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UCL Union Kendo News Beginners Media Random Rubbish  |
Kendo /
BeginnersFAQFirstly, welcome. We've all put a lot of hard work into UCL Kendo Club and we hope that you come to enjoy Kendo the same way that we do. Our aim is simple, to make practicing Kendo enjoyable for all of us including yourself!
Take a look at the About Kendo page.
YES. We want you to start Kendo with us and will do our best to make you feel welcome. Practice on Mondays and Wednesdays is centered around teaching beginners, with seniors practicing separately or helping the beginners lesson. Friday nights is the seniors only practice, however anyone is welcome to come and watch.
Sure. But we encourage you to join in, it's a lot more fun to do than watch. It's also fresher's TRY week, so TRY it out! Remember it's free to try out UCL clubs for the first 2 weeks of term!
It certainly sounds and looks that way, but the armour provides ample protection, the shinai is constructed of 4 bamboo slats that compress and bend upon impact absorbing much of the blow and when you compare it to other sports, Kendo has a ridiculously low injury rate
Loose fitting clothing, tracksuit bottoms and t-shirt is fine.
If you come to the first practice of the year, you'll cover week one of the beginners course: "About Kendo, The Targets, The Equipment, How to hold a shinai, How to stand correctly or Kamae, Basic Footwork."
Other than yourself and some of your new friends? No, we can lend you the necessary equipment for your first few sessions
Well at some point pretty soon you'll need your own one anyway, we don't have enough to lend to you all, so you'll need a shinai (bamboo practice sword, for sparring). A little later you'll need a bokuto (wooden practice sword, for forms). We can sell you both, £15 pounds for a shinai, the same for a bokuto.
However this is all you will really need for the first couple of months. We're all students here so don't go wasting your money on £3 million pounds worth of equipment and then quit kendo.
Buying the keikogi (jacket) and hakama (trousers) together will set you back around £40. You won't need to buy this until we decide that you're ready. The reason for this is that the hakama obscures footwork, which we need to keep an eye on until you've got it somewhat right. Typically this will be after one or two months.
Seven or Eight months after you start Kendo, you'll be ready to wear armour and take part in jigeiko, free sparring. At this point you'll want to buy your own armour, but until you do we have plenty of sets we can lend you. At this point there will probably be a group of you want to buy armour together. We've got good relations with a few suppliers so we can probably arrange a deal so that you get a decent set of armour for £200-?300 that will last you for absolutely years. If you look around Kendo supply websites, thats dirt cheap.
To start with you'll need to join the club. You'll hear about try/join week about a million times and how it all works. Eitherway I'll explain it again.
During join fortnight (about 2 weeks after term starts) go to the 2nd floor of the Bloomsbury building with your swanky new UCL Identity Card, you'll be sent over to a room where you tick boxes on a form saying which clubs you want to join, Obviously you want to join the Kendo Club. So tick that box and whatever else you want to join and take it over to the guys at the computer, you'll then have to pay the memberships for the clubs you've joined.
Joining Kendo costs £3 . They'll then print you off a shiny card declaring you a member of the kendo club.
Ok so once all that try/join stuff is over you'll have to start paying session fees, which will set you back £2 per week. When we get enough money in the piggy bank. We'll probably blow it on fun stuff like a big social or on important but not so fun stuff like equipment and hall hire.
Oh yes and if you enjoy kendo and want to take it up, at some point down the line you'll need to join the BKA
note: All BKA related prices are correct as of Summer 2005. Just ask one of us and we'll probably know or just look confused
You'll need a temporary membership with the British Kendo Association. This costs £10. What this provides is insurance so if anyone gets injured. It also means you get a shiny little black Kendo book and monthly snail-mail newsletters with pictures of us winning everything(and hopefully in the future, you as well!).
Three months down the line, you'll need to upgrade your temporary BKA membership to a concessionary one (we apply for concessionary as we're full-time students). This will be another £10 if done in December (£20 in January). If you're not a full-time student then it will be temporary to full, and that will be £20 in December or £40 in January.
This is answered in Info.GirlsAndKendo but quickly, in kendo, age and sex play no part in how good you are, strength doesn't come into play. Speed, agility, dexterity are much more important, areas where men have no advantage. This is why at some point you'll probably at hear/see about some 70 year old who beats up some 18-21 year old. This is probably where the old "Old age and wisdom always outruns youth and speed" saying comes from.
Yes, this won't be a problem
The easiest way is to come up to one of us and ask! Don't be afraid! That's what we're here for! If not have a look around our website and see if you can find an answer. Or, you head over to the forum where there's a board where you can ask questions, and one of us will get back to you.
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