Be Strong, Be Gentle, Be Beautiful is the title of Yuriko Gamo Romer’s still-in-progress documentary film chronicling the life of Keiko Fukuda. Ms. Fukuda, the last surviving judoka to have studied directly under Jigoro Kano, was recently promoted to 10th Dan by USA Judo. She remains the highest ranking female judoka in the world, and becomes the first female 10th dan.
While growing up in Secaucus, New Jersey, I started collecting stamps as a project for a Boy Scouts badge when I was eight. My Czechoslovakian grandmother and French father were good sources for foreign stamps. Dad worked in the restaurant business in New York City and had access to lots of customers from all over the world. When I moved to France at age ten, my stamp collecting took off like a rocket.
This past Sunday, I ran another quarterly in-house developmental tournament using what I call Judo America rules- no penalties, no terminal ippon, and no banned techniques. As players started filtering into the dojo, one of my dads approached me with his young son. He told me his son had fallen off his bike the previous day and skinned his knee. He brought his son to the tournament hoping that his son could compete, but was worried that he might bleed all over. I took a look at the “wound” and told his son to get on the mat and be ready to compete. It was pretty superficial.
If there was any doubt that the IJF, and by extension the national organizations, didn’t care for the athletes, here’s proof that the only thing that matters is how much each organization can make off rank and file players, coaches, and officials. I call this highway robbery.
I thought you would all appreciate this beautiful statue. It’s located in Chelyabinsk, Russia. Looks like a young Kano or Mifune, although it’s hard to tell from the picture. Are there any other statues dedicated to Judo in your cities?
I had the pleasure of attending the first two days of the 2011 World Championships in Paris. Here are my comments.
I ran into Michel Brousse, the French Judo historian (among other things) in the hotel lobby. He was kind enough to acknowledge that my daughter Natalie was participating in the championships. He also informed me that there would be an International Association of Judo Researchers symposium the next morning, and invited me to attend. I did, and came away with lots of good information from the morning session, which was dedicated to Judo history. Unfortunately, I had to miss the afternoon session as I was meeting my 86-year old father, whom I hadn’t seen in some twenty years.