[Saka]

I am not sure if I mentioned this already, but recently I got my first black belt. And of course, it feels underwhelming and I frequently feel like I have no idea what I am doing. 😂

[DoctorEldritch]

@Saka Congratulations! But what do you mean by "first", black is the highest rank, can you get it more than once?

[Saka]

@DoctorEldritch There are degrees of the black belts too. It's just not a common knowledge to people who don't do martial arts.

So I got my first black belt degree, in a year I would be eligible to test for the second. In kendo, the highest attainable is 8, but it's already half-legendary because so few people are able to even test for it, and the pass rate is below 1%.

[DoctorEldritch]

@Saka Is it something visual? For example, if a blue or red belt holders come across a blackbelter, then everyone would easily understand who has more experience or is a better fighter (or at least passed the requisites to get that belt). But if a black belt holder of the, for example, the second degree would meet a black belt holder of the sixth degree, would they be able to tell from a glance who is a more experienced fighter?

And why is 8th-degree half-legendary, what makes testing for it so rare? Do you have to meet many complex criteria?

[Saka]

@DoctorEldritch Alas no, there are no visuals indicating ranks in kendo. You just have to know, or maybe make some educated guesses based on the skill displayed.

Once you reach the first black belt degree, called shodan (1st dan) you need to wait years before the first possible attempt for the next graduations. The amount of years to wait is equal to the currently held dan. So for me it would be one year before I can attempt grading for 2nd dan. And of course one can fail the exam, and then they have to wait for another big seminar where they can re-attempt it.

That makes it a minimum of 21 years between 1st and 7th dan, and that's assuming one passes everything on the first attempt, which is unlikely. Then it takes another 10 years to be eligible for the 8th dan exam. The 8th dan exams are only held in Kyoto, Japan and have sub 1% pass rate. There is currently no European who passed as far as I know.

[DoctorEldritch]

@Saka Ah, so it was like the samurai of old, you may know some by fame, but often you do not know the level of experience of opponents like that.

This looks more like an elite club than a sports title like this 😅 I wonder what reasons are there to make this process so long and hard.

[Saka]

@DoctorEldritch Kendo people often joke this about kendo, but with a big grain of truth, that kendo is hard. It takes years to get a solid grasp on even the very basics.

[DoctorEldritch]

Originally Posted by Saka

It takes years to get a solid grasp on even the very basics.

Why does it take so long? I mean, many skills can take long to grasp, piano comes to mind, but there are reasons for that, from training muscle memory to establishing new neural pathways. In the case of kendo, why does it take this long?