Gunnery
Sergeant of the United States Marine Corps. Zane's refreshingly
humble, reflecting a life that has taken him all over
the world, from his Florida roots to the spitting vipers
and sand dunes of Somalia, to Europe and now to the
relative comfort of Okinawa. He has devoted many years
to the martial arts, training in karate, weaponry, and
hindiandi, a rare form of kung fu from southern China.
He is one of only half a dozen westerners ever to have
learned this deadly striking style.
We have been driving for twenty minutes since we met
at a central bus stop on the rundown main strip of Okinawa
City, an intersection the American forces call Gate
Two where you are as likely to see roving packs of fifteen-year-old
American kids in Eminem t-shirts and Yankees caps as
you are to see old Okinawans on bicycles. We are in
the central region of the main island of Okinawa, an
hour north of the capital of Naha, in the heartland
of territory occupied by the American Armed Forces,
who sixty years after the war still number more than
40,000 over the Japanese archipelago, with three quarters
of them on Okinawa. Everywhere I turn there is a token
bilingualism, English and Japanese, on street signs
and in shop windows, and locals still often refer to
this town as Koza, it's old Okinawan name, which is
proudly painted on some of the older walls and billboards.
As the main island of Okinawa rushes past me on either
side the strongest visions that hit me are the landmarks
of American suburbia- Army and Navy Surplus clothing
stores, lifeless strip malls, and dozens of Baptist
churches offering service in either of the island's
adopted languages. There are even A & W Hamburger stands
with old-fashioned drive-in booths that vanished twenty
years ago in North America. A local driver, a grey haired
dwarf of an old man, cuts us off with his tiny white
flatbed truck and Zane swings the car around the hazard
with clinical caution, without blinking, although his
voice lends a hint of anxiety to the situation. "Back
home a fender-bender's no big deal but here it's like
even the smallest accident is an international incident
if it involves one of our guys."
The gate to Camp Foster Marine Corps Base is guarded
by two muscular young men in crisp uniforms, one American
and the other a member of the Okinawan Guard, a marine
security that works in conjunction with the American
forces. A lean, black Marine barely out of his teens
raises a sharp salute as we pull towards the on-base
housing. Immediately a different world opens up all
around me- the lanes are wide and are spotted with kids
playing catch ball off to the side. There are inflatable
plastic wading pools in front of many of the plain detached
houses and American flags adorn as many of the front
doors and porches of these homes as not. It is the Americana
of folklore, like black-and-white television, and old
Sears catalogues, and apple pies on windowsills.
Zane and I train in isshin-ryu karate, an Okinawan form
popular in North America, and he is riding out his third
tour of duty on Okinawa, which makes him about as good
of a starting point as any to begin my search for the
secrets of the Okinawan martial arts.Over a home-cooked
dinner of barbecued hamburgers, fried chicken and potato
salad, Zane introduces me to Kensho Tokumura, a noted
instructor of goju-ryu karate in his early sixties.
He tells stories at our urging, and once he gets his
rhythm, his enthusiasm rolls along like a grandfather
spinning tales by the fireside. He talks of the days
when martial arts were reserved exclusively for royalty,
when first-born sons passed down local styles to the
next generation. More fondly he speaks of the rejuvenating
days after the war when he stumbled upon Tatsuo Shimabuku,
the founder of isshin-ryu karate.
"The dojo in those days was an open courtyard out back
behind his house. He earned a contract to teach the
Marines and soon enough he had many interested men coming
by the house for lessons. Sometimes we trained all day
and night. Most evenings his wife would come out to
the training hall and serve up his favourite snack in
between classes, a cup of awamori (Okinawan rice liquor),
topped with a raw egg, called kuga zake that helped
relieve his asthma. He would mix it with a chopstick
and knock it back in on gulp and then jump out on the
floor for the next class." He smiles with proud eyes
when speaking of his old dojo near his home that withstood
the annual typhoons for years until he finally knocked
down the worn building himself. He jumps up from his
seat to punctuate his speech by sitting in a deep horse
stance with his knees bent at almost perfect right angles,
and breaks into a sudden flood of English, "Okinawan
house strong like horse stance. Strong base," he shouts
with schoolboy intonation while slapping his thighs
with open hands, "makes strong house!" His English is
elementary and purpose-built-he is a retired member
of the Okinawan Guard and spent many years teaching
hand-to-hand combat to elite members of the Okinawan
and American forces. He slides a copy of an old karate
manual across the table as if it was the morning newspaper
and I notice, besides the many grainy black and white
photographs of the original masters performing drills
and posing in front of their students, that it is a
memorial manual dating from 1986, the year I began to
study the martial arts in Canada. He mumbles, "presento,"
before pulling at a barbecued drumstick with a soft,
smiling grin.
On the short drive back to my hotel, Tokumura Sensei
swings through the small neighbourhood of Taba, on the
Gushikawa side where the houses are snug together alongside
small shops with only the odd waist-high, stone wall
separating the small yards. "This is the house of Iha,"
he points a single finger towards a two story building.
"Top floor is dojo. You go and see him. He teach you
weapons."I am self-conscious, shaking ever so slightly
and suddenly feeling every degree of the thick humidity,
as I walk up the concrete steps that lead to the second-floor
training hall. It has been years since I have asked
anyone new to be my instructor, and the anxiety and
enthusiasm of a young white belt flows though my body
like a shot of adrenalin. His son, like me, in his mid-twenties
and standing over six feet tall, is guiding a small
class through a series of techniques with the bo, a
long wooden staff. He politely greets me and rushes
downstairs to fetch his father. Within the hour we are
in the middle of our third or fourth toast, a familiar
Okinawan form of expression that is as much social lubrication
as it is tradition. The bar is a damp basement club,
referred to as a snack in this part of the world, and
there is a solitary woman serving the drinks, as resigned
and emotionally threadbare as a thousand women doing
the same job in lonely clubs all over this chain of
islands. She smiles a forced, but almost alluring grin
when encouraged, and nods from time to time to punctuate
the speech of Iha Sensei. A phone call is made on an
old pink rotary phone in the corner and soon a tall,
well-tanned man in his fifties shuffles in with a whistle.
He is Okinawan, although his jet-black hair, leathery
tanned skin and polished white picket fence smile would
not be out of place in Las Vegas. I learn that the man,
Nago-san, is a renowned player of the shamisen, the
Okinawan stringed instrument that is made in part from
the stretched skin of the indigenous habu snake. He
smiles while spouting out the stories, and he and Iha
Sensei laugh and smirk their way though their lines
like the old amicable friends that they are. After a
couple of nudges from his friend's elbow, Nago-san is
on stage playing the instrument and singing the songs
that have made him an Okinawan champion with five albums
to his name. He sculpts the haunting songs with rigid
discipline and an unwavering pitch, to an appreciative
crowd of two on a quiet Monday night in this little
town a lifetime away from the old circuits. The woman,
cheeks flushed from the beer that she has been sipping,
joins him on stage for a few of the more somber numbers,
singing echoing harmonies and banging out a rhythm on
a well-worn cowhide drum.The next morning I am awakened
from a blurry dream by a call from the front desk, and
the voice on the other end is unmistakably that of Iha
Sensei. "I'm coming for you in five minutes. Bring your
camera." It is all that I hear before his voice cuts
away to an abrasive dial tone and I scramble up to gather
my things.
We are driving along the eastern coastline of this central
region, the Pacific side of Okinawa. The coast here
features mostly small rundown coves, and there are a
number of chain-link fences and wide-lettered warnings
not to trespass near the American bases, while the scraps
of beach that feature picnic benches and young surfers
are few and far between. We stop for lunch in a little
fishing village near Camp Hansen, an American Marine
base, where a roadside sign in bold black lettering
reads, "YOUR CARELESS WAYS ARE CAUSING MANY DEATHS!"Iha
Sensei was born in 1939, the youngest of four children,
of a generation whose earliest memories were punctuated
by the aftermath of war and the blur of redevelopment
under American occupation. He drives me to the site
of his old family home, where his brother still has
a house nearby, and we find him busy tending to a packed
greenhouse of prize-winning bonsai trees. The marshy
Tengan River that hugs the property line is the canvas
to yet another vivid memory. "We used to fish there
every day when I was a young boy," he said pointing
out along the emerald green bank, "We'd pull out eels
four or five feet long, the odd silverfish and even
little striped frogs. Good eating in those days".I struggle
to pull my heavy starched uniform over an aching sunburn
that must cover fifty percent of my body, and I reach
down to bandage a few of the worst blisters earned over
the week's touring. It's just past midday, and when
I crack open the change room door, I find half a dozen
older women out on the floor frowning down at me like
scolding librarians and motioning towards the clock.
A stern looking woman yells out, "Hurry up!" and I race
to join the end of the line before we begin the series
of bows that start the class. The six students are between
the ages of fifty-five and sixty-five. All are grandmothers
and wrapped around each powerful set of hips is a black
belt in Okinawan weaponry.
Iha Sensei smiles from the corners of his mouth as I
sweat and grunt and generally fail to grasp any of the
techniques being taught to me. We run through traditional
forms- the beautiful, almost dance-like kata. Each kata
was once the showpiece of a particular region or town,
as distinctive as a folk song or a pattern of cloth.
Today these stocky women, hair pulled back in tight
ponytails and well over twice my age, hardly break a
sweat in the mid-afternoon heat as they flow through
the motions with complete fluidity, without a hint of
effort. I am familiar with a few of the weapons, having
studied some for over a decade, and yet I have never
seen such simple power created by such perfect form.
After watching many hopeless attempts with arms folded
in silence, Iha Sensei takes pity on me and guides me
privately through the techniques of the long wooden
staff. He speaks only out of necessity, preferring instead,
it would seem, to lead by example, and as I strain to
follow every change in stance, every shift in balance,
I feel my confidence build and know that I have made
the correct decision in training with this unique and
talented man.
Over the next seven hours I see students from as young
as six years old swing nunchaku, sai (three-pronged
iron truncheons), and a host of other traditional weapons
around like plastic toys. Although sometimes only centimeters
apart, they manage to avoid so much as grazing each
other's uniform. Later that evening, walking back from
the dojo after class, he reaches up towards a branch
hanging down over his property from the neighbouring
yard. The small fruit he offers up from the palm of
his hand are the roe-colored acelora cherries, tart
and delicious and the size of small marbles. "Okinawa
size," he says with a smile.
On my last morning in Gushikawa, Iha Sensei takes me
to eat at a stand near his house, where we poke at steaming
bowls of flat Okinawan soba noodles with thin slices
of mint green, bitter goya on the side. He unrolls a
sheet of textured rice paper filled with Chinese characters
brushed in elegant strokes, black on white. A finger
pointed towards himself tells me that he is the author
of this, a poem written in the traditional style of
ryu ka, an Okinawan cousin of haiku. He describes each
character as others might explain photos of their grandchildren,
with loving care and an intimate knowledge. His poem
is about the blossoming deigo, a crimson flower that
rises to full bloom even after enduring the worst of
the rainy season.
After lunch, he insists on driving me back to Naha,
past the alternating stretches of American and Okinawan
life that blur together along the boundaries. In front
of the hostel where I will spend my last night on Okinawa
before flying back to my life in mainland Japan, he
offers me a hand with my heavy backpack. I turn down
his request with a polite phrase of Japanese and instead
sling it over my shoulder before stepping up to the
curb. As I turn around to say goodbye one last time
he is back sitting in his car, rolling down the window
on the passenger side. He leans out with a wide smile
and shouts, "Canadian size" before waving gently and
driving of back down the road to Gushikawa.
* * * * *
The author would like to thank Mr. A.J. Advincula and
Mr. Zane Legg for their incredible support.