Major Updates!!!

The past few weeks have been a bit busy for the club.  Not only are we resuming in-person practices, but our dojo will be moving to the Aikido of Cincinnati dojo starting this week (10/6/21)!  If you've been waiting for your chance to practice with us, that chance has arrived!  

One thing I need to note is that, due to the scheduling at the new place, we've had to move our practice times to the following (times and address has been updated on the "Location and Contact" page:

Kendo:  Wednesday 7:45 - 9:15

Iaido:     Friday        7:00 - 8:30

 If you have any questions or you're interested in joining us for practice, feel free to get in contact with us by phone or email!

Kendo Practice Updates!!!!

 Hello everyone,

Hopefully everyone is doing well!  With Thanksgiving coming up, I'm sure that some of us are busy making plans on how to spend next week.

In light of the Thanksgiving holiday, practice will be canceled on Sunday, November 22nd (Iaido) and Tuesday, November 24th (Kendo).  Practice will continue as usual on Sunday, November 29th for Iaido.

Also, I'm hoping that I'm not confusing people too much about the Zoom rooms and everything.  A few days ago, I decided to make one final change to the scheduling with the rooms.  At first, I had two different links to two different rooms for the Kendo and Iaido practice.  I felt that doing something like that is pretty redundant and a recipe for confusion should someone click the wrong link, so I decided to consolidate the room to hopefully reduce any foreseeable confusion.  I will update the links on the website and Facebook page accordingly.

Updated Zoom Meeting Info

 

Good evening everyone,

Hopefully everyone has been having a good week!  I have a few updates concerning the Zoom practices that we've been having:

1. Having a free Zoom account to run the Iaido practices has worked out well for us so far.  The main issue is that, if I'm not watching the clock, then we're automatically kicked out of the meeting after the 40-minute mark.  Last night, I purchased a subscription to Zoom, so now I can run practices without worrying so much about not going over (even if by a minute or so).
2. Recently, I've thought about running Kendo practices over Zoom as well, and I finally decided to pull the trigger on that thought.  Right now, I have it scheduled for 7PM on Tuesdays.  As I mentioned in the last email, these practices are going to be catered more to the people that already have practice experience, but anyone will be able to log in and watch.  I may try holding practices for beginners, but I need to take some time to figure out formatting assuming that we will still be out of practice for the next few months, at least.
3. The links to the practices will be added to the "Location And Contact" Page
   

Future Online Kendo Practices

 

Hello everyone,

When the COVID situation first started going on, my thoughts was that we would just need to do all that we needed to do and then we'd be right at practice again within a few months.  Obviously, that has not been the case, and none of us are sure when things will improve to the point where we will all be able to practice Kendo in person again.

Despite us not being able to practice in person for a while, I think that it's safe to say that the Kendo bug still remains strong with the desire to get to crossing swords again and enjoying all that Kendo has to offer.  While we can't exactly do that, I can propose starting up online practices so that we all don't have to start up again at zero from not doing much for at least a year.

At this point, I don't have a concrete structure on what all of the practices will entail due to this being new territory, but I know I can at least start off with the basics to get us back into things, and then dive into some of the things that I have been thinking about over the last few months.

At the moment, this practice is going to be geared more towards people that already have practice experience, but anyone is welcome to watch (though I guess it will also depend on how many people are able to be in one online session, but we'll cross that bridge when we get to it).  I may add practices for those that have no experience in the future once I can formulate a plan for that.

I don't have a set day that I want to hold these, but I'm thinking either Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday starting at 7 and going for about an hour.  Lemme know what y'all think and I will update everyone once I get the ball rolling!

Chris George

"Sleepy Eyes Of Death" Discussion

Last week, I participated in a pre-recorded discussion about the Sleepy Eyes Of Death movie, which is available for free through the Cincinnati Public Library system on the Kanopy app.  When they chose the movie, they asked if I was willing to participate in order to tie my Kendo and Iaido experience to how the fighting styles in the movie are portrayed.

The link below is to the video on Facebook, so let me know if anyone has any issues with accessing the movie.

https://www.facebook.com/CincyLibrary/videos/2555524254550192/

Iaido Zoom Canceled

Good Afternoon,

I will need to cancel practice tomorrow because there is a flight that I need to catch.  We should be able to resume next Sunday.

In-Person Practice Status

Hello everyone,

I hope that everyone has been able to stay healthy and sane during this extended horror movie that is 2020 and found your own ways to practice while we wait for the dojos to open up again.  It's been a minute since I've communicated with everyone about whether or not we will be able to open up the dojos again, so I think it's only fair that I send everyone an update since the last email I sent.

A few weeks ago, the dojo leaders and officers of the ECUSKF had a brief phone meeting concerning how we should handle the possibility of resuming in-person practices as the various sectors of our economy start to open up, including gyms and recreation centers.  The good news about that is we may have the spaces to practice open up again as the restrictions on close-contact sports are loosened.  However, we can't forget that COVID-19 is still an issue, and cases have been increasing across the country.  As much as we would love to resume practices as usual, we have to put the health and safety of our practitioners first, especially for those in the vulnerable groups.  At the end of the call, we made the decision that the risks were still too high to resume practices again, so we won't be having in-person Kendo and Iaido practices for at least the next few weeks while we continuously keep up to date about safety conditions.

Despite all of that, don't forget that there are a lot of ways to continue practicing on your own.  The Kendo practices over Zoom have still been going on so you can always join with those practices.  There's also a lot of Youtube videos to watch, blogs to read and cross-training to perform (so you're not starting at zero once we get back).
While I'm at it, I'd also like to announce that I've been able to hold Iaido practices over Zoom.  The last few weeks were touch-and-go making sure that those who were able to attend were able to get into the room, but it looks like that's all been worked out (fingers crossed!).  I've been doing them on Sunday mornings at 10, and the link can be accessed below.  Feel free to join us if you're able to, even if you are just able to watch!

Hope to see you all there!

Chris George

P.S.  Yesterday, I found out that the AUSKF has released some guidelines for practicing duing the pandemic.  I haven't had a chance to look at them yet, but I'll let you know when I do.