July 23rd, 2012
New Future Uchideshi?
It has been a good year for new babies at Nippon Kan and for the New Year we received photos of several of the newest additions to our extended Nippon Kan family. Two of our newest members belonged to Nippon Kan Certified Instructor, Cihan Karaogluol of AHAN Nippon Kan Izmir in Turkey and AHAN Nippon Kan Myanmar Coordinator, Nilar Than.
Homma Kancho sat puzzling one day over the new photos and exclaimed, “I mixed up the photos and now I am not sure which baby goes with which parent! I told one student they had a cute little girl, but it was a boy!”
Congratulations to all!
Ruzgar, baby of Cihan
Ye Htet, baby of Nilar
Nippon Kan Headquarters Outdoor Editing Office
Nippon Kan and AHAN activities have expanded all over the world and the Nippon Kan AHAN staff are constantly receiving reports and updates from many countries world-wide.
This summer, Homma Kancho and the Summer Marathon uchideshi
Summer Marathon uchideshi from many countries hard at work at the outdoor editor’s table.
editing team spent many, many hours cataloguing reports, writing scripts, editing videos and writing articles for the website updates. Even more challenging was the fact that this team spoke at least four different languages at the table! At least the setting was beautiful in the Nippon Kan gardens!
A Quiet Moment in a Busy Schedule
Even with Homma Kancho’s extremely busy overseas project schedule
Homma Kancho cutting Iris in the garden pond
with AHAN, he still finds time to care of the Nippon Kan gardens. “When we started this garden we could only afford small plants with foliage that was not even as high as my knee. If I take good care of them they will grow tall. In this way, the garden is the same as the dojo”.
The Passing of Genbei
Genbei, our Nippon Kan uchideshi of 13 years, passed away this past
Genbei and Yonta playing “water tag”
summer on July 23rd, 2012. Genbei was quite intuitive and a very good judge of character; always checking out students, visitors and new uchideshi upon arrival at the dojo. If Genbei did not approve of a new uchideshi or student, one could bet that problems would arise with that person down the road! Genbei was always right and he ruled at Nippon Kan!
In the last few years, Genbei’s position of Admiral at the dojo has been taken over by Yonta (our younger Springer Spaniel) and Genbei became become his senior advisor.
Homma Kancho was informed of Genbei’s passing after leaving Mongolia for Thailand. “I have no regrets”, said Homma Kancho, “I already said good bye before I left Denver”.
Good Bye, Genbei, rest in peace.
Homma Kancho’s Surprise Experience
Wrapping up his AHAN trip to Asia last summer, Homma Kancho
Rare illustration of the airplane making a U turn back to Bangkok
was on his way back to Narita, Japan from Bangkok when he had a somewhat unsettling experience. 30 minutes after his United flight had left the Bangkok airport, the captain announced over the speaker that there was a mechanical malfunction and that the plane would be returning to Bangkok for an emergency landing. Somewhat reassuring was the fact that there were many additional off-duty UA staff members on the flight that day that helped ready the passengers for the landing emergency.
“A few years ago I was on a flight that was rerouted for an emergency landing because of an ill passenger, and when the plane landed all of the passengers clapped in support of the passenger in need. This time it was a mechanical emergency and all of the passengers were nervous and silent. The plane landed safely however back in Bangkok and I got to stay in a nice hotel with good food for an extra night, compliments of United.
“I have to admit however, that what I really felt when the announcement was made by the captain that the plane was experiencing a mechanical malfunction was pure and simply… fear”.
Written by
Hiroki Yagi
Nippon Kan Japanese Editor Staff
From the Editor
Meaning of the Word
AHAN Nippon Kan focuses much of its energy and resources internationally on projects for orphaned children in many countries. Most of these children have lost both of their parents, but some of the children that come under AHAN’s care are children that still have living parents. In some cases, children still have living relatives but are unable to live with their families because of severe poverty, domestic violence, disease or displaced by religious or political wars. These children too are included in our care as children of AHAN.