Gagakuikai

Last Thursday I had a great opportunity for participate in a concert of Japanese imperial court music and dance form 5th century, Ichihime gagakukai in the hall of university in Poznan. 

By the 7th century, the gakuso (a zither) and the gakubiwa (a short-necked lute) had been introduced in Japan from China. Various instruments including these two were the earliest used to play gagaku. It is the oldest classical music in Japan, was introduced into in with Buddhism from China.

Gagaku also accompanies classical dance performances, and both are used in religious ceremonies by a few Buddhist temples.

Gagaku is related to theater, which developed in parallel. It was developed in the 14th century.

 

This performance that I saw, it was really beautiful. I mean not only music but also the costumes of musicians and a dancer. The instruments was amazing and original.

It is a video with a dance (not in the hall of university): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRM_FNooJHc

last year

This is the last year of study and it scary me of a little. The time past really fast. I would like to profit of this year and do things like a student. For now I don't know what can I do after the study, but I hope that I will find some inspiration in this year. At this moment, carpe diem !

training

Today I would to go to the concerts, but I had spent 8 houres on the training of the tai chi chuan. We practised chan si gong, it is a spiral motion of the whole body and each body part separately and at the same time. It is really difficult but important to do right the tai chi chuan. This training was additional so there were fewer people than usual. This pleased me because the coach could focus on each one of us and say what we were doing wrong. I'm really tried (but HAPPY) now and I don't what it my name is ;) and of course I'm sending this evening at home...

Haruki Murakami

Haruki Murakami is my favourite Japanese writer. He is genius, really ! For this moment I read all his books which are translated in Polish and French. Haruki Murakami was born in Kyoto in 1949. He grew up in Kobe, a port city in which particularly easy contact with other cultures. He is interested in the others cultures, he reads an American literature, he listens to jazz. He graduated from the Faculty of Drama Classical Literature at Waseda University. In the years 1974-1981, he had a jazz club. Now he is living in New York.

He made his debut as a novelist in 1979 Encouraged by Naoma Literary Prize for Beginners Writers continues writing career. The first novel, Hear the Wind Sing was available only in Japan for a long time. In this year this novel was translated in Polish. 

His books are interesting, it's a mix of the real world with the fantastic, but in terms of the subconscious and imagination of heroes. In his books, Murakami is not focused on action, but on the internal development of heroes.

The books which I recommend to you :

- A Wild Sheep Chase

- Dance Dance Dance 

- Norwegian Wood 

- The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle 

- Kafka on the Shore

- 1Q84

summer holidays

Approaching terrible exam session, but then they will be holidays :) This year, the holiday will be great. July and half of August outside the home, I'm going to camp of tai chi chuan, where they will be training all day of long forms and sword. Then I'm going to Belgium to volunteer, and then to Paris for the weekend to visit friends. I really can not wait :)

And you have any plans for summer holidays?

London

I was in London 4 years ago. I remember, this trip was really exciting because I had only 3 days for visit London ;). The pace of the sightseeing was crazy, but I had enough time for visit the most important monuments and places in this city (and for a cup of tee at 5 o'clock ;)). I saw the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace, Parliament and Big Ben, the modern part of London with a skyscraper in the shape of "cucumber", I was also in China Town, known as Soho, I was sunning  on a lounger in the park Buckingham, I also saw Tower Bridge and the Tower of London. I was in a waxworks museum of Madame Tussauds, in a museum of modern art and in the national museum. The most I was impressed by the natural art museum. and the science museum, which were huge and the entrance was free. The exhibitions were fantastic, it was possible to touch them.
I hope that I will ever come back, because London also is impressive at night, I wasn't enough time to benefit it. Besides, I also dream of a trip in the footsteps of Jack the Ripper and Harry Potter.

martial arts

"Martial arts are codified systems and traditions of combat practices, which are practiced for a variety of reasons: self-defense, competition, physical health and fitness, entertainment, as well as mental, physical, and spiritual development.
Although the term martial art has become heavily associated with the fighting arts of eastern Asia, it was originally used in regard to the combat systems of Europe as early as the 1550s. An English fencing manual of 1639 used the term in reference specifically to the "Science and Art" of swordplay. The term is ultimately derived from Latin, and means "arts of Mars," where Mars is the Roman god of war."


Of course, I am interested by Eastern martial arts ( Japanese Aikido and Chinese Taiji quan in the West it is called as Tai chi chuan). I trained aikido for two years as part of physical education in Toruń. The reason why I do not do this here in Poznań is that those classes were free and I could practice 7 hours / week .
Now I found a school of Tai chi chuan (Piotr Ziemba is a leader,he is a multiple champion of Polish and European Champions). The most people associate Tai chi chuan with the Chinese who doing the gentle movements in the parks. Of course they are right, but this is a very simplistic image of this martial art.
Style name appeared hundreds of years ago. Tai chi chuan is a term found in the Chinese philosophy of Yin Yang and Taoist philosophy. The concept of Tai chi, describes a world in which the original unity ( wuji ) emerged complementary elements of yin and yang. Tai chi chuan can  be translated as " fist / style taiji ".
Training includes the basic exercises, forms, or complex forms including weapons (eg, with a sword, spear, stick, halberd, two swords, hand fan, etc., exercise with a partner ( pushing hands ), teaching combat and self-defense, meditation and breathing exercises called as Qigong (chi kung). The training is significantly different from most martial arts because the most important in Tai chi chuan is the coordination between mind and body.
Tai chi chuan is divided into different styles, of which the most famous and popular are: Chen, Yang, Wu, Hao and Sun. Tai chi chuan training is usually associated with a slow movements of the exercise called as forms. However, many forms of Tai chi chuan combines both slow movements and dynamic.
I  exercise the Yang style, which is the basic style and I just started to exercise the Chen style, which was the first and the most difficult. To be honest, Tai chi chuan is for me one of the most important elements of my life at the moment. By training this, I feel that I finally found something that I love ;)
 
Here you have a link at the web side of this school of Tai chi chuan :http://www.taichi.com.pl/