my heart's a battleground…

Oh god…I’m at the board meeting right now with my computer being uncharged…

Jesus christ, let me go kill someone right now…

I’m kinda getting fueled up with the stupid 4dan test bullshit…

5:50:28 PM Mark Berghaan: I hate a fight where the other person is just there to block and do bitch tsune

ROTFLLLLLLLLLL and we all know which one THAT is…

It was interesting what Sensei said about the Dutch Mark. She basically said that he’s 4dan level—where his techniques are smooth (even for a big guy) and that he doesn’t have any real bad habits. It’s just that he needs that seme or focus.

She then was talking to me about his WIIIIDEEEEE living room in the Netherlands, and how there’s nothing in there—so it was perfect for naginata practice. She was practicing zen nihon with him, and she asked him,

“Are you ready?”

“I am ready!”

“Are you ready to die?”

Then his neck tightened up. She was then explaining to him the difference between kata and shikake ooji. She said that 「しかけおおじをする (to do)、型を打つ (to strike), Chinese: to hit)」. She was explaining to me that with shikake ooji you can do it over and over again, but with kata–you need to have that feeling of “Oh, this may be my last one.” She then said that he was even getting teary

Interesting, the key is in that one verb. To be honest, I always thought of shikake ooji as katas as well. I always thought of them as one possibly being my last one (especially since I didn’t even know about the 「もう一度お願いします〜〜〜〜！」shit until Japan).

Every time I do basics, it’s the same thing. That is also why Sensei doesn’t teach the Kearny kids about that—because “they need to strengthen their mind”

Makes sense as to why people who are good at kata, are usually good at fighting…

Really people, you are pathetic.

And s0o immature. You look down at me because of my age, yet look at you guys—you’re older than me yet acting like 12 year olds. At least I have even MORE of a reason to look down at you (aside from being kohai).

And Patrick brought up a good point, now that I think about it, did the 3 stooges really try to win that trophy for Margaret? Because if that’s really the case, why do they have such big heads now from it?

If they really were fighting for someone, they wouldn’t feel as though they’re obligated to everything.

Which I think is even more disgusting. It’s also sad that Sensei cannot see that…

Sensei can read opponents, but she cannot seem to read people.

Why did they think that they did poorly at Mount Holyoke? Is it because they actually lost to stronger opponents? HAH. Why are they looking forward to the August nationals, but not the March taikai that’s happening in 3 weeks?

Because the March taikai is harder.

That’s pathetic. Error-y was telling me that the 3 stooges wanna be like “us” (Ellery, Patrick, me).

I was about to puke.

I never would want them to become like me. That kind of 心 is weak. I don’t feel obligated for crap, except for my current rank in the dojo. But that’s 当たり前、that goes for everyone at the dojo anyway.

And to be honest, with their attitudes, I quite frankly don’t think they’re cut for budo. They whine, complain, claim that they’re trying whenever Sensei corrects them, but to be honest, they aren’t trying enough.

Otherwise, unless Sensei asks you to speak, you wouldn’t be speaking.

I never would’ve thought of myself as being someone that people compare me to.

And even if they did, that they would use me as a way to make them feel better—”Oh, well as long as you’re not as bad as Katie…”

I mean I never get compared to anyone—just my parents would say shit about how my brother works harder n’crap like that, and Sensei would always compare me to Tanaka Chikage. But like, with siblings, I just honestly didn’t give a shit (I guess because our genders are different, and our age difference is greater than 4 years), and Tanaka Chikage is just on a completely different plane than I, so if people were even to compare us, it would be more for role model purposes. I guess this is why I never had a rival. I never experienced sibling rivalry (I don’t have a sister who’s close in age with me), and I haven’t met anyone who’s had a very, very similar background to me. I guess I’m just that original

I mean shiet, even during celebrity doppelganger week on facebook, I couldn’t even find anyone…jeez.

But in any case, today was Sensei’s birthday. I got her a cute lil red velvet cupcake @ da Chinatown Starbucks (because dat fucken Lincoln Sq. Starbucks is a SKANK—every other place in NY sells the fucken red velvet cupcake! That’s such BULLSHIT that they are discontinuing it…HA!) and put a cute lil pink candle on it. It was s0o0o cute. And Nayantara bought Sensei flowers—and wow, coincidentally she bought her favorite kind.

It was hilarious, because we heard people coming in, and the first time was a false alarm, the second time I wasn’t sure if it was Sensei, then Nayantara already plopped open the curtain, and Sensei was like “HI NAYANTARA!” and I was like “SHIT!” ahahaha. Then we walk out and sing happy bday all obnoxiously loud.

And she even thought that the damn thing tasted real good too! XD Tah! You can never go wrong with a red velvet cupcake.

But then yeah…she started talking a little more, and when I went back to the changing room to put the candles and matches back, then the first thing that comes out of Sensei’s mouth is: “Marija has a problem.”

I was like oh no…

She told me that Marija emailed her again or something, and that apparently when Ghost House wrote Sensei an email asking her to be Toronto’s official Sensei, that she apologized on behalf of Marija. And then she goes off saying “Why she apologizing? That’s Marija’s job, that’s between me and Marija” and apparently Marija never wrote a personal apology, and that the apology note was a joint letter from both Ghost House and Marija.

I mean I can see why they would do that, THEY AREN’T TAKING THIS SHIT PERSONALLY!!!!!!!. They probably figured that it would be the most professional thing to do, to just have both the old captain and the new captain write a co-joint letter on behalf of the club. I mean it makes sense

but I guess that’s not how shit is supposed to be done in Japan.

Then she continued on about what she wrote in the email, and the comparison comes where, “You and Katie have similar background—both come from kendo, from good Sensei—Ono Sensei—but the one big difference is that Katie still learns from me.”

Wow.

I was in shock.

Like I was thinking to myself, “Really?…you wrote that?…” I was too shocked to even ask her to elaborate.

“Big difference is etiquette”

I was shocked. I couldn’t believe she said that. I didn’t even feel honored, or have a huge ass tengu nose coming outta my face—really, it didn’t make me feel good.

And I don’t think it made anyone feel good. Some people may get a huge ego boost after hearing a Kyoshi-ranked Sensei compliment them, but really, getting compared to…I dunno, just the way she did it, I just…didn’t feel that good…

And this isn’t the first time it happened. When Klara first walked in to the dojo, Sensei immediately started comparing her to me—saying how we both came from Ken Zen, blah blah blah—-which just ended up backfiring because Klara felt like an underdog.

She did it with Christina—except infront of my face. I mean, I was kinda annoyed saying that she’s “just like you just like you”…but yeah, like Christina was not a 4 year old girl—the big sister “one day you can be just like her” shit just doesn’t work for someone who’s only 2 years younger. I don’t think that Christina felt like she could be herself…

and you know what, now that I’m thinking about it…she’s done it more often than I thought–the other week when I was working with Sasha with 4honme—she had a furikaeshi problem, and I thought that I had the same problem, so I tried it out—but then Sensei told Sasha, “…the thing is that Katie’s grip still works” or something along those lines…

Really, comparisons don’t work with women, period. Women are prone to be more jealous and envious compared to men, so making comparisons is just NOT going to build harmony in a dojo.

Then I remember, this isn’t the first time Sensei compared Marija to me—I remember Marija mentioning that back @ the Bryn Mawr camp, she was trying to show Marija the correct way to execute a hasso strike–so she showed her one of my videos from the San Jose taikai, and said “See! She does it in 1 motion, it’s not 1-2″

To be honest, I had no clue that she would compare people to me behind the scenes. I really don’t think that I’m anything worth comparing to. I’m not a child naginata prodigy, nor am I the 8x all Japan champion, I don’t understand why she compares people to me. I guess I still think of myself as a beginner—I still think that I’m that 16 year old, that was the youngest at the dojo–the annoying, baby sister of JSS, back in the summer of ‘04. She could’ve shown Marija videos of the all Japan champions, why did she show mine? I don’t think that I have a model hasso strike. I’m not godan, why though?

I mean shiet, that’s probably why the 3 stooges are all jealous towards me—probably Sensei compares them to me, and they don’t like it. Do I blame them? No, but does it justify their behavior in the dojo? Hell no

I thought about the etiquette thing more—and like really, I cannot take sides on this thing. Because I just see both sides. I cannot compare both sides’ reasons. I just don’t think Sensei sees how people could misunderstand her. She’s very Japanese in which she thinks that the other person “should know”—

but really, they don’t know. I can understand why (from what I heard from Sensei) why Toronto and Marija did certain things. It’s never under malicious intent, or be considered rude here in the West,—it’s just different. I don’t think that they would know about the degrees of formality and all that other etiquette/manners crap that a Japanese person would know.

I mean shiet, I’m not a Japanese etiquette expert–hell, I probably did some fucked up shit in Japan that I don’t know.

And to be quite honest, I don’t even think all Japanese know everything about Japanese etiquette. I mean shiet, if you take my mom, who was born in Tokyo, and dropped her off a plane on top of Kyoto. She probably would be taken as rude because she’s probably still sitting on her ass chatting, eating, catching up on things, thinking everything is cool—-even though the dish she finished eating 2 hours ago was ochazuke. “Oh shit–wait, you didn’t know the ochazuke rule?!”—-where when someone offers you ochazuke, that’s the indirect sign telling you to go home. I mean shit, probably a Hokkaido person wouldn’t even know that, because that damn ochazuke rule is a Kyoto unspoken custom.

So really because of this, I am more sympathetic when it comes to things like etiquette in the budo world. I don’t think that people who’ve never lived in Japan, nor grew up with exposure to the culture, would even have that 6th sense to know these kinds of things.

And shit, why won’t some assholes tell them? I mean isn’t that the main purpose of a senpai/kohai relationship? I mean whenever I was in Japan, I always had someone guiding me/telling me some lil secret pointers on the side. I mean really, come on.

And you know what, now I understand that Hardcore Grandma movie now that I saw the other day with my mom—there was a scene in this Japanese movie where the main character saw a friend of his (who was also staying with his hardcore grandma) that was mentally retarded, getting bullied. He would always used to abandon him, and one day when the grandma noticed that the two of them didn’t come home together, the grandma told him “It’s even worse if you stand there and do nothing.”

Because I understand that…although I may be competitive and want to be the best at everything, I do want to post shit like this on the net for people to read—you know why? So that people won’t have to go through that. And if even the victim sees it, then can be aware of what’s going on behind their backs, and perhaps try to find a way to fix it. I’m stuck in the middle, and to be honest, I would feel more like a bad person if I just stood there, took everything that Sensei said in, and just kept the knowledge all to myself. I should spread some kind of awareness.

And to be honest, I would want someone to do the same thing for me if I were in the same situation—if someone was doing some shit behind my back, or there were some things that I did which could affect my future with wtvr I want to do, I’d want to damn know so that I don’t continue to make the same mistakes in the future. I mean god knows what kind of reputation I have in Japan. Like shiet, I’m too scared to know. And although by posting shit like this to spread awareness, may make other people look better than me, I just cannot even think about that shit, because I just feel priority with awareness.

——

I got a txt message from Patrick that said “Joey is resting in heaven now”

And I was like ‘wtf?…’ because I wasn’t sure if he was joking, or if they really put the dog to sleep..so I literally txted him back with ‘wtf?..’ and what kinda got me sad and guilty was his response, “he’s resting now, no more growling…”

Yes I hated that dog, it was cute, I always wanted to pet it, but like he never did well with humans that weren’t members of the family. It was annoying to have that dog bark all the damn time whenever Mai and I were there, but at the same time I felt bad for the damn thing because they would always lock him up in the room n’shit…sometimes, I do admit, I wished and waited for that dog to die, but now I feel bad for ever have those thoughts and feelings…I felt bad because this was the 2nd dog that died within a matter of like 3 months.

Then while I was on the phone with Patrick, I get a call from Charlina, crying. Apparently her Uncle went fucken Korean temper crazy by throwing shit around the house (almost hitting her face) and saying some fucked up shit that really shouldn’t have been said.

It’s weird…there’s alot of weird changes going on…alot of weird shit…I mean these things, and the shit with Canada going on…it’s kinda creeping me out and making me think about things a little more…

It’s interesting to look at this picture and see how much has changed in such a short period of time.

This was taken at the ‘03 NY seminar…one year before I started naginata.

It’s unbelievable to see how people got along so well in the past, not so long ago, but then now hate each other due to politics.

“I am really getting into Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box—there’s these 300 puzzles and as you go through different maps and crap and…” – Hiroko Suzuki

Okay really, I never would’ve expected this to come out of my mom’s mouth…

But then again, I grew up with my grandmother playing video games for me…so yeah…

I am TOTALLY looking forward to going to Seattle next week

not for my 3dan shinsa,

But to go to the original STARBUCKS!. OMG I can’t wait, I’m counting the days now…

and gonna tell Yamauchi Sensei that I cannot go to the board meeting, but instead need to go to the original STARBUCKS–because I just NEED to.

I haven’t watched that show in ages…I’ve recently started to watch it again, and like

the new episodes aren’t that funny anymore…especially since they put that blonde kid as a more important character.. >_<

but the older shit is HILARIOUS. Especially the chinpokomon and cartman gets an anal probe…ahahah those are classics

and I really need to stop procrastinating…haha, yes, people who are not in schools have things they can procrastinate from…

holy shit, that thing is HUGE

I mean that shit is 16″ long…cool.