First time learning about a "Pen Spinner"? Super interesting! 😆

There's a sport called "Pen Spinning"?!

From elementary school through university, I never once slept in class!
That's because I was always doodling. 😅 Even when I was sitting in the very front row, right in the middle.

In junior high, the friend sitting next to me was pen spinning.
What's more, he wasn't using a normal pen, but just spinning a pen that looked like it couldn't write anything at all.

When I asked him about it, he told me there was a sport called pen spinning.
I was absolutely astonished.

Pen spinning is a sport!?

I love drawing, so I hold pens often, but I've never spun one. 😂
Or rather, I don't even know how to spin one. 💦💦

Knowing that the world champion is Japanese, I reached out to see if I could meet him, even though I knew it was a long shot. (>_<)

I never thought I'd get a reply, but I was able to meet him,Pen spinning performer Kay!
He is the 2019 Pen Spinning World Champion and has taught pen spinning to people like Ryoma Takeuchi and Taiiku Okazaki.

I want to meet a world champion!

There are a few reasons why I wanted to meet him.

1. The unique sport of pen spinning.
It's also interesting to know that there are various techniques in pen spinning.
Since it's something so close to us yet a completely unknown field, I became very interested.

2. The hardships of being a minor sport.
Unlike baseball or soccer, there are few people aiming to go pro, and it's hard to make money from it.
Also, it must have the characteristic of being difficult to get understanding from those around you.
I think there must have been many difficulties that are different from other sports.

3. Reaching the top of the world.
I feel that winning first place in any field is truly amazing. Becoming a champion must have required tremendous effort.
And he must have employed various strategies to win.
I wanted to hear about the process leading up to that, which is often hard to see because it's overshadowed by the title.

Listening to his story!

⭐️ Things I felt were unique because it's a minor sport

1. How others view it
Unlike baseball or soccer, the first questions asked are different.
Why are you doing something like pen spinning?
Is there any point in doing it if it won't be useful in the future?

Actually, people start baseball and pen spinning if there's a trigger, and they continue if it's fun.
Only a handful of people can make a career out of soccer or pen spinning in the future.
You end up thinking about things within yourself that you wouldn't be asked about in major sports.
I thought that perhaps you end up thinking about not just improving your skills in front of you, but also how to approach the sport itself and how to communicate with yourself from an early stage.

2. The desire to liven up the industry
And one more thing.
The fact that people don't understand how amazing it is.
Anyone can tell that juggling a soccer ball is impressive, and even an amateur can be surprised by a breaking ball or an accurate pitch.

However, it seems that's not the case with pen spinning.
To begin with, from the outside, you can't even tell the difference between techniques, and you can't tell the difficulty of those techniques even more. 💦
Thanks to that, I get told, 'Do some other tricks!'.

As I continued, I felt like I caught a glimpse of the unique struggles that come with pen spinning.
What I find truly amazing is that they think about how to boost the industry itself.

If it were me, I feel like I would have been discouraged and switched to a different sport.

⭐️ Even in pen spinning, Kay's approach is different

Given the difficulty of not being easily understood by those around you, I wondered, how did Kay manage to climb to the top and become a champion?

I asked about the turning point during a time when it was hard to be understood by others.
Spinning a pen with both hands, passing it under the leg, and so on.
Apparently, the reaction from those around him was completely different when he performed like that.

Pen spinning used to be a sport involving only the fingertips, but
it evolved into a performance that uses the whole body.

Side note: I went to see street performance!

Now that street performances are difficult due to the COVID-19 pandemic, I went to see Kay perform at a park!

A common pattern for street performance is to see it while walking by and stop in surprise.
But actually, it seems they use techniques to make you stop.

Also, mistakes are part and parcel of street performance.
If a mistake happens, how they recover is also a chance to show their skill.

Drawing in customers from afar while making those watching up close lean in.
I want to see techniques unique to street performance...‼️

With a racing heart, I spent 3 hours round-trip to go see it!

......Huh?
It's not starting.

Thinking something was wrong, I checked Twitter.
It said, "It looks like rain is coming, so it's canceled" 😭😭😭

Oh no! 💦💦

Since I came all this way, I took a stroll through the park♪

The park was full of small children having fun,
older people were practicing trumpet and guitar,
and young people were practicing dance.

Parks are fun even if you don't do anything and just walk around, aren't they? 💫
My step count for the day was 20,000! lol

All's well that ends well‼️
Something similar happened before.
I would be happy if you could check out this article too 😆