Thoughts On My Hakama

By Margo Ballou,3th kyu,
Brown University Aikido Dojo

I passed my 3rd kyu tests. I didn't want to just pass, I wanted to perform very well, and I think I did that too.

I looked very serious. I tend to smile and dance around, so I kept my face intent so I wouldn't dance and bounce. I enjoyed the test, though. The throws went very well, and my partner Dare took great falls for me.

There were huge numbers of people testing, including black belt tests, which only take place once a year at the dojo. The dojo was packed. I especially wanted to test well in front of the black belts, in the hope that they might notice.

I'm relieved to have the test over so I can return to my everyday life: work on dissertation, work on Slavic things, Aikido three or four times a week but leaving class in time to get to bed at a decent hour. Our Aikido classes run so late at night that sometimes I'll drive all the way to Boston for a class instead, just so I can get home earlier.

The most visible difference now that I'm 3rd kyu is that I'm wearing a hakama: wide-legged, flowing pants. In our dojo, women can wear hakama after 3rd kyu, but they don’t always choose to do so. I've become more orthodox in my feelings about Aikido, orthodoxy also reflected in my choice of an indigo rather than a black hakama. I know that sounds suspiciously like I need to get out more.

I'm the first woman in my dojo to reach 3rd kyu, so my instructor, Carl Fasano, had to decide whether he wanted me in hakama. Carl likes hakama because they break up the visual monotony of the white gis. He conferred with his sempei and somehow decided to go ahead, and he called me before class the day after my test and told me to bring my hakama.

Hakama have a reputation for being difficult not to trip over at first. Of course I'll probably trip over it one day, but compared to women's dress clothing, a hakama is a breeze. I happen to have a special place in my heart for useless but elegant clothing. In fact, the hakama is more useful than my wraparound slinkwear, electric blue party dress, 1920s evening gowns, or collection of high heels. (And it's a lot easier to sit down in a hakama.) The hakama tricks my brain into thinking I'm bigger than I am: a useful idea in Aikido, where we want to move in ways that are large and round.

There is only one problem with the hakama. The material of my particular hakama (tetron) is slippery, and so the hakama tends to slide down. In order to counter this tendency, one day I tried tying the hakama as tightly as I possibly could. I endured discomfort and shortness of breath for about an hour before I began to feel actual pain. It was another 20 minutes until I gave up and loosened my hakama, by which time my kidneys were killing me from the straps digging into them, and I had given myself a killer migraine that lasted for the rest of the day. The next morning my stomach was still sore.

So. Over-tightening the hakama is a definite no-no!

In a few years I'll buy a cotton hakama, and it won't slip.