I would like to
welcome all of you who have gathered in Northfield, Minnesota to study the way
of the bow. Iijima Hanshi, Satake Hanshi, and Kubota Hanshi have traveled all
the way from the other side of the globe to teach us, for which all of us are
truly grateful. We should know that we are blessed to have such excellent
teachers for our study, and we also owe thanks to the International Kyudo
Federation and the All Nippon Kyudo Federation. We, for the first time in our
seminar history, welcome Mr. Asami from the ANKF office. We are grateful for
his valuable supervision of our seminar test operations.
In 1992 my husband
and I visited both Munich and Hamburg to study the European seminar operation,
and in July 1993 the first U.S. Kyudo seminar was hosted by the Northern
California Kyudo Federation. The AKR had not been established at that time.
Today at the 16th AKR seminar 135 participants have gathered and
there are five countries from both North and South America. This is truly
significant to me as one of the members of the first hosting federation.
As all of you know,
the International Kyudo Federation was established in 2006. When I think about
the linchpin of the creation of the IKYF the most important thing today is that
all of us should realize and understand that we are all studying the ALL NIPPON
KYUDO FEDERATION KYUDO. According to the development of technology, YouTube can
freely provide examples of various kinds of forms of shooting with Japanese bow
and arrows. Some of them are traditional Kobudo but some of them look like a
performance of abstract arts. There are also some different private schools for
shooting in the U.S. In such a situation, with many different styles of
shooting, we must recognize the type of Kyudo that we are doing which is ANKF Kyudo.
This recognition of ANKF Kyudo will allow you to concentrate on the core of
your Kyudo study. To look at your own Kyudo study does not mean that you should
dismiss other groups, but such study will lead you to become aware of these
other schools of archery. Today we have gathered here to study ANKF Kyudo and
on the first seminar day I would like everyone to think about this.
This seminar is an
extremely important study opportunity for us to be able to receive instruction
from the highest level of ANKF teachers. I am quite certain that the senseis
will show us the excellence of the bow and its technique. Moreover,
the senseis will inspire us by their true belief in their own shooting
that they have cultivated through their Kyudo training. All of us
should seriously, without wasting time, absorb the teachings from the senseis. At
the same time I would like to ask you to bring such valuable teachings back to
your fellows who could not come to this seminar and share them.