THE COOPERATIVE UKE

by Phillip Starr

Years ago, I witnessed a demonstration by a martial arts teacher who performed a series of one-step fight techniques with one of his students. After blocking his student's attack, he'd deliver multiple counter-techniques. His counter-attacks were quick but lacked any real power and he'd respond to each attack with as many as a half-dozen or more strikes. It was a fine demonstration of ineffectiveness.

An instructor who was seated next to me leaned over and said, “That's a pretty cooperative uke (receiver)” and I agreed. The demonstration lacked any sense of realism; the uke simply stood stock still while the defensive techniques rained down on him. To the uninitiated, it certainly LOOKED impressive, but there was no practicality or realism to it at all.

In the traditional Japanese martial arts, practitioners strive to develop the ability to bring down the opponent with a single blow although they may deliver as many as three techniques just for the sake of insurance. But six or more? Nah. Someone who has to do that needs to put in more serious practice to temper his techniques!

I recall one of my classmates approaching me and trying to frighten me by letting me know that he could hit me many times in the space of about a second. I was very young and inexperienced and I was rather frightened. In those days, kung-fu wasn't taught to non-Chinese but my teacher broke the mold and did it anyway. I was the only non-Chinese in the small class (and the youngest by a very long shot) and my classmates, all of whom were American-born Chinese didn't appreciate my presence. Anyway, the fellow who made that statement didn't notice my teacher standing behind him. He responded to the bully's statement by saying (in a rather loud voice) that he would only need to hit a man once to take him down...

In traditional forms, (particularly Okinawan and consequently Japanese forms) the emphasis is on doing just that. In a given sequence, you may execute a defensive movement/technique and follow through with one or maybe as many as three counter-blows before dealing with the next imaginary assailant. But never do you execute more than three blows at the most (usually, it's just one or two).

And anyway, in the practice of one-step fight or self-defense techniques, it is helpful to have the aggressor to respond to the counter-attack(s) as if he'd actually been hit. For instance, if you strike someone in the throat or neck with a sword-hand, he likely isn't going to continue standing there, looking at you like a zombie and waiting for the next blow to land. His body will react to your strike in a certain way and that alters what you will use for your next counter-attacking technique.

It's important to keep it real...