This past weekend we finally held the 2nd Annual Japanese Championships in Osaka. 2nd Annual. I can`t even tell you how good it feels just to say that. 2nd Annual Japanese Footbag Champs. What sounds even better is this: the 4th footbag tournament held in the last year. Ooooh, that`s sexy. I remember when I landed on these islands, what? 2 and a half years ago, and there were only a handful of footbag players who weren`t even playing in circles. Now, the scene is just beautiful. Now, this was more of a case of good timing, rather than me working miracles, but I still like to think I`ve helped the scene flourish, in my own little ways.
And there`s nothing like a tournament to illustrate how beautiful a blossoming footbag scene in a new country is.
Osaka. O-rock-ah. What can I say? Yes, it was a pain in the ass to get there. An expensive pain in the ass to boot. But well worth it. Unfortunately, the fact that it was in Osaka meant that a lot of top players couldn`t make it all the way out, due to time and money constraints. Mostly time. Even so, most of Japan`s strongest players came out and competed real hard.
The weeks, months really, leading up to the tournament were pretty packed with preparation. I was contacting sponsors before World champs, and in Montreal I was already picking up the prizes from Flipsider to save on shipping costs. Since the tournament was being run in Osaka, Ikezawa-san was the tournament organizer. I passed along some advice like getting a restaurant sponsor, as well as technical stuff like how long routines should be, how big pools should be, etc, but Ikezawa-san and his staff did all the hard work of renting the gym, printing fliers, etc. I felt it was real important for Japanese players to start judging their own tournaments, so a few weeks ago I went to Tokyo and ran a judging workshop for a couple hours, where I trained 3 players to judge, 2 who judged JFC2 with me. Daryl sent us prizes from Freedomfootbags which arrived a couple weeks before the tournament, so other than writing the award certificates, my work was mostly done by the time I got on my plane on Friday night.
On the flight into Osaka, I slept for almost the entire duration. I tend to this on flights, even if I`m going to a tournament or feel any pressure. I woke up on the descent into Osaka, and as I looked out on the shimmering glitteriness of big city lights, I felt a rush of excitement that the tournament was finally going to happen. I had a bit of deja vu of when I flew into Montreal over the summer with Team Japan, though there were no fireworks this time.
When I got out of the plane, I checked the e-mail Henmo had written me on my cellphone giving me directions to his place. In retrospect, I should have studied the mail harder before getting in, and asked a friend to translate the kanji (chinese characters) I didn`t understand. As it turns out, I was a little confused by the meaning.
Anyway, I was pleasantly surprised to learn that the first leg of my journey would be on.... a monorail!
Now I knew why Osaka was famous enough to be mentioned in the same breath as towns like Brockway and North Haverbrook. I hopped on the monorail and grinned as I mentally watched the Monorail Simpsons episode in my head.
*The Monorail is out of control. Marge calls Homer (the conductor) via the intercom*
Marge: Homer! I brought a man who thinks he can help you!
Homer: Is it Batman?
Marge, in an annoyed voice: No! It`s a scientist.
Homer: Batman`s a scientist.
Marge, in an angry voice: It`s not Batman!
I snap out of my reverie in time to hop out at the right station. I watch the monorail ride off, as I think to myself: `I call the big one "Bitey".`
I transfer to a local by mistake, and hop out at the next stop so I can catch an express. I wait 7 minutes, and hop on the express.... which turns out to be another local.
I finally meet up with Henmo at the appropriate station, and I apologize for my incompetent late ass.
I haven`t seen Henmo since Worlds, where he made me so proud by doing so well in Open. It`s good to catch up. With him was Kaz, a player who came all the way from Okinawa to go to the tournament. Big props. Both of them have bicycles, but I don`t, so I ride on the back of Kaz`s bike by standing on these spikes which jut out the back wheel, and I balance by holding his shoulders. We careen dangerously through the busy Osaka streets, and I think to myself that it would be OK if I died AFTER the tournament, but not before. It`s real exciting though.
Finally we hop off at a curry shop, and after hammering out some more last-second tournament details with Masa via phone, we sit down and eat and catch up. Afterwards we hit a public bath to relax in anticipation of the big day the next day. The bath proves to be a real good idea, as there are special pools with bubble streams to massage your back and feet. I didn`t think I was tired before hitting the bath, but after taking it, I realized how drained and stressed all the travelling had made me.
When we get to Henmo`s, I`m hit by a wave of nostalgia. The first time I played with Japanese players was exactly 25 months earlier, when Tu Vu visited Japan and everybody met up in Osaka. At that time, I crashed at Henmo`s place, and met Kim, Masa, and all these other players who would become good friends of mine. Going back to the same place, 2 years later, it really struck me how great it is that I had become good friends with these people, and how far they had come along footbagwise.
The nostalgia is cool, but I realize I need to re-write some of the award certificates and mail them to Ikezawa-san, so I get to that while Kaz and Henmo watch some footbag vid in the next room. When I finish, I join them, and we all agree that Sunil looked real cool when he had dreads and the beard. They point out that with the haircut Sunil has on Sick 03 and other vidoes, he resembles the main character from the sniper manga, `Golgo 13.` We get a good laugh out of this, and discuss combos that involve golgowalkers. I give Henmo some food from my part of Japan, and he gives me a custom-made Henmo bag that he made just for me. He says its a token of gratitude for my help in Montreal, and I`m real touched. He even made it heavier than his usual bags, because he knows I prefer heavier bags. It`s my first new 32 in over 5 years.
Kaz gives me a cool wrist-sweatband with kanji on it that says `sea-person.` Awesome-ness!
I sleep real well, and the next morning I feel in good shape for the tourney. Henmo makes a rice-chicken soup with Okra, and I eat a bit for a light breakfast. We head out early, but at the train station, Henmo realizes he left something important at home. Kaz and I kill time waiting by hacking, and I give him some tips on butterfly. We hit a convenience store where I buy a pastry to round out my breakfast, and then I browse a Golgo 13 manga and marvel at the similarity in hairstyle.
We get to the event site no problem, and as we enter the building, we see a hip young couple also entering the building, and we jokingly wonder if they are there for footbag. As it turns out, they are! That`s the cool thing about Japan. Since footbag has no hippie-stoner stigma, we get a lot of cool people taking it up, since it`s like this new subculture.
When we get inside I`m struck by the size of the gym. It`s well-lit and the ground isn`t too slippery, so I`m happy. There`s a TV news crew there who is doing some sort of documentary on Henmo, and his entering the tourney. I wander about some, and say hey to a bunch of Osaka shredders I haven`t seen in a while. The staff has a few meetings to run over judging procedures and the schedule, and then finally i have some time to be social. I juggle for a little, then put on shorts and hop into some circles.
Kenzo was playing well at TSG2, but he seems to have gotten more variety and flipsidedness since then, which I was stoked to see. In a circle with me, he hits whirl-drifter repeat to start a run. Abe Yuko is in the same circle, and she has also increased her string length. I saw her hit stepping butterfly-ripwalk-pdx mirage, which I was impressed by. This whole time I am wearing shorts, a t-shirt, and an NBA Olajuwon jersey over it, which is kinda baggy, but it`s OK cause I`m just messing around. Sides, I think it looks cool.
Despite the bagginess, I manage to hit bedwetter and flaming tard on both sides in the same string, which is a first for me. I felt like all the egg dexes were good, but my step on my flip bed might have been na na na na.
I hop into some beginner circles and introduce myself, and some of the shredders seem a bit intimidated. I remember the first time I played in a circle with Peter Irish at Worlds 99, and was incredibly intimidated. It`s still strange to be on the flipside of that. I want to tell people not to sweat it at all, and that it`s fun to play together, but I think that would just be weird. I feel good though in that I remember a bunch of newbies` names, and give them props by name later on in the day.
The first round of Big 3 starts pretty soon, and Masa, Octoe and I get in position to judge. The first round of Big 3 has over 30 competitors, so we limited each competitor to 5 tries. We figure they can hit a safety in that time, and then go big in finals, which is 7 tries. Each judge has a white flag and a red flag, and we raise the white flag when an acceptable 3 trick combo is hit. We raise the red flag when we think something was the, or they drop. The system works well, and adds some drama to the event. For the most part it works, though we use video replay in a some cases where it was controversial. Only 8 players advance to the finals. Some players hit more than one qualifying combo, which was cool, and the people who hit combos hit good combos.
We take a short break before freestyle, and then go right into it. Routines are 1:30 at this tourney, which is good because it runs faster, and most players are at an intermediate routine level. I am very very impressed by the routines, and the judging goes pretty well. In the second pool, the 7th seed (bottom seed) is a relative unknown from Osaka, who does a one drop routine!
it had good variety to boot, with fliers, spins, and unusuals on both sides. He advances to finals with one of the highest seeds. Yuko Abe and Hatakeyama Enna compete in the men`s division, and both do well, but neither make it to finals.
We`re running on a tight schedule, so after freestyle ends, I only have like 25 minutes to get warmed up again to do my Big 3 demo. I realize that I shouldn`t have played before, because sitting down for over an hour really tightened me up. I warm up in a circle and hit some decent stuff, but I know I am rushing it, and my body doesn`t respond well. I suck it up though, for the sake of the tournament running on time. I step up and hit a decent Big 3 on my 2nd or 3rd try. It goes downhill from there. I am determined to hit a combo which includes an in-spinning flyer, but I keep slipping on the floor. By my 9th attempt I see the crowd is getting restless, so I hit fog-paradon swirl..... ps whirl-ps whirling fall -on -my-ass.
I meant to hit fog-paradon swirl-superfly, but I settle for it, bow, and scurry back to my judging chair. It was probably my worst performance at any Japanese tournament, but it wasn`t a total disaster either, especially given my warm-up time constraints.
Men`s Big 3 finals is a bit of a letdown, since only 2 players hit their combos. I think everybody was trying stuff that was a bit too hard, because they knew everybody else had the potential to hit something real big and win. Morii (Japanese Chad, he hits blurrage on the Big1 Jam page) hits ripwalk-blur-pixie butterfly for 2nd place. Considering he was hitting blurry whirl-ripwalk-food processor in practice leading up to finals, I was a little let down. Henmo steps up and hits smoke-pdx whirl-dyno to win it. The whole combo was nice and controlled.
Freestyle finals goes real well. The judges have trouble deciding who took 3rd and 4th, and we end up going with Kenzo in 3rd. All the finalists did a real good job of including choreography and pauses in their routines, rather than going for hard tricks or shredding. I was real happy to see this, since I knew they could shred from the Tokyo Shredder Gathering tournaments before. The 1 drop routine guy from semis, Igarashii, does another strong routine with 3 drops, and takes 2nd. Henmo had a 5 drop routine which was real hard, and so he took 1st unanimously.
When the judges finally made their decisions, I still had to sign award certificates. I hop into a fun hackey slacker circle that includes some shreditas who were playing for the first time. I hear some `oohs` and `aahs` from a circle where Morii is busting, but I realize I can`t warm up in time to join before the awards ceremony, so I decide to keep my energy for the next day.
The awards ceremony goes nicely. I get to hand out the 1st place certificates, and I make a few short speeches in my bad Japanese, thanking our generous sponsors, thanking the staff for sacrificing playing footbag that day so the tournament would run, and thanking the players for competing so hard. We distribute the award certificates, along with Japanese-style envelopes filled with prize money, and then we all take some photos. After the last official photo is taken, people gather round for some final fun activity, but I realize our time in the gym is nearing its end, so I help Kim and the Staff start moving the chairs and tables out the gym. I go grab a bag from the recycling bin and make the rounds collecting empty water bottles. We manage to get out in time, and clean everything up.
Outside in the lobby, we distribute the prizes. This feels so good. Almost exactly a year earlier, Kim held the first Tokyo Shredder Gathering, and we lacked sponsors. I ended up donating one of my favorite footbag t-shirts, as well as a commemorative event key-chain I made for the event. Henmo donated a bag, and Kim bought shred videos as prizes out of his own pocket. JFC2 was totally different however, thanks to our kick ass sponsors. I can`t tell you how good it felt to have so many prizes at our disposal with which to reward the worthy efforts of the competitors. Henmo took home a Freedom Footbags hoodie, 2 footbag tapes, money, and I think a t-shirt too. Thank you again Flipsider. Thank you again Freedom Footbags. Thank you again Naranja Juggling Shop.
After cleaning up, we all hit the restaurant for the players party. There`s over 50 of us there, and its a great vibe. I exchange lots of toasts with the other judges and staff, and congratulate them on a tournament well done. It`s nice to drink and catch up with Abe Yuko, since she used to live near me last year and we played together regularly. She`s the best shredita in Japan now, and I`m real proud of her. I drink with some new players I met that day, and it`s cool to share in our enthusiasm of the sport.
After the party, several players go to drink some more and sing karaoke together, and I really want to go with them. I force myself not to, because I didn`t get to play much footbag that day, and I knew I wanted to be at full strength for the all day shred the next day. I take some more photos with everybody, and then head home exhausted but happy with Henmo, Kim and Kaz.
Next: All day, no-pressure shred outdoors in good weather!
Plus: I meet my footbagging match in Street Fighter!
Just playing with you Damon. 
and then look like they want to spit it out. 
I try not to let this all get me down, telling myself I`m only in Tokyo for the weekend, so I need to stay positive....but it still sucks. I do a lot of trick-teaching, and then out of nowhere, Morii shows up! Whoo! 
... 