Hikage

Tie Die Bri Guy, (I assume that you Brits have tie die and therefore can enjoy the joke)

You see, the story continues after I left off. My "best friend" actually joined my class and went on to earn a 2nd degree. Also, another of my friends joined up at about the same time. These two were at each other's throats from the beginning. Even though we only have 2 belts, each is broken down further. Green has 9 kyus and black has the traditional 10 dans. However, we place no demarkation on the belts (i.e., the slashes that many karate styles favor) in an attempt at arresting any infighting that may ensure. It was not sucessful. Each time one, or both, was awarded rank they would have it out, usually in the form of little squabbles and boughts of one-upmanship.

This was enough to make me want to drop the belts altogether when I started a class at my college with my "best friend." (I keep putting him in quotes because we've sinced fallen out of contact for various reasons.) He was my assistant instructor during the 4 or 5 years we taught there (that means, yes we taught after graduation). During that time we taught a self-defense class. One of the major points wewanted to make is that all were on a relatively equal status. We did things like bow in in a circle instead of the more traditional line-up. We would put our black belts around a white belt and let them teach for the day (under supervision of course). All sorts of things to help people understand that everyone has something to bring to the table. How naieve -- nieave --- nieave -- oh hang on.... naive was I?

What ensued was a sublte, yet existant lack of respect from teh students. Now this was also mildly propogated by the fact that many of the students were also our close friends, but either way it still didn't work. Class time became social hour. We had a class of over 30, and most couldn't fight their way out of a wet paper bag because they didn't really want to be taught, rather coddled. When I left, after becoming married and moving an hour away, there was only one student of any significant value. He left that class, still being taught by my assistant, and went to Soke. About 2 years ago he earned his black belt and just this winter was awarded 2nd dan.

What happened to my assistant? After continuing to instruct at the college, he never again called Soke or myself to invite us to see the class, as is customary in out art. He soon ran out of material to show his students and started making things up for himself, which is dangerous at his level. Furthermore, after commiting other offenses to my instructor, which I will not go into here, he has since been "disowned."

My conclusion following all this has been that Americans need some form of intrinsic (or extrinsic as many see it) motivation in order to continue serious study of the art and to avoid becoming satisfied with class being "social hour." Furthermore, it is necessary in cases where students and teachers are young and of the same age that there be some form of structured hierarchy. If I ever do it again, I would not invite close friends, nor will I teach again until I'm 10 or so years older.

-Hikage

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