Throwing it out there: aikido is all about discipline

With Dubai’s Zanshinkan aikido dojo celebrating its 20th anniversary, we take a look at the unique martial art.

The sensei Stephen Toyoda demonstrates his skills at the Zanshinkan dojo in Dubai, which was founded in 1995. Victor Besa for The National

Ordinarily, it’s strange for someone to laugh when they’re in pain – not, however, in aikido.

Zanshinkan, the UAE’s first aikido dojo (school) celebrated its 20th anniversary last month with an international seminar. Over three days, more than 70 students from the UAE and Kuwait refined their techniques, in the presence of seven dojo managers – or “dojo-cho”.

It was an occasion forged in honour, heightened by the presence of the sensei Stephen Toyoda, president of the Aikido Association International, and members of the Japanese consulate.

“This 20th anniversary is one of the best things that ever happened to me,” says the sensei Sugumar John Ratnam, the dojo’s founder and a 4th dan chief instructor (a dan/kyu is a grading system).

“And in the same year, I also reached my 60th year. In Japan, the 60th year is one of the most important celebrations for a man – they believe he becomes a real man in his 60s.”

Although today he runs an ­internationally accredited dojo, the Sri Lankan remains humble about his pioneering of aikido in the UAE.

Japanese and Chinese martial arts entered the global public consciousness in the latter half of the 20th century, chiefly through cinema. However, aikido, a uniquely defensive martial art, remained in the background – with its most recognisable practitioner, Steven Seagal, making his film debut in 1988. Aikido techniques redirect an attacker’s energy through joint locks, throws and pins.

When Ratnam arrived in Dubai as a graphic designer, he had almost a decade of experience in aikido, but couldn’t find a dojo. He was soon invited to teach on Fridays at a small karate centre in Al Rigga, where he practised on a concrete floor.

“Then I met an Iraqi person who was also doing advertising. He told me: ‘You seem different from other artists.’” The man recommended Ratnam try his luck at Dubai Karate ­Centre.

“At that time, very few people knew aikido. Now, Dubai has grown up from very small emirate to an economically and ­financially powerful centre in the Middle East. It’s the same with aikido: it has also grown so much.”

Of the dojo’s 38 blackbelt students, it counts instructors from Dubai’s newer aikido schools. “Some just got the blackbelt and left, but I think the blackbelt is just the beginning,” Ratnam says.

Though there are varying forms of aikido, Zanshinkan teaches aikikai style – the original form ­developed in the 1920s by Morihei Ueshiba, headed by the Hombu dojo in Japan.

“In the Hombu dojo, the blackbelt is just a membership. It does not mean someone is a teacher or a sensei,” Ratnam says. It’s not the colour of the belt that makes a person, he elaborates, but the person who makes the colour of the belt.

Pointing to his own belt, weathered by 21 years of daily practice, he smiles: “My belt has become a white belt. There is no black left in it. I don’t take holidays or go home, because aikido training gives me more happiness than spending my time on a beach. I like to come to the dojo for ­training, see nice people smile and motivate them with what motivates me – that’s it.”

Because of the transient nature of Dubai, most of the 3,500 students who have walked through the dojo have since left the UAE. However, this is also a blessing, contends Toyoda, the son of the legendary Fumio Toyoda – founder of the Aikido Association of America. “One of the advantages of being in Dubai is that you have a really powerful opportunity to spread this art, and way of peace and harmony, throughout the whole world,” he says.

Running a dojo dedicated to traditional martial arts hasn’t been easy since the financial crisis of 2008, he explains.

“To have a place where people can go and see that you can do traditional martial arts, and it’s not about a trophy or even about the belt or ranking,” he says, “I think it’s a great ­accomplishment.”

Now 33 years old, Toyoda’s earliest memories took place on the mat. While he’s based at Tenshinkan dojo in Chicago, as president of the second-­largest aikido organisation on the planet, he regularly visits international member dojos, such as Zanshinkan.

Gesturing to Ratnam, he says: “This is one of my close dear friends – how would I ever have met him if it wasn’t through the vessel of aikido?

“We all live in this world and we have to work together if we want to make it the best place we can. So I think this small exercise of aikido can really lead to bigger sort of realisations of what we can do as a global community – together.”

Strength, he adds, comes from trying to understand someone else’s perspective, or compromising one’s ego for the greater good, which aikido ­encapsulates.

“The traditional word for samurai really means ‘somebody who serves’. Most people don’t think about samurai as weak people.

“It’s not a bad thing to say: ‘I’m serving something, I have a ­purpose.’ Trying to make things better for others – I think that’s an honourable thing to do.”

During the seminar, two of Ratnam’s students passed their 2nd dan examinations, for which they had spent 18 months preparing. The examination requires they submit an essay and demonstrate an extensive variety of skills and qualities.

Emanuil Stoimenos, 49, says breathing management played a crucial role in his achievement. “I started doing aikido as part of my management training,” he explains. “I used to be a regional chief executive of a Fortune 500 company – the way that we handle conflict is the same in my business life as my aikido life.

“Most of the conflicts in management escalate because people end up in a stressful situation, where egos are clashing – and not finding the best way to solve the situation. Aikido is a better way of tackling this issue, because it allows people to release their physical stress.

“Thousands of years ago, the only method of defence when a wild tiger turned up in front of you to attack was that you would get this shot of adrenaline, which could give you much more strength. It would block most of the logical functions of the brain and then you would react.”

However, this response also raises one’s heart rate and blood pressure, which is why, he says, “managers suffer from heart ­attacks and strokes”.

Managing this reaction is important during exams, regardless of the grade. During his 2nd dan assessment, he had many uke – attackers – whom he had never trained with before. Some were tall, some short, some strong, some soft. One of them even won a tae kwon do trophy last year for breaking objects. “This is a situation when you do not really think any more,” he laughs. “You need to continuously adjust your style to the person who is attacking, and this requires a huge amount of mental preparation.”

Despite his strong performance, he says he feels “exactly like the day before”.

“Nothing changes; you keep on doing the same mistakes that you did before, you feel the same insecurities you did before,” he laughs. “What does change is you have one more experience.”

Stoimenos discovered aikido “by coincidence”, when he took his daughter to train at the Dubai Karate Centre. Nearby, Ratnam was teaching children the principles of non-conflict. After watching a few classes, Stoimenos ­approached the sensei and, having not exercised much for a decade, asked if he could take part in the children’s classes until he was in better shape.

“Sensei told me if I stayed for two years, he should be able to bring me to the level of 1st kyu, which, at that time, was unthinkable for me.

“So, I gathered all my strength and courage and I even went to the head office of the organisation in the US to train for one month as an uchi-deshi – literally translated as a ‘live-in ­student’.”

Aside from training, he also cleaned the dojo and folded the teachers’ hakamas – the black skirts worn by accomplished aikido practitioners. Doing this, as a 45-year-old chief executive, who was managing 200 employees, required a lot of humility, he says.

“I think I was about 25 years older than any of the other students there,” he says. However, the intensive training helped towards his equivalent of 15 years of experience.

The main thing, he says, is finding the right teacher – which he found in Ratnam. He even prolonged his stay in Dubai to continue his aikido education and is keen to expand upon the benefits for children, whom it teaches, he says, “not to fight violence with violence”.

“It is very difficult to understand aikido because you need to be searching for something to change your life, and today’s world does not give you the ­opportunity to do that. It’s a very difficult world we live in today – a world full of conflict.”

Conflict, he adds, is often difficult to solve because people are not willing to do a “tenkan” – a 180-degree pivot. Aikido also teaches that the attacker always loses, because they are the ones who hit the ground, which teaches children and adults to be confident, not aggressive.