Floating Along with a Cosmic Wind, Part 2

by T.K. Chiba

Editor’s Note: This essay originally appeared in Biran, the Aikido Journal of Birankai/USAF-Western Region.

I left the port of Sasebo, Nagasaki Prefecture, Japan, on March 28, 1966, on a six-week voyage across the sea to England. I was the sole passenger in the first-class cabin on board the Al-Sabbiyah (“Little Princess” in Arabic) -- a 35,751-ton Kuwaiti oil tanker that was leased to a British company based in Newcastle, England. Mitsuko, her cousin Satako and her father, Mr. Sekiya (see End Notes, No. 1), were at the port to see me off. I was 26 years old, a fifth dan in Aikido and had been married to Mitsuko for less than three months.

As I stood at the stern of the ship watching the shadow of my homeland fade under the twin lights, I felt as if I were in a dream. When the last traces of the isle of Japan sank beneath the horizon at nightfall, I suddenly awakened to the reality that I was actually on my way to England -- the country about which I had heard so much. The weather, the food, the people and their customs all seemed strange to me, and I did not feel encouraged or interested in experiencing them firsthand. Why was I going there? For what reasons? I had yet to resolve the internal conflict that had plagued my heart and mind for so long. All the events that had been set into motion occurred against my will, and all I could think was, I don’t want to go to England! I did not want to leave my homeland for which I had such profound love and attachment, and I could not bear to leave behind the people for whom I cared deeply and to whom I belonged. I felt as if my heart was breaking.

It all began in April 1964, when Kenshiro Abbe Sensei (see End Notes, No. 2) from England came to Hombu Dojo to pay his respects to O-Sensei. Since his departure from Japan 10 years earlier, Abbe Sensei had successfully established a Judo organization in England, and upon his return had brought with him the chairman of the British Judo Council, Mr. R. Logan. During their meeting with O-Sensei, they requested two things: first, that O-Sensei assign an instructor to head the Aikido division of their organization in England, and second, that he designate a teacher to provide Mr. Logan with private lessons during his stay in Japan. For reasons unknown to me, I was given the task of instructing Mr. Logan -- a project which lasted one month. At the time I was unaware that this was the point at which the wheel of my fate began to turn for good or ill.

In the summer of 1965 -- several months after I had provided Mr. Logan with private lessons -- he and Abbe Sensei indicated to O-Sensei that they wanted me to be the instructor assigned to England. O-Sensei happily gave his consent, but when I heard of his decision, I was not so happy. I was very concerned that the English climate might aggravate the serious spinal injury I had suffered a few years previously. After enduring intense fasts I had managed to recover sufficiently to resume training, but I still suffered from severe headaches and unremitting back pain with concurrent numbness in my leg. My own experience told me that cold, damp weather was my worst enemy.

Throughout the few months following O-Sensei’s decision to send me to England, I traveled back and forth between Tokyo and Abbe Sensei’s family home in Kyoto to prepare my contract and to gather information regarding the situation of Aikido in Britain. By the end of September 1965, the contract was completed and signed by Abbe Sensei as the president of B.J.C., by Mr. Logan as its chairman, by me as the new head of its Aikido division, and by Tadashi Abbe Sensei (see End Notes, No. 3), signing as witness. The contract provided me the assurance of the necessary visas and work permits, an after-tax salary of 60 pounds per month, two weeks paid holiday per year, health insurance, sponsorship of Mitsuko to join me in one year and a two-year renewal option to be agreed upon by both parties after the first three years. The contract was the first of its kind to be established between Hombu Dojo and an outside organization for the purposes of sending an Aikido instructor to teach abroad.

One week before my departure to England, my elder brother and I went to Hombu Dojo so that I could say goodbye to my teacher. We had gotten stuck in the morning traffic in Tokyo and had arrived at the dojo much later than expected. O-Sensei was waiting for me in the reception room, and when I sensed his impatience I felt bad and ashamed. He filled our cups with cold sake and presented some grilled dried squid he had prepared for us. We exchanged a farewell “kampai.” He then looked at me gently, and said, “Don’t you ever worry about me -- I am going to be all right, and I will live up to 126 years of age.” His mysterious words haunted my consciousness for many years, until one day long after his death their meaning was suddenly revealed to me, and I finally understood completely. Then, and only then, was my mind at peace with the death of my master.

As I stood on the stern of the ship contemplating the events of the previous two years, I knew it was futile to continue to ask myself why I was going to England. Ever since the decision had first been made, I had struggled again and again with the question of why, and each time I came to the same conclusion: I must push away all of my personal preferences and desires and surrender myself to the will of my teacher -- a will that must be obeyed at all costs regardless of personal sacrifice. I stood there for many hours, watching and thinking. The sea was calm, and low clouds covered the horizon at all points. The only sound I could hear was the crashing of the huge, white-capped waves that rose up from the sea like small mountains in the wake of the ship as it surged through the dark waters. I could see no stars in the sky that night. I recalled more of the major events that had taken place in the few months prior to my departure.

On Jan. 15, 1966, I put an end of seven years of life as uchideshi at Hombu Dojo, and married Mitsuko. Following the ceremony, the reception banquet was held at the Tokyo Kaikao, Shiajaku. O-Sensei was the guest of honor at the banquet, along with Kisshomaru Ueshiba Sensei (Waka Sensei) and his wife, who had functioned as matchmaker in our marriage arrangement. Almost every major Aikido teacher in Japan was present, including Koichi Tohei, Okumura Osawa, Yamaguchi, Arikawa, and Tadashi Abbe Senseis, to mention a few, plus nearly every chief instructor of the branch dojos throughout the whole of the country. The date of the wedding reception had been purposely chosen to fall on the day of Hombu Dojo’s annual New Year Kagamibiraki celebration, when most of the chief instructors of the branch dojos gathered in Tokyo for the occasion. Sasaki Sensei and a close friend of mine, Mr. Kitaura, jointly presided over the reception, and all of both my and Mitsuko’s family members were present, with the exception of my mother.

After the reception I took Mitsuko to Obama, Fukui Prefecture, to see Harada Tangen Roshi -- my Zen master and the head abbot of Bustukoji. Tangen Roshi lived in a small temple built next to the monastery and was attended there by his disciple, Yamahata Hogen (see End Notes, No. 4), who became a lifelong friend of mine. Obama is a simple fishing village with a magnificently beautiful shoreline on the Sea of Japan. The winters there are deathly cold with heavy snows and frequent strong blizzards blowing across the sea from Siberia. The four of us: Tangen Roshi, Yamahata, Mitsuko and I, went for a walk on the shoreline in the middle of a blizzard, afterward enjoying hot sake and singing songs throughout the night.

One month after my wedding, on Feb. 15, 1966, my mother passed away at a hospital near her home. She had been in a coma for one week following the onset of acute heart failure. She was 56 years old. I was standing at her bedside when she took her last breath, and when I saw a single teardrop slide down her cheek, I knew she was gone forever. I carried her home on my knees in a taxi.

As I stood at the stern of the ship in the middle of the night, in the middle of nowhere in the wide open sea, trying to gather all of the memories of my mother as far back as I could remember, I was suddenly struck by overwhelming sorrow and terror as I realized that I was largely responsible for her illness and untimely death.

My earliest memory of her was from a time when I was 4 years old. My mother and I were visiting my grandmother in Mukojima, Sumida district, Tokyo, during which time my mother unexpectedly gave birth to my younger brother. My grandmother was out walking one day when she heard a huge commotion nearby. Much to her surprise, she found me in the middle of the fray, fighting off about a half a dozen kids by myself. She rushed in intervene, and rescued me from the melee. She took me back to her home and sat me down next to the futon where my mother was resting. My mother raised her head from the pillow and watched me as my grandmother recounted the whole shocking story. I still vaguely remember her pale, sorrowful face, but I can’t recall what she said to me that day. After the incident, my mother was routinely called to the principal’s office of my junior school to hear about other episodes of my violent behavior. Every time she came back home from one of those meetings, she would sit me down by the fireplace and lecture me while tears streamed from her eyes. Despite her suffering and her efforts to civilize me, I never changed my behavior. I saw everything around me -- home, school, community and all people -- as filled with hypocrisy and injustice, and I could not make sense of it. To me, there was nothing else I could do but resist and revolt against them all. I know in my heart that martial arts saved my life; otherwise and without a doubt, I probably would have ended up as a gangster or a terrorist.

Within my sense of helplessness and guilt about my mother, the one thing that eased the heaviness in my heart was the fact that I knew she had loved Mitsuko from the first moment she saw her. My mother was very happy about my marriage to Mitsuko, and she treated her as though she were her own daughter -- like the daughter she had lost at the age of 3 years. It was Mitsuko who stayed at my mother’s bedside and tenderly cared for her from the day she lapsed into a coma until her death a week later.

The sheer number and impact of the changes I had experienced -- starting with Kenshiro Abbe Sensei’s visit to Hombu Dojo and ending with my standing on the deck of the Al-Sabbiyah -- were difficult for me to comprehend. I was at the threshold of a future I had not previously imagined, and how it would unfold was impossible to know. I told myself that this was only the beginning, and, whatever else happened, I must detach myself from all that I had left behind.

Toward the evening of the second day of the voyage, the ship entered the South China Sea, and I watched the Island of Taiwan as it faded into the distance. Soon after, I spotted a couple of U.S. submarines -- their weird, blackish metal bodies gleamed in the bright sun, and my body tightened as I sensed the darkening clouds of war over Vietnam.

T.K. Chiba
Sept. 25, 2005
San Diego, California

End Notes
1. Mr. Masatake Sekiya (1917-95) was a direct disciple of Dr. George Osawa, the founder of the macrobiotic dietary system based upon the ancient Chinese philosophy of “yin/yang.” With the help of his wife, Mr. Sekiya employed his expertise in macrobiotics to care for O-Sensei in his later years. A sixth dan in Aikido, he started martial arts training in the Yoshinkan School, later changing to Hombu style. He was a devoted student of the late Yamaguchi Sensei, and started Kashima Shinryu swordsmanship under Noguchi Sensei. Mr. Sekiya assisted me during my early teaching endeavors in the British Isles.

2. Kenshiro Abbe (1913-86) was a renowned Judo instructor who graduated from Busen Martial Arts College in Kyoto. He founded the British Judo Council in 1956. As a disciple of O-Sensei (exact dates unknown), he established the British Aikido council within the B.J.C. His most famous fight as judoka occurred in 1936 in Saineikan at the Imperial Palace in Tokyo. The lineup was comprised of all the godan -- the best and strongest practitioners in Japan. The five best were selected to fight all contestants. Abbe Sensei finished each opponent in less than one minute, including Mr. Kimura, who at the time was regarded the strongest judoka in contemporary Japanese Judo history.

3. Tadashi Abbe (1915?-79) was a longtime disciple of O-Sensei, who trained in Iwama and Hombu Dojos both during and after the war. He was a legendary Aikido teacher in Europe who is still held in high regard by the older generation of martial artists. He went to France in 1953 as the first Aikido teacher to be sent abroad by Hombu Dojo. He introduced Aikido throughout Europe and North Africa. Well known to Kenshiro Abbe, he was occasionally invited to teach for the British Aikido Council. During the war he took preliminary courses at Takushoku University, and then transferred to Waseda University. He later volunteered to Yokaren Navy College, where he was selected for a special one-man submarine mission that involved transporting and deploying 500 pounds of explosives to destroy enemy boats as they were released from the mother craft. He survived the war, thereby missing a chance to die, and was bitter about it to the end. He and I were frequent companions after his return to Japan in 1963, and I came to admire him greatly.

4. Yamahata Hogen (b. 1937) is a Zen monk who visited Iwama Dojo in 1960 while traveling the country to seek his master, He stayed at Iwama for one month, after which he continued his journey. During his stay we became lifelong friends, and have communicated regularly since then. On the advice of his master, in 1962 he went to Nagoya to live and train at Nagoya Aikikai during the time I was in charge of the dojo. He came to the States in 1983 upon my invitation for the opening of the North Park dojo in San Diego, California. He authored the Zen publication, “Open Way,” for which I wrote the introduction. He currently resides in Australia.