Apologies for my candour, but I don’t have a great deal of time free to post reams of wisdom to rather foolhardy questions. There’s a lot of Green Belt Syndrome in the martial arts, and I tire easily. Perhaps I shouldn’t have replied at all. Being not an absolute beginner with tachi or daisho, does that give me any real understanding of other sword principles? Can I just pick up an English backsword or an Indian Talwar and use it well? Hell no. Now imagine attempting to wield a kusarigama without experience, as you wish to do. You will be more of a liability to yourself than to your enemies. I have used a kusarigama and they are INSANE (but a lot of fun). If you a) haven’t actually used weapons in combat or b) follow a lineage that has indeed done that, you are just kidding yourself if you think you are learning a weapon art. Being a monster with nunchaku doesn’t give you any insight into surujin. What is your experience to date with weapons? Please try and be honest about your level of understanding - and perhaps tell us the line of study you follow? I think my opinion has been explained perfectly well? Good luck with the seminars.
I refer you to the baby and the bathwater metaphor. I don't necessarily agree with Scott. Coming from FMA, my take on weapons and the transferability of skills is a bit different. But if you can circumvent the snark, there's an important point being made. That said, Scott, the snark... What's obvious to you, with your years of experience, isn't obvious to everyone. And smacking down beginners for being beginners is something we need to be wary of as a community.
If I'd have believed he was a beginner (which I did not coming from his tone of post and wording), I would've been a little more polite. Noobs get led onto the path, not-so-noobs get an impolite shove. Better coming from me on here than a lesson in the real world.
Scott, I'm asking politely. There's no need for things like "foolhardy questions." Whether you perceive the OP to be a beginner or no. If they're new to weapons, they're a beginner. And plenty of us survived learning our lessons in the real world prior to the advent of the internet. No need to make it sound quite so grim.
Yet when problems do occur the consequences can be rather severe. http://www.martialartsplanet.com/forums/showthread.php?t=53303 At the end of the day most people on here are adults and they really should be able to deal with some direct advice, especially if they are looking at traditional weapons training. So an adult with current experience in a system that also teaches weapons should certainly have no problem with being told they are daft and really should know that weapons aren't something to take for granted or do by half measures. Good god people how do some of you deal with getting punched if you get twitchy at hearing something you don't like?
...and I'm agreeing. On top of that, I’m certainly not making it out to be like Mad Max out there. I was simply suggesting that people perhaps need to be more thick-skinned and not whine at a spot of criticism. They are budoka, after all.
Let's be honest for a moment. Who here HASN'T swung around a pair of nunchaku or tonfa, twirled a bo, etc. without proper instruction? I'd wager it's a fair few who have. We mucked around. We got smarter. We sought out instruction. And very, very few of us did any real harm in that process. I scuffed up a few ceilings, gave myself a few bruises, etc. So sure, the consequences COULD be severe. But I wouldn't say that's the norm. I think it's sound advice to steer the OP toward proper instruction because that's the way to get better. Not because, until he does so, he constitutes some threat to himself and the world around him. I'm simply asking that we all recognize that we were once in a similar place. I know I was. Difference is that I did it without the internet. So I didn't have legions of people judging me over it. It's not an unreasonable request, given that, at the root, I've agreed wholeheartedly that he needs proper instruction.
Oh man kusarigama! I have a wooden one of those someone made as a training safe one (it's balsa, a long rope and a rubber dog toy ring on the end haha) that brings back some memories of struggles with hojojutsu. Interesting you raise the green belt syndrome. I do however find it's definition funny since the common one I'm finding is here:http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Green Belt Syndrome which is quite the opposite from what I feel I am. I have 6 years bujinkan experience, but I have happened upon some weapons friends have sold me for dirt cheap that they don't use anymore. Thing is, I don't know jack about martial arts. There's no way I'd claim to be a master of any kind of anything. That being the case (and the fact martial arts is a big thing to me) I try to make an effort to understand other styles, their techniques, principles and weaponry etc. At least in a theoretical sense in case some day I find a teacher of that style that I like. For example before I try out a place, I like to understand some of the arts philosophy, it's focus areas (weapons, hands, feet etc) and see if that looks to be of some interest. I'm a 2nd kyu bujinkan. I had a brief period of british fencing, but my main experience is Bo, Spear, Katana, Tanto. I have some shurikenjutsu and tessenjutsu we've glossed over in class when the oppertunity arrives but outside of that I consider myself far from knowledgable in all those areas. I've never been in a knife fight (thankfully my city is relatively shy of that sort of crime) but I still do want to learn. I can pick up a weapon any day, being good with it however is different. Last thing I want to be is the 'star wars kid' of kobudo I'm currently in a position where I may be taking up Hung Ga at the moment and I am aware the club has sai from when I tried out there, so that's at least one thing on the list covered. The Kobudo seminars will probably benefit me with the others (seriously though, thanks a tonne for that, those dates are going in my diary).
I'd like to learn some Jo and considered looking at youtube and books. Just for the self interest really. What's the worse that can happen? Clonk myself in the head with a stick? But I can see why such a venture would grate on someone as knowledgeable and invested in a weapon art as Scott so can understand his virtual internet "eye rolling".
It does of course depend on your goals. If I pick up a Grosse Messer I can certainly use it within an FMA context but not so much a HEMA - so can i use that sword or not? I would argue "yes', but my aim is "lopping things off" not "preserving a martial tradition"
Are you looking at learning these weapons in particular or are you interested in different weapons for self defense? When I read your posts I'm not sure which it is. One concept I learned in the Marines a long, long, long time ago was weapons of opportunity. It was more of a mental attitude about seeing everyday objects as weapons. You'd be surprised if you just sit in a room, look at everything there and think how could I use that as a weapon. I don't know if that is part of ninja training but it seems to me it should be.
If that was the case, there is no point understaking a study of classical weapons. The OP could take up pool-cue-jutsu and be happy. That said, I would love to read in the local newspaper about some old girl who defended her home with a tinbe-rochin.
