Chapter 5: Combat With Weapons... Eeek!

Up until now, I haven't really mentioned anything about weapons...sort of the orgins of the techniques involved in Aikido, so to speak. There are three main weapons used in Aikido, Tanto (knife), Jo (staff) and Bockun (sword).
The first weapon I really used was the Jo. I love the Jo Kata,it is quite relaxing in some ways (except the time I got klonked on the knuckle..THAT ONE HURT!). The best part of weapons is allowing you experience the orgins of techniques as well as self-defence in knife work. Weapons also teach you spacial awareness and distance in techniques (Brillant if you can trip over your own shadow like me)
But I should say that just because you use weapons in the dojo, it does NOT mean that you can use them against other people. They are purly a training tool and should be used as such with the up most respect and only used in the Dojo.