If you translate the above characters individually you will get the words "Sword" "Geki" and "Squad" (or "party" depending on the translator you use.) Geki in Japanese refers to drama, mainly the word is prefaced with another to denote the period in which the drama is taking place. Many samurai dramas take place in the Jidai-Geki period, the period most of us think about when the term samurai is mentioned. You can see that this is a no-brainer in Lucas' inspiration for the term "JEDI". For those of you out there that know me well, you now see why I was so eager to join the KENGEKITAI, or Sword Drama Group, which is literally what they are. We learn a style of sword fighting called Chambara, a method developed for its highly stylized appearance and choreographed moves. The name itself is a Japanese onomatopoeia word for the sound the swords make, "cham-cham; bara-bara".
The class dedicates itself to the samurai appearance and styles, and practices routines to perform in front of live audiences. Although mostly for performance I would not want to test the actual skills of some of the veteran students in an actual dual. They are very good at improvising when I make mistakes, which enforces that this is very real. I have been working on advertisement for the class as well and I have been invited to play the role of the hero in our April performance at the annual Yokosuka base Sakura Festival. The photo above is the latest ad and I am posting photos from a recent performance on the slide show. I was not participating in this one, but was called out of the audience as a "ringer" to act as if I were simply a volunteer. Jennifer got ninja stars as a gift for my participation, she plans to use them as Christmas Tree ornaments.
That poster is AWESOME!!!!
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