Having a quiet year before Bosnia-Herzegovina I found my self excited about going into some other seminar as well until the end of the year. Due to my work I couldn't be away too long but I still though that even for few days it was worth going.
Travelling to Oslo is relatively easy - at least when compared with some other places I have been in. Blue1 aviate between Helsinki-Vantaa and Oslo Gardemoen and sometimes one finds their prices low. I checked them out and found out that during the week of nanbudo seminar led by Yoshinao Nanbu the flights were reasonable. I asked for two days off from work and the permission was granted. So, Oslo it is.
The trainings in Oslo lasted from Monday to Friday, but I managed to partake only the ones on Thursday and Friday. All in all I got seven solid hours of training which is pretty much the amount one gets in regular weekend training. On Saturday I went to see how the locals managed their grade examinations and later that night participated their dinner party.
Basic things were clearly emphasized in the trainings. On top of our regular kinanbutaiso, Nanbu sotai combinations and randoris and Nanbu katas we spend kinda lot of time doing just dodge'n'block training. Being slightly displeased Nanbu went through in detail how to do clean technique. Randori ichi no kata and randori irimi no kata were also essential part of low grade training and problems that showed up there were also pinpointed in the high grade group.
What I achieved during this piece of a seminar was an increase on my interest towards clean basics. This was also supported by some conversations I had with local nanbudokas. I also got some new perspectives on doing nanbudo from them. And also I learned that when travelling one should reserve a day to rest and recover. To leave my work behind to train nanbudo in international seminar had become essential for me but I suppose the excellence would reach its peak if there would be no need to drag oneself to work with blurry eyes next Monday morning.
Kalle Lönnroth, 1 dan