After training, Nakayama asked Nakakura of his current occupation and was told that he taught Kendo in school. Nakayama proceeded to advise him to change plans: “You are still young and that’s a waste of your time. Don’t you want to come to Tokyo to practice?”.
Kiyoshi went back to his school in the Fukuoka Prefecture, resigned and left right away without taking care of anything else (he had not given sufficient notice). On the same night, he took off without anyone knowing, with just his Kendo gear in his pack. He walked for two hours to reach the nearest train station and caught the early morning service to Tokyo.
Kiyoshi had thus moved to Tokyo, where, thanks to the financial support of his grandfather, he was ready to join Nakayama sensei’s famed Yushinkan Kendo Dojo.
Hakudo Nakayama was nicknamed the “god of Kendo”. His school, the Yushinkan, had become known for a trademark hard-style and aggressive type of training. It wasn’t unusual for some of the students to be conveyed on a stretcher by the end of a session. Nonetheless, the dojo was very popular and full of students.
Not much time after entering the dojo, Nakakura asked his sensei to have a match, which Nakayama laughed away. Kiyoshi had never been beaten before and had great self-esteem and no fear of the Tokyo practitioners. In the Yushinkan dojo, there was already someone with similar temper and skills: his name was Junichi Haga.
Haga agreed to have that match with Nakakura, with the intent of giving that country boy a wake-up lesson. The session became rough and ended in a fight with no victors. Nakayama sensei had to step in to separate the two litigants.
Source: Aikido/Facebook
