Ninja Senshi Ryu lulwut!?

That's good. The bujinkan has far too many holier-than-thou types Lready as it is.

 

You got in just before me ... Bob Jones created Zen Do Kai (ZDK) from Goju ryu Karate initially, and over the years has added many things, including a form of Ninjutsu which I only found out about a few weeks ago (like a good ninja ryu it's been kept secret all this time ... :vanish. Richard Norton is probably the highest profile of Bob's students because of his movie work and talent.

Just to play devil's advocate with some other issues raised in Alvin's post ...

Why use Bujinkan techniques and terms etc? Because that's the basis of his curriculum, just like ZDK has a basis in Goju ryu karate, and use Goju ryu kata and terminology, it reflects the foundation of the system. In the years to come Kaylan Soto may incorporate different things into his teachings and move away from the Bujinkan's terminology and structure.

Another thing you may like to consider that perhaps Mr Soto, and other independants, moved away from the Bujinkan not because of the strategies and tactics inherent in the fighting system(s), but because of the Bujinkan's method of teaching them and the other 'warts' you're willing to tolerate for the privelge of training in Japan.

One last thing to consider, and it's starting to move away from the original topic, but relevant nevertheless, is the possibly that in the not-too-distant future there will be a lot of 'independant' ninjutsu (like that term or not) dojo around the world, unaffiliated with any Japan-based organisation. Just like Kyokushin karate and Aikido dojo. But perhaps that's for another thread ...

With respect

 

Cool, I stand corrected.

 

There are a lot of people who have gone independant, that's true. Many have remained pretty respectful of the source of their teaching qualifications and their training history though. All I have to do is look at your own website, Dean, to see that.

The sticky point is the claims of "fully accredited to pass on these teachings" when that's simply not the case.

 

Alvin,

Thanks for clarifying that and accreditation can be a sticky thing, given he's 'independent' does he need accreditation from anyone?

However, he does appear to be 'guilding the lily' somewhat, which is in the tradition of his teacher Dion Kalos (see earlier post clarifying his teaching qualification timeline).

With respect

 

Anyone can teach without accreditation. If people want to train with someone who is so vague about their real martial history, then that's their choice.

As for the standards in their ranks, well that's really up to them to. What isn't ok is that their students at one stage were given the impression that they could just train in the Hombu without being Bujinkan members.

It's not ok to just break off, buy a way to get membership to go to Japan to train and then just go back to bagging how bad a system it is. Especially when there are other Aussie independants who at least maintain a standard for good fundementals. There are a lot of people still training with Mike Hammond for example who was one of the more recent people to split off.

 

Why do all you people care so much about this guys accreditation...especially you alvin. why would you have had a joint training session with this guys school if your so against him and his phony credentials...seems to be a bit of the green eyed monster imo.

 

Well fearless, it's been suggested that since Volkan now trains under me, and that Volkan is mates with Kaylan, that somehow it would be ok to suggest that somehow Kaylan and I were connected. If someone were talking about you then I'm sure you'd pipe up and throw your two cents in.

All students have a right to question their instructor on something as basic as accreditation. If Kaylan was more truthful about it then other people wouldn't be giving him so much grief. I'm not the only one who has commented on it.

And the name calling damages your reputation more than it does mine. I've been pretty informative and civil on here... particularly about clearing up things like certification...

 

First post and bang on this thread?

Hmmm now what's the chance fearless has a stake in this somewhere?

 

ok ok for starters i am not and never have been involved in this club. i train in mma. i have jumped on this thread because i have watched you all make fun of and try to destroy a mans business and for what? until the press coverage of the mugging you (alvin) havent onced questioned his credentials or his ability to teach. i agree volkan trains under you dont know who he is i am assuming the bigger man on your site is volkan...i dont see why you would still have a joint training session with him if you were so concerned about this credentials...from what i can see bujinkan is a dogs breakfast of so many schools that in all honesty no one could come close to perfecting each and every one of them in a lifetime to be able to say they are a grandmaster. at best bujinkan has been around for what 200 years? i am the first to agree that mixing many schools and systems of fighting can create a solid fighting style (mma) but seriously we are all grown men and we all love the fighting arts that we participate in. i think you guys need to give it a rest on the credentials point and focus more on peoples knowledge, skill and ability. at the end of the day the bujinkan is a some what new school of martial arts. i know its got toga and koga ryu and whatever linages in it, it is not anything more than a mixed breed of a number of various schools on ninja. not here to start a fight just want you to see there is a bigger picture out there and if you do a little reasearch you will know that when it comes to this ninjutsu stuff its all a little muddy and credentials in such a lost art are some what subjective.

 

Hey, no-one forced them to put up videos. They were poorly executed waza from the instructor to the senior students. Now I've also had the benefit of seeing it live and it was just as bad. You haven't trained with them so how would you know?

VB invited them to a class which they weren't charged for. As I've stated previously, it's VB's dojo, not mine. What I saw was bad. When I saw Alex (the guy doing the black belt test) I thought he was around 7th kyu. And I dealt with it by never inviting them back.

I started commenting when someone suggested that I had taken over VB's dojo. I think that as one of the few black belts who have seen them train live, I'm entitled to an opinion... What I saw was rubbish and frankly, I felt pretty badly for the students. Hatsumi Sensei has always said to choose your instructors carefully though.

I'm aware of the bigger picture. I explored a lot of other MA prior to settling on the Bujinkan. BTW, Bujinkan doesn't have a Koga school - you must be thinking of Kumogakure Ryu which is different and has never been taught.

The other schools that have been taught are predominantly Samurai based schools. That's what I find so ironic - that they call it ninjutsu when they are attempting to do waza from Gyokko Ryu Kosshijutsu.

What you may not be aware of are things that I haven't mentioned like people chasing rank from me (without even paying me the respect of training with me).

I don't see how this is much different from what's being said on the Tae Kwon Do thread about the validity of instructors. So with all due respect, fearless, I disagree with your perspective on this.

 

ok fair enough you have your opinion...i only jumped on here to stand up for the "little guy" (not as in stature but more in a business term). you might want to think about what you could be doing to this guys rep and for all you know his business and income. do you really know enough if anything really to base any of this on? just on a lighter note can you post some youtube vids of your class im interested to see the difference. i think some of this taijutsu stuff could help me in mma and i wanna see who i should pay my money to, to learn some of it.

 

It's nice you want to stick up for "the little man" but while you're going off on one about this guy's business and income have you given a thought to the fact he has students?

 

There are dvd's floating around of when I was an uke for a visiting instructor from Japan or the US. All of them were judans or above that had spent a long time in the art. It was tough - try making committed attacks for someone a lot better than you for a 2 day seminar some time. Some of them were filmed when I was a shodan so I have a good basis for seeing how I used to move and how students that are close to shodan are moving.

There are plenty of moments when I go, "crap, I looked really bad there" but it is my opinion that to improve, you need to be honest with yourself about how you train. e.g. if I show people a dvd of me in it, I would be doing it to ask them which areas I could improve, not to promote a dojo.

I don't film classes. Instead, each and every student gets a good amount of personal time with me - not senior students (who are training, not trying to instruct). I only have about 9 people to take care of in a 2 hr session.

I've only ever considered myself a junior instructor. I still train with people more senior than me but I can honestly say that I am conscientious about the quality of people that train with me. I pass on more than just "rank", I train with good people.

As for who you should go to, it depends on the area you live in. There are a lot of instructors around and it's basically up to you to go and visit them and see who you click with.

From a business aspect, if you were going to a doctor, wouldn't you want to ensure that the person had a licence to practice medicine? If that medical practitioner said, "hey, I've got a family to feed" would that make it suddenly ok?

Now this isn't medicine so people instead talk about mat time as much as they talk about certification. If you read the early part of this thread, the Roy Dojos only ever ranked him to 6th kyu. Considering that white belt is 10th kyu, that's not a lot of training time. Andrew B. ranked him to shodan (1st dan) - and Andrew's shodans have solid fundamentals. They're not considered good enough to open their own schools though and teach. From a Bujinkan perspective, that's about where his training stopped. Andrew had a 5th dan, Joel instructing in the Emu Plains so why wouldn't people just see him?

From my information, Kalos Dojo ranked him to nidan (2nd dan) and organised some sort of "assistant instructor" certificate for him but he's only ever had a handful of lessons there. He's supposed to be actively training with that instructor to keep that certification until he is ready to sit for the godan (5th dan) test. Otherwise, what that person is holding isn't certification, it's a piece of paper with kanji on it and a family seal.

You can buy those on the internet - I can't promise you that they would spell your name correctly though

 

Fearless said - "i have jumped on this thread because i have watched you all make fun of and try to destroy a mans business and for what?"

While I'm sure there are many valid answers to this question, perhaps they can be summed up with this point?

http://encyclopediadramatica.com/I_did_it_for_the_lulz

 

Whilst I'm certainly against slandering someone for no good reason, the chances of this thread ruining his business and income are tiny. Believe it or not internet discussion boards are not the first place a lot of people come to looking for training information. And many existing students do not participate in discussions either. So the chances of Alvin's opinions (valid or otherwise) affecting Kaylan Soto's 'business' are very very slim, rest easy.

With respect

 

Like Dean just said. We have all ignored this thread for as long as possible. but Alvin is just making a fool of himself and enough is enough. We've heard that even his own students are embarrassed by this thread. So enough is enough, give it a rest.


Alvin,


Before you comment on standards in dojos perhaps you should take a long hard look at your own. (Your comments here and the fact that you feel you need to be the Sheriff of all Aus Ninjutsu kinda says a lot about the sort of person you are).

You know what Kaylan’s student took away from that Joint Training Night? Absolutely Nothing! They were too busy trying to teach YOUR students what Ichimonji was!

Now you want to bag Alex , a lower grade than you on his technique when your own is quite appalling, especially at a 5th dan level.

Here is what I remember from the night and we have Video footage and photos of this night.

You demonstrated 5 Taijutsu Techs 3x you stuffed up so badly that even YOUR students noticed. The 4th one you struggled to put your uke on the ground and he wasn’t even resisting! And the 5th one, you tripped over backwards and then made out that you meant to trip!

One of your students (who will remain nameless out of respect for him) afterclass tried to make the excuse “you were nervous” lol! Nervous at a 5th Dan level????? Hahahaha

On every technique Kaylan’s students went straight into it and atleast had a grasp of the technique you were demonstrating. While YOUR students were left wondering what was going on. Kaylan asked one of your students to go to Ichimonji as your student looked lost. The student looked at Kaylan and said “Ichimonji?” Kaylan demonstrated ichimonji and your student replied “OH! First character posture” lolwut!?

Many of Kaylan’s students including his whitebelts spent most of the night teaching your students which leg should be forward when punching from ichimonji


On one particular technique one of Kaylan’s students (A WHITEBELT MIND YOU) told your student the technique was similar to Sui from the San Shin. You even stopped the class and called out to everyone “Yes , it is just a variation on Sui, I should have made that clear”….. Your students turn to Kaylan’s students and asked “Whats the San shin?” (FACE PALM)

It was around this time that you asked Kaylan to demonstrate something as “Kaylans students were catching on quicker than your students” – your exact words. (video footage)

We then moved onto Knife work where you demonstrated how to cut yourself while disarming your uke….not once, not twice but THREE times! You’re a 5th dan! And you somehow manage to cut your own wrists while pulling the knife out of your ukes belt!

Most of your students had to be shown what Musha Dori was by Kaylan’s students Kaylans whitebelts had to show students of yours who claimed thay had been training for a long time)

We moved onto Sword work where most of our laughs come from. 9/10 of your student’s bokkens were still in shrinkwrap as if they had never used them before. One of them was holding it from the Kissaki end , another held it with the blade facing up. Most had the grip reversed.

After demonstrating technique you never wiped the blade and had to look at your hip as you put the sword away into the saya. At a 5th dan level you should be able to put the sword away without looking. Even Kaylan’s 7kyu’s can do this. What made it worse was that you had an imaginary saya! Lulz

Again, you managed to cut yourself with your own katana while demonstrating technique, and managed to get cut by your uke.

You demonstrated one basic technique where you evaded Ukes cut and sliced at his wrists you then said “at this point you face your uke again, and IT’S ON!”…….(meaning he will attack again)

Um, dude it’s NOT on! You just sliced off your ukes wrists I don’t think he’ll be attacking again….lol and you’re a 5th DAN?????? You lack a basic understanding of human anatomy! Lol

Even your own students noticed and laughed at you. It was at this point that you asked Kaylan to demonstrate some sword.

In an earlier post you said you had never seen the techniques that Kaylan demonstrated…. 2 of the Techs Kaylan showed were basic whitebelt Bujinkan Techs that he and VB were taught when they trained together. And you claim to have been training since ’94 and are a 5th dan! You’ve never seen those techs???!! WUT!?

You also commented to VB how impressed you were not only with Kaylans students but with Kaylans sword technique! It wasn’t until after word had gotten back to you that we were unimpressed with YOUR technique, standards and how we would refuse to attend another joint session with you that you turned nasty like a little child.


Before you comment on other dojos standards perhaps you should look at your own as they are surely lacking. What we don’t understand is what business is it of yours what other dojos do? As you said yourself you are just a lowly 5th dan ..pfffffft.

If Kaylan wants to teach ballet and call it Ninjutsu that’s his business and has nothing to do with you. I started out in the bujinkan and I see no difference to what Kaylan is teaching, except for some stuff that I have never seen before

To everyone else in the Bujinkan I would like to express my deep sympathy that you are being represented poorly and embarrassed by this lowly 5th dan (his words), all his students are embarrassed by it too.

 

Here is a photo of you cutting your own hand!!!! WTF? And you call yourself a 5th dan?

We have video footage of you tripping over your uke and struggling to put him down would you like to see it?

The funny thing is Kaylan has asked you to call him or to speak with you and you haven’t had the balls to ring. You are lower than a snakes belly.

Not even your own students are happy with you, You should hear some of the things they say.

 

He looks a little out of balance in that photo.

Was this the tech where he sliced his own wrist then tripped over his own uke as he stepped forward or was that a different one?