Alberta Kyudo Association

The Alberta Kyudo Association had its beginning in Tokyo, Japan in early 2016.  Ken and Ryoko were in downtown Tokyo to see the Tokyo Nippon Budokan, an indoor martial arts arena originally built to host the 1964 Summer Olympics for, at that time, the inaugural Olympic demonstration sport Judo.  

While there we were able to see the practice of many martial arts including Kendo and Kenjutsu. Ryoko saw people shooting arrows at a range on the other side of the hallway across from the gymnasium.  She said "I want to go see that" and off we went.  We were watching these archers with these very longbows, wearing traditional Kyudo gi's, shooting arrows into sandbanks with targets.  After about 60 seconds of watching the peace and calmness of these archers was very apparent.  Ryoko said to me "I want to learn that.  It looks so tranquil!".  

Upon arrival back in Calgary we began to search for Kyudojo's, however, it was to no avail.  There were not any.  The only thing that we found after our internet searches was a seminar that had been held from a previous year at the Capital Region Archery Club (lhttps://crarchery.ca/) located in Edmonton with a contact email.  We emailed and after a while received an email from David Boswell sempai.  That online communication started a long relationship with David Sempai who was living in Edmonton and practicing Kyudo.  David sempai, at the time a 3rd dan in Kyudo, said that he would contact us when the next introduction seminar for Kyudo was held.

On May 28 and 29, 2016 Ryoko and I showed up at CRAC not knowing what to expect.  Wow!!!   That weekend was life changing.  After that seminar Ryoko and I were driving back to Calgary and talking about our Kyudo future.  Several decisions were made that trip.

1. We both wanted to start practicing Kyudo.  

2. As there was no place to train we would have to find a practice area.

3. We had plans to return to Japan in September that year so we would buy and ship all we needed to start.

We arrived back in Calgary in early October having purchased our first Kyudo Gi, Kake (glove), Yumi (bow), and Ya (arrows) in Japan.  While looking for a place to practice (with very high ceilings), we were speaking with Shihan Jay Creasy, a well known martial arts instructor in Calgary, who was also Kannushi (Shinto priest) for the Usagi Jinja (https://usagijinja.com/), a Shinto Shrine, located near Chinook Centre in Calgary.  He offered to let us practice at the Shrine.  He said that, in addition to an area to practice, this would offer a different understanding to the training as the shrine was a cultural building but also it would offer a deeper connection to the historical connection between Kyudo, Shinto, and Zen.  

We started in January 2017 practicing at the Shrine with 3 members and David sempai acting as our long-distance instructor.  

Since then, we have expanded to over 20 members practicing Wednesday evening at Archery World (https://archeryworld.ca/).  Additionally, senior students are invited to train at the Usagi Jinja on Monday nights.  

Please stop in the Archery World to see us or to watch.  Experience the fun, camaraderie, and Zen offered by Kyudo.