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Master Murakami - Memories of one of his students
Henri Plée asked the Japanese Karate Association to send one of their Karate experts to France to help promote this Martial Art in Europe. For this reason, Murakami Sensei came to Paris in 1957. He was the first Shotokan Karate teacher in France. At this time he was a second Dan, fighting level. At the time the Japanese teaching system demanded that fighters first complete their technical development and reach Dan level before they were admitted to fights.
Legend has it that Murakami Sensei had been trained to be a Kamikaze but that war ended before he boarded a plane. Those who knew him in the years from 1960 and well through the 1970ties are tempted to believe this story, as the Sensei incorporated the Japanese spirit through and through.
To understand the Sensei one must know that he first and foremost considered himself to be Japanese: he thought in a Japanese way, he lived a Japanese life, he reacted in Japanese fashion, he taught his art in a Japanese way that is always in accordance with the rules concerning honour und respect Japanese society is built on.
The Sensei had been sent to teach Karate in France by his Japanese elders. He stood up for his work to them and to nobody else. This is one of the reasons why his school wasn't recognized by the French Federation of Karate for many years, but I shall say more about this later on.
So he used the same method with his students he himself had been taught with. Therefore his students often didn't understand his method of teaching and his "brutal" ways of behaving and most students never really accepted them. The problem is that European students aren't used to be told off or even beaten if they don't execute the techniques properly. In Japanese teaching, the teacher shows a technique, but he hardly ever explains how one is to master it. It is the students' task to learn to see, to work and to find they way how to do it themselves. In French teaching this is different: the teacher shows, explains a technique and repeats it as often as necessary for the students to understand. Students may even ask "Why don't we rather do it this way or that?" No one among the Sensei's students would ever have dared make a remark like this.
Another reason for the poor understanding between the Sensei and some of his students was the nature of the practise itself. The Sensei taught a Martial Art, not a sport. He demanded mental vigour, vigour in practising, that is the will to continually try and go beyond one's physical and mental limits . He did not allow his students to work "like office clerks" during practise. Let me tell you something that happened to myself: while at doing Kihon I was suddnely told to do ten rounds of "frog hops" as a punishment. I didn't know what I was punished for, and I still don't. Maybe my posture wasn't low enough in Kihon and this he disliked.
I was lucky to know the Sensei and to see the difference between a true master and a teacher or someone who only believes himself to be a "master". I could tell you many stories to make my point but I shall only mention one. I started Karate with Michel HSU, who was then the Sensei's assistant, and I practised with him for three years. This teacher's technichal level was very high and therefore also his teaching was of a very high quality. This was confirmed when we met members of other schools practising different styles of Karate. We often were superiour to them technically even though graded lower. When I was ranked brown belt I was to change to the Sensei, as was the custom at the time. It was a revelation. My first training session with the Sensei remains engraved in my memory. After thirty minutes of practise the Sensei had spotted and noted all the weaknesses in my techniques and postures. He had "taken care of me", opened up an angle of my hip here, a position of the hand there, then of the foot, and so on, in every single technique we practised that day.
That moment I realized what a difference there was between the Sensei and Michel Hsu, although the latter had an excellent technical level. Michel Hsu's teaching was difficult and exhausting, but it was nothing compared to the Sensei's teaching. Those who did not like the Sensei being constantly on their backs or who did not like being beaten by him I would like to tell that they did not have the sense to see the qualitiy of his teaching and that he especially concentrated on the students who did not work the way he wanted them to. His guideline in teaching was: "My students must be the best when compared with students of other schools".
Most important to the Sensei was to be as best a teacher as possible. Hence his being extremely demanding and his never relenting, for the student reperesented the school and the school represented the master and so forth. The technical prowess of his students was proof of the quality of his work for his elders in Japan.
The Sensei was always searching for the best technique. For this reason he changed from Shotokan style to Shotokai style. Questionning himself and his work after years of practising a style in which he excelled must be acknowledged to be a very courageous act. But he thought Shotokai Karate to be more adapted to real life. At the beginning though, there weren't too many differences between the two styles. Only by and by the Sensei refined his technique to arrive at the form we know today and which is fundamentally different from Shotokan Karate.
I earlier on mentionned that the school wasn't recognised by the French Karate federation. Indeed the Sensei never asked for publicity nor the recognition of his work by the French Karate federation. He didn't want to comply with the administrative regulations of the blackbelt exams and further Dan gradings. This proved to be problematic when some of his students wanted to found clubs of their own and teach Shotokai Karate*. The oldest students finally arrived at making him change his mind by making sure that he wasn't bothered with the admnistrative formalities of the exams. Therafter, in the seventies, and this I can testify to, the Sensei was renowned and respected by representatives of the Federation for the quality of his teaching and the technical level of his students' who presented themselves at those exams.
Since his arrival in France the oldest students always played an important part in the Sensei's life and in his school. There are the eldest of the years 1958 through to 1970 and the eldest of the eighties and later on, but I don't make a difference between them on purpose, because all of them, in their time, have contributed in supporting the Sensei and Shotokai Karate.
As mentionned earlier on, the Sensei had arrived with Henri Plée in 1957 in order to teach at the Dojo in Rue de la Montaigne Ste. Genviève and promote the practice of Karate in France. Their collaboration, for several reasons, only lasted for a brief time. The Sensei's first own club was located, if I am not mistaken, in the Cité Univérsitaire of Paris, then he opened his Dojo in Mercoeur. Economically, after splitting up with Henri Plée, the Sensei found himself in a very difficult situation and he did not want to return to Japan. For this reason his students founded the Murakami Kai Association and appointed him martial arts teacher. This way the Sensei had a payed job and social security which was the basis for being able to indeed start and promote the practise of Karate in France. For some time the Sensei also was the official representative of Shotokai Karate in Europe and he was in charge of clubs in Spain, France, Italy, Portugal and Switzerland.
Students who experienced the Sensei's teaching generally said: "It's good before and after, never during practise". You never knew how it would go. The Sensei was no superman and he wasn't perfect, he made mistakes and he was difficult to deal with. But those who appreciated him still praise the quality of his teaching.
Some notes concerning the pictures below:
We do not possess any films and only very few pictures of the Sensei with him demonstrationg a technique, for he detested this. On some of the pictures we have found to put on our website you will notice that the Sensei has his eyes closed. Indeed he often worked with his eyes closed to develop his Irimi (his sense of anticipation).
Anecdotes:
1) During a training fight with one of his students the Sensei stepped into a shard of broken glass and his foot started bleeding. The student interrupted the fight and pointed to the bleeding foot. The Sensei said: "Who is bleeding, you or I?" And he pushed the bit of glass even deeper into his foot and proceeded with the fight.
2) During a stage the Sensei ordered an English student to attack him with Oitsuki (hand technique). It wasn't clear whether the student misunderstood or did it on purpose, but he put a Maegeri (foot technique) into the Sensei's lower belly. The Sensei answered the attack within a fraction of a second and knocked the student out with a Tsuki. Afterwards, the Sensei said, in his particular way of talking: "Well then, you, control, no?"
3) This happened to myself during one of our practise sessions. We had been standing in a very deep Kibadachi (low front stance) for about fifteen minutes when my legs started shaking and I slowly stood up. The Sensei got behind my back and put his hand on my head to prevent me from standing up. Inspite of the power of my legs I couldn't get up any further. My knees gave in and I fell.
4) During another practise session the Sensei felt his arm hurt a bit; indeed his arm was broken. He had to have it in a cast for a month. The cast had hardly been removed when he started making Gedanbarais (arm defense technique) to see if the arm would take the blows.
5) During the 1960ies and the 1970ies the Sensei used to sit at the entrance of the Dojo in Mercoeur before practise and "take care of the office". Everybody had to pass in front of him so he could check who was present. Unfortunate those who had forgotten their checking-cards. They received a kick to their shins from under the table laced with the remark: "So you, forgotten your card? And I, have I forgotten to come?"
© Copyright Christian Bert, Dojo Mercoeur, Paris, France (translated from the French)
*In France one has to pass a blackbelt exam that is approved of by state authorities (which are represented by the FFKAMA; the Fédération Française de Karaté et Arts Martiaux Affinitaires), in order to be allowed to open a club. (note of translator)