Detroit Summer 2012

This blog is supposed to be a "karate" blog where I blog down my thoughts about karate. Well, it's also my blog so that means I can blog about whatever the heck I wanna blog about even if it ain't about karate. Which brings me to the subject of this post, "Detroit Summer". Yes, today is the 27th of May. And it was on this day last year that I first arrived in Detroit, Michigan. I was just on the phone with a friend (whom I had gotten to know in Detroit) and we were marveling at how long it has been already since that time, but also how it seems as though it were yesterday. I technically first drove into the city on the 26th of May, but it was like ten at night. So my first official "day" in Detroit was today, the 27th. I remember when I initially left Torrance, CA I told my parents that I thought I would be gone for the summer. I ended up staying in Detroit for 10 months. I mean, I knew I wasn't just gonna be gone for a summer, but I also didn't know what was gonna happen. I had never taken a trip like that before. An adventure really. It still amazes me that I actually did that. I mean, the whole reason I am living in Oakland now is because of my time in Detroit. If I hadn't met someone there, if we hadn't nurtured a long-distance relationship on the phone, then I wouldn't be in Oakland. My life has literally not been the same since I left LA. The magic of that Detroit Summer is still with me when I reflect back on it. But it saddens me because I feel as though I still want to bask in the glow of that time. Being in Oakland now for almost two months, working this crappy make-money-so-I-can-pay-the-rent job is downright depressing compared to the summer I arrived in the Motor City. Sometimes I wonder if that actually happened. It's almost dreamlike. I'm a bit disappointed in myself that I am still not doing my "bliss". I most certainly do not want to work as a slave for $9/hour washing cars at a dealership. I mean, it's great that my schedule is part-time which allows me some flexibility in doing my real work, like training and volunteering. But I want my "real work" to be my full-time job. I mean, ideally we want to make a living doing what we love. Problem is for me, I still haven't quite figured out what it is that I "love". What's significant about this blog though is that its genesis was the result of my experience with "teaching" karate to people in Detroit. I say "teaching" like that because I'm not trying to make it sound like I'm actually a martial arts instructor. Maybe one day. But right now I consider myself a student. I mean, 5 years of training? That's not much to go on. Give it another decade or so and I might have something to actually "teach".  Point is, what I "love" has something to do with a combination of things, mainly artistic/creative pursuits of which karate is one. My time in Detroit led me to discover things about this art of my ancestors that I had absolutely no idea of before. Things that, had I not learned about in my research, would have probably driven me to quit this art before I even really started. It is my limited but growing understanding of these things that drives me to want to continue my training. In Detroit there was not a sister school of our LA dojo, nor did I find peers or instructors that did the karate I did. Yeah, maybe I didn't look hard enough, but I mean there really was not a lot of quality martial arts opportunities there, at least not on the surface. In Oakland, it's almost the opposite in terms of opportunities for training and quality, but there is still no sister-school nor have I found a set of peers that do the karate. So, like Grace Lee Boggs rephrases, I have to make "a way out of no way". I mean, it's not so much that I need to find a sister school, but rather a group that is about the serious pursuit of a karate that is beyond styles.

Funny, I thought this post was not going to be about karate....

My friend and I doing some sparring at Belle Isle. Cool photo courtesy of Julie.

Oh well...I miss you Detroit.

Elbow SMASH!
- Hiji Até