Chapter 2. The homeland waits. Part one

Printed on the printer the location of the hall, which was only a few metro stations from my house. It was only after I printed it out that I realized that I could safely remember the route with my improved memory. Having reached the subway, I bought a ticket and drove to the desired station in just fifteen minutes, leaving and orienting on the map, in five minutes I reached the hall.

- Hello, I would like to attend trial training - I turned to the girl for reception.

- Yes, please pass and change clothes, the class will begin soon - and gave me the key. Entering the locker room, combined with a shower, he changed clothes and went to the hall.

Going into the hall, I saw about fifteen people of different ages and different sexes, with different belts - from brown to white - which were currently simmering. Moving to the end of the hall, he began to try to remember something from the school warm-up movements, which he did not really like, but something still remained in his memory. Having blurred as he could, he began to look at his, possibly future colleagues in the classes.

They already managed to warm up and now performed some racks and somersaults forward and backward. Trying to repeat after them, only clumsily slapped on the ass. A muted laugh in the cam was heard nearby. Turning around, I saw a girl wearing a blue belt, who stood behind me and smiled. Smiling in response, he asked her:

"And what's funny?"

"It's just that you tried so funny to repeat the movements... Okay, look at it. You have to start with insurance, and what you tried to do was she. First from the knees, for more confidence.

And she showed me how to do it correctly, how to put your hand and make a roll.

After her first movement, he felt something strange, but could not understand exactly what. He began to watch her closely and here it happened... I would call it level ap. if it was a game! I managed to repeat her movements absolutely accurately, after only three attempts.

"And you learn quickly," she said in surprise. Then the sensei entered the hall and gave the team. Everyone, having stopped their classes, ran to the center of the hall and sat on their knees opposite the sensei, bowing first to the Japanese hanging in the corner and the sensei itself. After that, we got up from our knees and divided into three columns and began to warm up to the Japanese score, rather rhythmically warming up all the muscles of the hands, legs, back and neck.

- In aikido, the main thing is to work simultaneously with the whole body, and not with its separate parts, everything should go together, if the movement starts from the feet, then they should go continuously from the movement of the hands and back to the right direction.

- And now let's start with basic movements!

Moving simultaneously with the sensei, we performed what he showed us. I looked carefully on the sides and tried to repeat exactly what I saw. To the left of me was the bearer of the brown belt, and to the right was white, also, apparently, recently came to the hall, since in his movements there was not the ease and naturalness that the brown belt had, and so did other carriers.

After which they gave us the team, we got up the belts from senior to junior and sensei showed one of the basic techniques performed with the partner. The execution of which was carefully and closely watched, trying, apparently, to remember the movement of the hands and legs, both the attacking side and the one who defended. I also carefully watched and tried to absorb the strange sensations that arise in me when I watched the execution of the technique by sensei and his partner. Having shown a couple of times the technique on the left and right sides, he put the younger belts to the older ones, and we began to execute the just-seen technique.

Standing opposite the brown belt, we began to execute the technique, and again I caught myself on this feeling that I was trying to absorb something coming from a partner, while he was performing the technique. Completely focusing on this, unknowingly fell into a kind of trance, in which he looked at his actions as if from the outside. He perfectly controlled his own body, watched his movements, suddenly realizing that something was clinging to my eye, in all my movements. I tried to do them in the way that the older comrade does, that I suddenly began to succeed, despite the way he moves, how he breathes, and the naturalness of his movements, tried to do the same. After ten minutes of repeating the same technique, on the right and left sides, he was able to do exactly the same as him. Completely adjusted to his movements and rhythm. Then we worked as a debugged mechanism, executing all movements synchronously. At first, my partner was surprised that I began to move better through such an insignificant amount of time to work out equipment, but then I overcame my surprise and began to enjoy our sparring, judging by his satisfied face.

How to describe what happened to me in training? Later I thought a lot about it and was able, as it seemed to me, to figure it out. No, I'm not a born fighter, as it might seem from the outside. If it were not for my partner in the development of equipment, but everything depended on him at this stage, then I could not perfectly repeat all those movements, as I did in the hall. I think I would be as clumsy as a white belt who begins to know the path of aikido. I would have to repeat each movement many times and practice them to automatism, bringing them to full naturalness through long stubborn training. But my partner got an excellent one and I managed to do what I did, namely, "absorb" and adjust his technique, his understanding of movements for myself. Feeling how he saw her perfect performance and what he was striving for, he was able to become on a par with him for a while. After all, in every art, performing any kind of reception or movement, whether it is combat or dance, a person thinks about it and moves with the thought of making it as correct and perfect as possible. To like it himself, and if he likes it himself, it will look just amazing for the rest, because there is no more strictly judge than you yourself.

Somehow, unnoticed for me, the partner changed, and the brown belt gave way to the sensei, which is where I felt that, even feeling how to move correctly, I could not repeat his movements, without long practice and intensive training of my body. Literally after five minutes of a furious pace of execution, the technician felt that if I made at least one more movement, I would fall and could not rise for a long time. Seeing, apparently, my condition, sensei stopped sparring, and I tired of falling to my knees, breathing noisily, tried to calm my breath with deep breaths and exhalations, and after a while I did it. Relaxedly fell apart on a tatami, spreading hands to sides, as it didn't bother anyone with it.

"Hey, man, are you okay?" the sensei came up to me.

- Yes, normally, it is necessary to take a break, - after breathing, I answered.

"Have you ever done anything before?" after this question, he looked at me very carefully.

"No, today is my first aikido class.

— Interestingly … Very interesting, I would say, - thoughtfully said sensei.

- For the first time who came on a tatami you moved very well and felt both mine, and movements of the partner - in his voice there was clearly visible amazement and even some shock.

Still, because I felt them the same way you did, I thought. But the answer, of course, is completely different, since telling the truth about his amazing opportunities to the first person who got caught would be too reckless on my part.

"Maybe I have a talent for martial arts?" I asked with a smile.

— No … This is something else, I carefully observe those who came again, and for a decade of experience as a sensei I learned to define fighters from their first movement. And before you came out against Andrei (had a brown belt, as I later understood), there was and could not be the ease with which you began to perform techniques without even working out basic movements!

- Well, I see, you are tired, come to training in a day, if you don't change your mind to practice. Sign up at Oli's reception.

"All right," I replied. Leaving the hall, I did not forget to bow at the exit, I saw what others did.

Taking a shower and changing into a clean one, he signed up at Olga's reception. I found out from her when the next training, it turns out, a day later, on Wednesday. After saying goodbye, he went outside and shaved slowly towards the metro. The whole body felt pleasant fatigue, but I knew that after sleep the muscles would be very whining and sore, I had a sad experience in the past when I tried to do karate. And today I strained those of them, the existence of which I had not suspected at all before. Having reached his station, he witnessed and participated in the incident, the consequences of which could be very sad, if not tragic.

At first, on top of the stairs, the turnstiles heard a loud sound of whistling and screaming. A guy ran down, without sorting out the roads, a few steps later, and it so happened that when he wanted to round a girl standing almost at the very edge of the platform, he hit her with a briefcase that he held in his hand. And he ran further, without even looking back. And at this time, the girl swung from such a powerful and unexpected push and began to fall right on the rails. And everything could have ended well, since a man was standing behind her and managed to grab the girl by the coat, but she, unable to withstand such rude treatment, burst with a loud sound like a shot, and the girl continued to fall on the rails, right under the train, if not for the guy who rushed forward and picked up the girl just before the fall, throwing her up, towards the apron. And just a second later he disappeared under the train, which the driver desperately tried to stop, realizing that something was wrong on the tracks, but did not have time. Under the loud sound of brakes and loud cries of people demanding to remove the train, he stopped. After a few seconds, the train again touched down, and when the train moved on, under the place where the girl was falling, the guy lay, grouped together.

The guy you must have guessed was me. At the very moment when I realized that the blouse was tearing and in a few seconds the girl would fall under the approaching train and definitely cripple, and possibly die. At that very moment, the time around me seemed to stop, and, overcoming the strong air resistance, I felt how my muscles stretched and how the veins creaked from natuga. At the limit, he jumped forward, landing between the rails and, realizing that I did not have time to lower the girl down between the rails and drop myself, literally threw her out in front of the muzzle of the train, on the very man who was already trying to help the girl. Immediately after that, he fell sharply, without even trying to soften the fall, under the deafening humming brakes of the train trying to stop. Having managed, however, to shut your ears with your hands so that, God forbid, not to stun. When the train left, the same man jumped down to me, to whom I threw the girl, and helped me get up.