I’ve just got in and I’m tired, so this is going to be a pretty half-arsed entry. This evening I had the experience of trying Kyudou, a Japanese style of archery with an incredibly long bow. It was really something to be able to see a lot of the forms in which kyudou and archery differed, but still kept some core concepts. It seemed that in kyudou however, the focus was more of the individuals actions and form rather than the score, as could be seen from examples such as bowing on entry to the shooting area. When it was my turn, a combination of two factors vastly limited my ability (as I’m somewhat’s used to archery). Firstly was that in kyudou the arrow rests on the other side of the bow instead of between the bow and the shooter. Secondly is my left eye (which is almost blind). Because of these it was impossible to see the 36cm target from it’s 38 foot distance, making aiming … pretty tricky.

Tomorrow we’ve got an early start as we’re going on a class trip to Koyasan!

Bye bye!

For more information on kyudou, click here (Wikipedia)
For more information on lazy eye, click here (NHS Direct)
For more information on Koyasan, click here (Shukubo)