Shureido Sai

[Shorin Ryuu]

Now on to a kobudo subject,one of my training partners just received his Agena sai,sweet very sweet.His hand is smaller than mine but the feel and quality of the weapon can not be compared to any other including Shureido.I will be ordering mine soon.

 

Please do. I am so glad I have myself a pair.

 

Edit: As a piece of advice, it is best to call Mr. Carbone up and leave a message on his answering machine as well as email him. He travels quite frequently.

[Assassin_with_sais]

Harley,

 

If you don't know about "kool or flashey things" then you don't really know much about modern sai. Do you honestly think that they they make chrome plated, octagon sai that reflects more light because it makes you fight better?

 

So, is there really a lot of difference between octagon sai and what I want to do?

[1kickKO]

I've been reading up on this subject for quite a while. I am well trained in using sais I guess you could say, and I do love them. They're quite a flashy weapon, and if you want to show them off I suggest a nice stand and a good place for them. Ok, so anyways, back to the topic. I know what you mean by bladed end, but the only pairs of sais I have seen with the bladed ends are in movies, such as everybody's talking about...Elektra.

 

Pretty much what I've got to say is what everybody else has told you, if you want to find that type of sai look for a weaponry replica company, if it's just not possible to find them, I might suggest just using a nice pair of silver, black, blue or red pair of sais with a leather or wooden handle, or whichever you prefer...Sais (in my opinion) are one of the flashiest weapons out there, and I became interested in them a long time ago. So any pair of sais would look "good" or "flashy"...and if you're planning on using them in tournaments or in class for katas, then I suggest getting a nice pair with a sharp tip (which is like the pair I own) and with an octagon end, the main intent being to look good for the judges, you don't need a complete replica of a movie pair of sais, which are sharp and might cut yourself if you're not experiences enough to handle them.

 

The basic use of sais used to be to plant seeds, and the prongs would measure out the length between the holes that the seeds were planted in, then when weapons were banned, the innocent farming tool was turned into a weapon. Most judges know the history of this weapon, and it is always nice to have a good-looking pair of weapons, but don't "overdo" it with fancy gimmicks in the sais, as that was not their original intent. With that in mind, good luck finding whatcha want.

Edited January 23, 2005 by 1kickKO

[harleyt26]

Modern sai? ha ha thats funny

[Shorin Ryuu]

I've never bought the whole "sai were used to plant seeds" theory, because metal was very expensive back in those days, especially on a place like Okinawa. To think of it as a very common farming implement keeping in mind the relatively large amount of metal it required (most other farming implements used very little metal if they used it at all) always seemed a bit strange to me.

[1kickKO]

Well, I guess it's pretty much how you perceive it...from what I've read in many books, welders used to make one sai, make a firm impression in the ground, then pour the mix into that then let it harden..I don't know how accurate that is, but anything's possible. It's so hard to tell any history of any weaponry, because history goes so far back.

[Kill Bill960]

Harly,

 

I do realize that this is in deed a weapon forum. Please harly ponder this if you can handle it:

 

Elektra is a make belive action hero character who has studied martial arts since the age of 5. Along with hand and feet training she also studied the sai. Belive it or not the sai just so happens to be a weapon. For the last 3 pages we have been discussing the sai. I just simply said that her sais are one of the nicest weapons i've seen. So i ask you...............................WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT!!!!!!

 

By the way it's not a crime to find Elektra's pair of Sai Beautiful, Is it? I mean is it against the law to want to have a pair like hers (minus the sharpness)? Whats wrong with likeing sais that are embossed with fancy markings. You act like it's disrespecting some all mighty SaiGod or something!!!

[harleyt26]

Keyword "make beleive",If you got out of the comic book world and put yourself in the dojo long enough to practice about 10,000 sai kihon you will see the difference for yourself.But I have no problem with your immature attitude or your desire to play with shiny toys.I am sure your father or sensei could explain the difference between toys and weapons.And for your information I do know what I am talking about,25 years of martial arts practice gives me the confidence to say that, but I also know that there is plenty of real budo for me to learn yet.I just do not appreciate seeing peoples time being wasted on trash,but that is just one of my pet peeves.This SaiGod you spoke of is he another make beleive action hero character?I think I trained with him in Ozato Okinawa once upon a time.If you really want to see an impressive set of sai find a picture of Taira Shinkens sai or Akamine Eisukes sai.My instructor has a set of Akamine senseis sai,they are beautiful.Patrick McCarthy has a set of Tairas sai which I have only seen pictures of but they also look great.I will admitt that I have only seen pictures of"Electras sai" but they are gaudy and very impractical they look like they might last about 2 seconds in makiwara practice.But I am sure they will look fine hanging on a wall somewhere. My address is in my profile feel free to look my up when you are in my area I would be glad to show how impractcal they actually are with a little bo tai sai practice,do not take this as anything but an offer to show you the proper sai technique that Ryu Kyu Kobudo teaches.Hey if you see SaiGod tell him to show you the true path to enlightenment

[Shorin Ryuu]

harleyt26,

 

I'm going to throw my two cents in here. Personally, I'm not for all the showy movie sai replica or any of that. I find movies where the fighting and weapons usage is "fake" to be lamentable. However, if they really, really want to spend money and get themselves a pair of those kind of sai, I see no problem with it. If they wanted to use those sai in combat, then I would be concerned. It's obvious they just want them because they feel it looks nice. Again, I don't see anything wrong with that. I don't agree, but I don't think it's "bad".

 

It's the same thing with people training in nunchaku just to do tricks, for example. I tell those people that there is a difference between what they do and practicality, but if they want to keep doing it, then who am I to care? I am happier if they understand the difference between that and the "real deal", but once again, unless they are doing all of that with the intent of saving their life one day, I don't let it get to me.

 

It's also the same as when I see someone practicing a martial art I view as ineffective. I can talk to them, give them some advice, maybe even train with them to show them what I perceive to be the error in their ways. However, it's their life and their choice, and in a most John Stuart Mill sense, I've no right to infringe on that.

 

In the end, let me say I agree with you one hundred percent. I think it is a waste to spend money on those sai and because of their likely crappy balance, a waste of time to train with them. But if they really want to, I guess there's not much to be done but shake our heads and smile.

[Sauzin]

First I'd like to agree with everything Shorin Ryuu said. Having done that I would like to take a quick detour and talk about the movie Electra.

 

First I would like to say that I am a comic fan. While I don't have a huge collection I am a pen and ink artist myself and have long thought that comics were a grossly overlooked means of story telling. Many of the more recent comic book movies (Spiderman, Xmen) I have really enjoyed. With that said I did get dragged to Electra. Here's a review from a martial perspective.

 

Without a doubt, Electra has the worst choreography I have ever seen. I've haven’t even seen a low budget 80's Hong Kong bar fight scene that looked as bad as what was in Electra. It was horrible from every possible perspective. The camera work was horribly choppy. There was one scene with decent camera work where a bunch of white sheets were falling, but of course for 90% of it you couldn't see the actors so that helped a lot. Jennifer Garner is a great actress, don't get me wrong. But she's one of these few people who truly has no natural physical talent for fighting WHAT SO EVER! Her confidence is not faked very well as the moves she performs seem timid and scared. There is no flow or control. Her fists are often not even straight. She can't keep her hands up. And her punches look more like awkward slaps. She would fail an audition for She-spies (seriously). Her sai use is best described as basic baton work sped up by a camera. During most of the movie she holds it with the wrong grip. The point where I just about lost it was when she was fighting a katana wielding opponent and she blocked chop after chop with four of her fingers firmly protecting the top of the prongs she was blocking with. While her fight movements were terrible, the villains surprisingly weren't much better. The main bad guy wielded katanas and the most impressive thing he could do with them was whirl them around with his arms fully extended. He looked like a teenage mutant ninja turtle doll. After he was defeated by Electra simply stabbing the guy (good thing she didn’t think of that before) I was at the point where if there was another fight screen I would have walked out of the theater to get a drink and not come back. Thankfully the very last villain to die was killed by Electra throwing her sai no less then 100 feet. Twirling through bushes all the way until it stuck straight through its target.

 

The acting was good, the script was passable, and the story line was non-existent. But for anyone who really knows the sai, there will be moments where this movie will likely be physically painful.