Takanohana Interviewed on NHK

[Joe Kuroda <joe_kuroda@yahoo.com>]

Yokozuna Takanohana was interviewed on NHK's current
affairs program, "Close-Up Gendai" yesterday. This
program usually features a prominent news story of the
day like North Korea or Iraq or whatever.

Here are some of the things he said (as much as I
could remember now):

- At the moment he feels he is relieved that he has
been able to finish the basho.

- When he stepped up on the dohyo after so many
months, he said he realized the dohyo was such a quiet
place to amazement of the program interviewer, Brown
University educated Hiroko Kuniya.  She asked him how
he could feel that way when everyone in the Kokugikan
was screaming and cheering loudly on Day 1.  He said
perhaps he was so happy to be back to the familiar
place, the place he feels natural to him.             
  
- He no longer has a pain in his right knee but he
notices that it seems to tire easily now. 

- Even in retrospect knowing he would be out a year
and four months, he would still not have gone on Kyujo
on Day 15 when he won the Yusho.  If he has taken the
kyujo route, he felt he would have missed a page of
his life - there willl be a blank page in the road he
has travelled.   To him, having a blank page meant as
if he has ceased to exist or he would havelost any
meaning to what he has been doing.

- Regarding his training regimen prior to the basho of
not having any training sessions with sekitoris, he
basically said he marches to a different drummer. 
"Even when everyone else says it's hot but I feel cold
then I wear a sweater," said Takanohana. "It may sound
a bit strange to you but if I felt tired I may have
skipped a workout or I insisted on doing more workout.
I did whatever it felt natural to me."

- Regaring his warm-ups at the Hanamichi this basho,
he said by moving his body, he would not think too
much while waiting.  He was impressed with Hiroko's
assessment perhapas unconsciously he was trying to
sweat off any worries and uncertainty he may have had.
     


- Yes he was prepared to retire if he felt it was a
right thing to do.  It's not to do with a number of
wins or losses.  "If I got more than eight wins but I
felt I wasn't satisfied, I would have retired."

- What he was striving for was not the result. He knew
a result would come one way or another but more to do
with how much and how far he could endure at the
limit, on the road of his life.    
 
                     

=====
.....Jonosuke 
  <  Heart  Technique  Physique     ^ÐS   ^ËZ   ^ÑÌ  >

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