Densho Digital Archive - Roy Murakami Interview (denshovh-mroy

<Begin Segment 4>

RP: Can you share that story about the wrestler and Sensei Ito? Do you recall that story about the exhibition that was...

RM: Oh, I don't know. Even if I know exactly what... because I was too young then. But as I understand, he took on a wrestler and he kept throwing him and he kept coming up, throwing him, you know, judo we don't do anything harmful to this person. But the last time he got mad and threw him and then he wanted, what we call arm lock and busted his arm. And so couldn't do anything more.

RP: That was...

RM: But the, but that's true of all the ones that came over here from, that went to South America, Europe. They were doing that. Showing their skills over there.

RP: Exhibitions.

RM: Yeah.

RP: That's...

RM: There's articles in the Judo Journal, sometimes it's out in there. And there's gonna be books out, I guess, too. Someone wrote the books. This book is just written recently.

RP: What, what was your father's philosophy in teaching techniques? How did he approach the teaching of judo? Was he low key about it? There, some of these, some of these senseis were very strict and disciplinarian and...

RM: Yeah, well, he wasn't that strict, I wouldn't say. He would try to get the character out of the person more than judo. Because they learned how to bow and remember how the things were in Japan and that, but that... it wasn't that tough. But he would teach the, his students and the students would advance forward. Some of 'em, they won a tournament in '39, I think it was, or '40, that they weren't supposed to win. It was a team tournament and they took a flag there. And then he knew all these other teachers, too, so. The Nanka was very strong. The groups that make up Nanka is very strong. A lot, a lot of 'em are good experts.

RP: This, this Nanka Yudanshakai formed and basically that's the black belt association?

RM: Yeah, uh-huh. And they have meetings and they do tournaments. They put on tournaments and stuff like that. And, but the... as I remember the old teachers, there's not very many left around, but they were very strong characters.

RP: Some, sometimes very quiet but very strong internally?

RM: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

RP: Uh-huh.

RM: They sometimes brought out troubles or something like that, but then pretty well, stuck together pretty well.

RP: There was a story about one of the, one of the teachers who got involved with this gambling club.

RM: Oh.

RP: And, you know, was told you either stop gambling or we're gonna have to drop you out of, out of the dojo.

RM: I don't know about that but...

RP: That's a little early for you, but.

RM: I heard a lot of stories but that type of thing, no.

RP: But your father was very much focused on developing the character of a person through judo.

RM: Yeah, he liked to talk to 'em and try... that's why in long, after a while, I guess in Manzanar he became more like a mediator.

RP: That's, yeah, we're kinda gonna follow that to that point, yeah, in Manzanar.