Fragmentation and Preservation Part Deux

It wasn't very long ago that I mused about the future of the RyuTe Renmei. Rather than recap it here, I'd suggest you just go and scan the other post, if you're interested. At any rate, I was perusing YouTube the other day--as you might imagine, every so often, I search YouTube for--oh, what do I search it for?

RyuTe
Ryu Te
Ryukyu Kempo
Kyusho
Kyusho-Jutsu
Tuite
Toide
Tuidi
Ti
Te
Di

and (ahem!)

Stevie Nicks

Hey, what can I say? Big fan. Still my favorite songwriter.

At any rate, I saw a video, a new one, from a group I hadn't heard of before. Oh, I had heard of the principals: former students of Taika Seiyu Oyata, fairly high-ranking ones, they were, before they left. God knows they're better than I'll ever be. But for whatever reasons (and I'll leave you to speculate), they are no longer part of the RyuTe Renmei and they have apparently formed their own association. If there's anything that really grabbed my attention, it's that on this video, someone was clearly performing a particular kata that--ahem!--not very many people are supposed to know. I have seen only a couple of bits and pieces of it myself. That, I thought, takes cheek. At least they didn't show the whole thing, just a substantial part of it, but you can bet your bottom dollar that won't last.

They are not the only ones. There is, as far as I can tell, at least one other association headed by one of Taika's former students. It seems to have a fairly good-ish number of member clubs and I have seen several videos associated with the group. And there are other schools, I think, whose chief instructors used to have some association with Taika Oyata.

All of them, as I noted in the previous post, are teaching "Ryukyu Kempo," or "Ryukyuan martial arts," or something like that. Nothing wrong with that, those are perfectly generic terms. And, as noted in the previous post, even if what they're teaching isn't exactly what Taika is teaching now, the content they're giving their students is still a long way ahead of what you are going to get in your average taekwon-do or karate class. Some of their students look, I must say, pretty good.

And that got me to thinking. You see, RyuTe, despite being very well known in certain circles, isn't exactly what I'd call common. Oh, it's not that you can't find instruction. There are several places/people in Missouri, some in Texas, one successful school in New York, and so on. But most of the clubs are, I think, fairly small and spread fairly far apart. In Oklahoma, for example, as far as I know, there are two kyoshi-level instructors (my own and a gentleman in Edmond) and a handful--a very small handful--of other yudansha, some of which are no longer active and none of which, as far as I know, are teaching.

So let me riddle you this:

Let's suppose--just suppose, mind you--that you have seen video of RyuTe on YouTube and visited the RyuTe website, and you are interested, but are two hours away from Edmond and four away from Tulsa. Let us further suppose that by sheer dumb luck, a yudansha from one of the aforementioned "ryukyu kempo" associations moves into town and starts teaching at a local community center.

Are you telling me you're not going to go study with that guy because he's not with the RyuTe Renmei? Because you're not sure his instructor left Taika Oyata under perfect circumstances?

I'm thinkin' you're gonna go study with that guy, because he's all you've got.

At any rate, now, to my mind, this creates a situation and I wonder how many people have thought about it. As I mentioned above, at least one of these "ryukyu kempo" associations seems to have a fair number of clubs under its umbrella. I'm thinking that most likely, most of the students involved had nothing to do with whatever reasons their instructors are no longer affiliated with Taika Oyata.

How do you handle it when one of those students moves into your town and wants to start training with your RyuTe club?

Another question: as I noted in the previous post, it seems that in the RyuTe Renmei, not everyone knows all the weapons. Some know the jo, some the nunchaku, some the sai, some all three of those, some bo, some tanbo, some tonfa, and so forth. As far as I know, no one in the RyuTe Renmei has ever put the weapons kata on video--except that Tashi Logue had the jo kihon kata on Facebook for a week or so, and one person put Sakugawa no jo on YouTube. There are a handful of the kihon katas out there in cyberspace, but they were not put out there, as far as I know, by current RyuTe Renmei practitioners. At any rate, there is a dearth of video material on the weapons. Nothing like the series of tapes Taika did for the empty-hand kata exists for the weapons kata. So, what if--

Okay, let's say you're in the RyuTe Renmei, and the only two weapons your instructor is familiar with are the bo and the sai. Of course, you learn those from him, but you want to learn kama, too.

And someone from one of the "ryukyu kempo" associations comes out with an instructional video on the kama. Multiple views of the kata, applications, everything (mind you, this hasn't happened yet, as far as I know, but face it--it will).

Do you order a copy?

Just wonderin'. I'm thinking that this situation has all the ingredients for a really interesting couple of decades.