On behalf of Kaicho Saito Hitohiro I wanted to send a huge thank you to all who attended and supported the Seminar.  Sensei arrived on Thursday afternoon shortly after the arrival of Pat Hendricks and Alessandro Tittarelli.  It was therefore quite a reception committee on hand to greet Sensei at Heathrow Airport.  We arrived back in Seend Cleeve late in the afternoon and had time for some rest before my wife Sarah served up a wonderfully warming winter meal.  After everyone’s long trip we had an early night on Thursday in order to rest and relax ready for the seminar. 

The area that I live in is filled with ancient relics and monuments.  One of these relics is Avebury Henge, a huge stone circle almost a mile in circumference; much like Stonehenge but on a bigger scale.  We took Sensei there on Friday morning and spent a very serene hour wandering around the stones, some of which weigh more than 60 tonnes and have stood in place for over 3000 years.  Sensei was intrigued by the stones and drew parallels to their use in Japan.

The first training session was on Friday afternoon and despite having a cold it was great to see Sensei on terrific form and with great energy.  Many people made the effort to attend the Friday session despite work commitments and were rewarded for their efforts with three great classes. 

On Saturday we began with an early morning meditation session and were treated to a very rare, in depth explanation of how to meditate.  After breakfast we then headed for the dojo and five inspiring classes from Sensei.  Throughout the course of the seminar Sensei covered ken and jo basic suburi, kumi tachi, and the 13 and 31 jo awase’s.  In tai jutsu Sensei taught the ikkyo to gokyo series, kokyu nage and a special emphasis on ki no nagare and some oyo waza.  The after class photos were superbly organised by James in a record 20 minutes giving everyone chance to get changed for the evening party, a Medieval Banquet in a stunning English Country Manor.  Everything from the food (a traditional hog roast) to the staff costumes, mulled wine and traditionally decorated banqueting hall were expertly crafted to make the evening very entertaining.

Sunday morning began again with meditation at Cleeve House and training at the dojo was once again full of energy.  The course finished on Sunday afternoon with a group photo of all attendees.

I would like to say a sincere thank you to my wife Sarah, James, Howard, Rachel, Mireya, Rebecca, Pam, Nicole, Danny and Mark from my club for an incredible effort in making the seminar a great success.  I know that their efforts touched many people during the course and many of you have already written to me to pass on your thanks to them.

On a final note I would like to thank all of you who have written to me with notes of thanks for the seminar.  It was deeply humbling to have so many people come to the course from so far away.  There were 150 people in attendance over the three days from seventeen different countries and over 40 different clubs and organisations.  I think that this speaks volumes for the openness of the art and its practitioners and of course the teaching of Kaicho Saito Hitohiro.

Please browse through the photos of the course above.

Yours in Aiki,

Matt Hill.