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Japan: The Ithaca Of Grigoris Miliaresis
You are a keen observer of the cultural reality of Japan, a country where you have been living for many years. From your privileged position, we would like to ask you about the phenomenon that Japanese culture is today all over the world. Why this consideration that has exponentially spread a way of seeing life so different from that proposed by the West? What is the secret of this cultural success?
I wonder if your basic premise is accurate. Living in Tokyo’s Asakusa, arguably one of Japan’s most popular tourist destinations, I see every day hundreds of people from all over the world and mostly from East Asian countries which, presumably, have a closer cultural proximity to Japan, interact with it, its people and its customs and what I mostly perceive is ignorance, awkwardness and inability to adjust, often even to trivial things. Since these are people who came to visit Japan because they were drawn to it, I tend to believe that they were drawn by some aspects of Japanese culture that have managed to become relatively popular abroad and especially those that are adjacent to the stereotypes created with mid-19th century Japonisme that remains strong today albeit in a different mutation. Undeniably, Japan is more familiar to the world today than it was even 20 years ago and some elements from its reality, including budo, have managed to travel abroad -and even travel well- but personally I wouldn’t go as far as to consider that a success on a broader level.
Cultures overlap, mix and coexist. This phenomenon is readily observable in any large city in the world in very different contexts: literature, leisure, food, sports, tourism, fashion, etc. Beyond the purely anecdotal, the frenetic consumption, the almost generalized snobbery: Do you consider it feasible for a Westerner to understand a culture as distant in space-time as the Japanese?
I do believe it is feasible for a Westerner (or any other foreigner for that matter) to fully understand Japanese culture, provided they are willing to live in Japan: the fact that to understand any culture you need to immerse in it, is true anywhere but it is even more so in a country like Japan which remains, for the most part, difficult to access –if not geographically, certainly culturally because of its language, its natural tendency for introversion and its self-reliance, among other things. And just to be clear, by “immerse” I don’t mean just come to Tokyo, find a part-time job teaching English, and only practice your art of choice with minimal interaction with society in general: like any culture, Japanese culture is an expression of its people so unless you integrate with them, your understanding of the culture will be limited.
For centuries Japan was a country entrenched in itself. Its perception as a sacred land, as an unequivocally unique country, as the center and axis of the world, with an almost divine and mythical design, isolated it from the rest of the world, until the opening of its borders in 1868 with the Meiji restoration. What is the perception that the Japanese have of their own country? Do you consider that self-sufficiency continues to be part of the DNA of the Japanese people? What interest does the West and its culture arouse in the average Japanese citizen?
I come from Greece so the above are true for most Greeks’ perception of their country; people from other old cultures (Italians, Egyptians, Indians, Chinese) often share this perception and to some extent so do Americans, British and French, especially when it comes to being the center of the world --colonialism and imperialism, cultural or political, surely help in developing such an attitude. In the case of the Japanese, isolation is certainly a major component of this self-image and while this isolation is usually attributed to the Tokugawa shogunate’s sakoku/locked country policies, it is actually much older (because of Japan’s geographical location and the overall lack of technology that would allow access to it) and, in a way, continues existing today: as I said before, people are traveling to Japan more but for the most part, their understanding of it is still confined to the superficial layer. So the Japanese still feel they are alone in this world and, taking into account the small number of both immigrants and, until about 15 years ago, inbound tourists, this is how they have organized their state, their society and their everyday life at all levels.
As for their view of the West, my feeling is that they are interested in it but not in the spirit of something they feel compelled to understand deeply –more in the spirit of something that fascinates them because of how different it is from them. They will watch a TV show where a Japanese travels, for example, to London, visits some of its sights and provides some information about its history, its customs and its cuisine (food is always included because it is immensely important to the Japanese and, incidentally, this is one of the aspects of their mindset that, amazingly, many people don’t fully comprehend), and they will be genuinely intrigued by it, but that doesn’t mean that when the show is over they will go online to learn more about London or the UK or Europe.
As a long-term researcher that you are, and given your position as a resident of Japan, we would like to ask you about the current situation in the classical schools there –koryu bujutsu-. What is the current situation of these traditions? What social value do they have? Have they managed to fit into the current context, beyond the trends imposed by the times?
Before replying, please allow me to point out two things. First, I do not consider myself a “researcher”. I have a tremendous amount of respect for researchers but I am most assuredly not one of them: I lack the credentials, skills, discipline and, frankly, the passion that go with being a true researcher. I am, literally and professionally, a reporter: I observe and experience things, record my observations and experiences and opine on them but I have no allusions that my writing has any significance beyond that. And second, that I will be using the word “budo” instead of “bujutsu” because “bujutsu” is foreign to me: it is hardly ever used by my teachers or other teachers or practitioners I have met through my work or social interactions or by the Japanese in general. I know that in the West and because of Donn Draeger’s influence, there is this notion of separating “budo” from “bujutsu” but this isn’t the case in Japan and personally I don’t see any reason to use it. (Lest I be misunderstood, I need to say here that, like most Westerners active in this field, I have great appreciation for Donn Draeger as a pioneer in exploring koryu budo and feel extreme gratitude to him for introducing them to the rest of the world, myself included. But at the same time I would only be stating the obvious if I said that 40 years after his death, his vision for the creation of a scientific field that would study human combative behavior hasn’t been realized and that his analysis of Japan’s fighting traditions needs to be updated.)
Moving on to your question, I think the answer is relatively easy: koryu budo is a subject that has little meaning for the majority of the Japanese and practically zero relevance to their everyday life. However, if explained to them through modern budo (by which I basically mean kendo and kyudo because this is what forms the core of the Japanese’s perception of “budo”) they can understand what it is. The reason they can is that many aspects of koryu budo including the veneration of tradition, the master-apprentice relationship, the obsession with perfecting one’s skills, the organization of ideas, methods and techniques in set curricula that are passed from one generation to the next and the specific nomenclature, customs and practices that go with the particular field of knowledge, can be found in numerous Japanese pursuits –from sado (the so-called “tea ceremony”) to carpentry and from cooking tempura to Kabuki theater –and of course modern budo. And when they do understand them, they can relatively easily recognize their position in their country’s cultural continuum and their value.
Now, that these traditions are fringe, doesn’t mean they are not alive: Japan is very good at allowing fringe groups to coexist and especially in the case of koryu budo, their significance as cultural artifacts hasn’t escaped the local and national authorities and efforts are made to help them continue existing. Such efforts include (but are not limited to) the creation of organizations for their promotion (including the Nihon Kobudo Kyokai that is functioning under the Nippon Budokan, the main national organization for the promotion of budo), their designation as intangible cultural properties by local governments and their inclusion in a variety of events and educational programs. And while there are some possible dangers in institutionalization, to the extent that there are voices that dismiss it altogether, it isn’t something new: for the most part of their existence, many if not most of these traditions were functioning under the auspices and with the support and patronage of the shogun, feudal lords, specific temples or shrines or local communities. In Japan, independence isn’t always valued as beneficial: from my experience, some of the most strongly supported traditions are the ones that also thrive (and I mean that qualitatively as well as quantitatively) and some of the most independent are the ones shrinking and lacking essence.
You have studied, and study, different forms of traditional bujutsu: Tenshin Bukô ryû and Ono Ha Ittô ryû. Could you tell us about your personal career? How do you become part of a classical school there, in Japan? Are the channels similar to those we can find in the West?
My involvement with budo was rather accidental: I had a broader interest in Japan but in 1980s Greece, very little information about it was available and that was mostly about budo, basically through one local magazine and whatever books were sold in Athens’ single martial arts’ equipment shop. So when I wanted to participate in some Japanese activity, and with no Japanese community to turn to for calligraphy or music lessons (the things that interested me the most at the time), I started learning Shotokan karate because the teacher was Japanese and the dojo was very close to my home. At the same time I was reading martial arts’ books, including Draeger’s, and got fascinated with weapons’ arts and koryu budo but since that wasn’t available either, I eventually turned to aikido (which included some weapons) and when later they started appearing in Greece, to iaido and, to a lesser extent, kendo. (As an aside, I also studied judo for a few years but that was only to better understand the profoundly influential genius that was Jigoro Kano.)
My actual participation in a koryu came through my job as a martial arts’ journalist and translator of related books in Greece: I translated Ellis Amdur’s “Dueling With O-Sensei” in Greek and with the support of my publisher at the time, Alkimachon Publications, invited him to Greece for a presentation of the book bundled with an aikido seminar, an introduction to koryu kenjutsu and a lecture on verbal de-escalation techniques i.e. his field of professional expertise. He accepted the invitation, came to Greece, did the seminars and upon some of the seminars’ participants’ request, started two groups, one for Araki-ryu Torite Gokusoku and one for Tenshin Buko-ryu Heiho. I was part of the Tenshin Buko-ryu group, studied under him for four years and then, when I moved to Japan, was transferred to the dojo where he had learned the art. His teacher, Nitta Suzuo, had passed but her successor Nakamura Yoichi headed the school and when he passed too, it continued under shihan Kent Sorensen, a long-term practitioner and since Nakamura soke’s passing, the school’s soke dairi i.e. acting headmaster; I still practice with him and participate in his Meiji Jingu demonstrations but I also have my own dojo.
With Ono-ha Itto-ryu, things were a little more orthodox but the first contact also came through my work as a martial arts’ journalist: I was always interested in studying a kenjutsu tradition and had seen several in demonstrations or at their dojo. I had, however, a special interest in Itto-ryu which shares some ancestry with Tenshin Buko-ryu (they both come from the Chujo-ryu stream) and Ono-ha Itto-ryu was a school I had only seen in demonstrations and wanted to include in the “koryu experience” column I do with “Gekkan Hiden” one of Japan’s premiere martial arts’ magazines and the only one focusing on koryu budo. (The concept of these articles is to go to a tradition’s dojo, practice with them and then write an account of it.) So I visited Ono-ha Itto-ryu’s dojo, Reigakudo, for the article and had the unique experience to participate in a full class under the direct supervision of the 17th soke, Sasamori Takemi while partnered with his eventual successor and present-day and 18th soke, Yabuki Yuji. I was amazed at its vibrancy, the atmosphere and the attitude of Sasamori soke and after the article, I enrolled in the dojo and still practice today.
This is my personal story; going to the subject of how one becomes a member of one of these traditions, it’s pretty much straightforward: you contact them, ask to watch a practice (some even have trial courses where the visitor gets to practice with a senior member or teacher and learn some of the basics) and then, if you want to enroll, you follow the procedure. In my experience, and I don’t just mean about the two traditions I practice, people are easily accepted provided, in the case of non-Japanese, that they will stay long enough in Japan for their attendance to have any meaning i.e. for at least two-three years and that they have a functional understanding of the Japanese language at least for the beginning. (With time, language will become more of an issue so aspiring members should consider learning it as well --which they should do anyway if they are going to be living in Japan for any significant period of time.) Other than that, what the schools invariably demand is commitment: people who are willing to demonstrate it won’t have any difficulty becoming full-fledged members and being accepted as equals. The only problem is that most Westerners don’t immediately realize that for the Japanese, “commitment” doesn’t just mean “diligence” but rather making the tradition a part of your life as important as your family. And that the level of attention you will get will be directly proportional to the level of commitment you offer.
Opinions about the origins and foundations of medieval koryu vary depending on the sources; leading historians, such as Karl Friday or Cameron Hurst, have written extensively on the subject. You yourself, who have interviewed great exponents of these traditions and professional historians, have published on this topic. We would like to know your opinion on whether or not koryu bujutsu are martial arts designed for the battlefield. Could you elaborate on this?
As a matter of fact, I am not sure I can because unlike Dr. Friday or the late Dr. Hurst, I do not feel I am qualified to: one of the first things I learned as a journalist was that for any opinion to carry weight, it needs to be well-researched and my personal research in the matter is insufficient. There are some things I am comfortable saying though, for example that there are several teachers who claim their traditions originated in the battlefield and that there are techniques in various traditions’ curricula that are interpreted or traditionally explained as techniques to exploit openings in an opponent’s armor or that there are some traditions that even practice wearing armor; in Tenshin Buko-ryu too we occasionally do that and indeed several techniques and movements make sense when practicing in armor. (For the record, Ono-ha Itto-ryu does not have any pretense about its techniques originating at the battlefield.)
There is, however, no way to absolutely know, for Tenshin Buko-ryu or for many or perhaps most other traditions, if these were techniques that were indeed created from battlefield experience and for battlefield application or if, for example, they were invented in the middle of the Edo Period by some provisional samurai or commoner who wanted to find a way to deal with, say, armored guards: armor of various types continued to be used in Japan until the fall of the shogunate in 1868. If pressed to express an opinion, I can only offer the one I have for my own personal use and that is that I don’t believe that the majority of these arts were designed for the Sengoku Period battlefield, despite what their teachers say: I find Dr. Friday’s arguments convincing and go with them until I have a reason not to.
Since we are on the subject though, I would like to point out something that is often overlooked: even if these arts were designed for the battlefield, for four hundred years they have been practiced in different settings, using different weapons and under a different mindset. So I think it would be nonsensical to bypass these four centuries and all the developments in them, technical and theoretical, and debate the arts’ origins, in the same way that I think it would be nonsensical to bypass four hundred years of Kabuki evolution and fixate on its origin with Izumo no Okuni and her troupe. Also, I would like to add that oddly (or perhaps not so oddly), it is Westerners who usually debate these things: I don’t remember having heard any such discussion in budo circles in Japan. And this makes perfect sense to me because, frankly, I never quite understood this debate and especially the significance of an art’s origin as a measure of its value or its relevance (or lack thereof) in the present day.
Another controversial point can be found in the philosophical component that accompanies bujutsu, something that, as happens with the matter of their origin and foundations, is contradictory for some. Do you consider that the philosophy of bujutsu/budô has been part of its essence from the beginning, being consubstantial to its study? Or on the contrary, that it was an added element, added to its entity at a propitious moment in Japan’s history? How do you establish the coexistence between two positions as antagonistic as philosophy and war?
Is it really controversial? All societies need to legitimize institutional killing because a soldier without an ideological context justifying his acts is just a murderer and the more sophisticated the society and its thought, the more deep and multifaceted that context is; even in Ancient Greek mythology there was a difference between war as expressed by the god Ares and war as expressed by the goddess Athena, in other words between a savage and a noble approach to fighting. Regarding the question when the philosophical background of budo was created, I will again defer to those more learned than me like Drs. Friday, Hall or Bennett; my personal working hypothesis is that it exists from the time the bushi realized themselves as an entity with unique characteristics, i.e. during the Kamakura Period and can be found in the bushi families’ kakun codes of behavior (the earliest such texts I am aware of are Hojo Shigetoki’s “Letter to Nagatoki” and “Gokurakuji Letter”, both written in the mid-13th century).
So I believe that these traditions did have a philosophical component from early on (Kamakura-Period Ogasawara-ryu is the oldest budo tradition that I know of and it is a school of applied budo techniques as much as it is of etiquette which is one aspect of what we call “budo philosophy”) and as for this component’s contents, all texts I have seen are a blend of contemporary morality and various ideas borrowed from Buddhism, or later, in the Edo Period, from Neo-Confucianism, imported from China and processed in Japan; the latter was a major influence to a greater elaboration of those ideas, helping the samurai deal with the difference between the perceived reality of being warriors and the actual reality of being administrators and public servants whose weapons often were but mere symbols of their class.
You are a journalist and translator and publish your columns and reports in Gekkan Hiden, a prestigious magazine based in Tokyo, dedicated to the dissemination of content on budô and traditional bujutsu from Japan through its English-language website Budo Japan. Could you tell us how this publication is received in the Japanese market? Beyond Japan: How are your publications received in the international context?
“Hiden” does indeed enjoy some status in Japan, if only for the fact that it has been the only magazine focusing on koryu budo since 1990; the fact that its parent company, BAB Japan, is responsible for the only systematical video documenting of classical traditions, the “Nihon no Kobudo” series produced by the Nippon Budokan between the late 1970s and the late 1980s, certainly helps in it maintaining said status. Budojapan.com is an effort to disseminate some of this content to the rest of the world and having been a part of it from the start, I can say that the overall response has been positive. However, since the time frame Budojapan.com has been active for coincides with the advent of social media platforms, I sometimes feel that its significance today is considerably less than it would had been 30 years ago and that has less to do with the quality of its content and more with the way people consume content in general: for many people these days, it is much easier to watch a 10-minute YouTube video of a visit to a tradition’s dojo than read my 5-page, 2000-word account of it, peppered with a few photographs.
Your interests are not limited to bujutsu, you are an observer of Japanese reality and an extraordinary student of its culture. What is, today, your most immediate professional project? Where are your interests directed in the field of bujutsu?
As pertains to budo, I am working on several videos for BAB Japan that will be available, like the ones I have done previously, through its video on demand service which is also accessible through Budojapan.com; unlike some translators, I consider my work with videos as important as my work with books and in continuation to what I mentioned before about the value of video in contemporary people’s information intake, perhaps even more so. At the same time, I am looking into more traditions to visit and write about; the amount of work each of these stories involves is much more than it is readily apparent so I cannot do them very often. From time to time I also toy with the idea of writing a book about the martial arts but I have yet to decide if I will do it.
Outside budo, two of my main interests in Japan are shokunin i.e. craftsmanship traditions and matsuri festivals which are still very active in the East Tokyo area where I live, the area usually called “shitamachi”. I enjoy learning more about them and, if possible, sharing them with the rest of the world; whether this means that some of this information will eventually become a book, remains to be seen.
Thank you very much
The link for the PDF of this interview is here.
