KYOTO: When Jap sumo wrestler Takuya Saito retired from the game at 32 and started jobhunting, he had no skilled enjoy and didn’t even understand how to make use of a pc. Athletes in lots of sports activities can combat to reinvent themselves after retirement, however the problem is especially acute for the ones within the historic international of sumo. Wrestlers are continuously recruited early, every now and then as younger as 15, and their formal schooling ends after they transfer into the communal stables the place they are living and educate.
That may depart them in for a impolite awakening when their topknots are shorn within the ritual that marks their retirement. When Saito left sumo, he regarded as turning into a baker, impressed through one among his favorite cartoons. “But if I attempted it out, they informed me I used to be too large” for the kitchen house, mentioned the 40-year-old, who weighed in at 165 kg all over his profession. “I had a number of task interviews, however I didn’t have any enjoy… They rejected me in every single place,” he informed AFP.
Skilled sumo wrestlers or “rikishi” who upward thrust to the highest of the game can open their very own stables, however that’s now not an choice for many. Ultimate yr, of 89 skilled wrestlers who retired, simply seven remained within the sumo international. For the others, the eating place business every now and then appeals, providing an opportunity to make use of the enjoy won cooking massive foods for his or her stablemates. Others develop into masseurs after years of coping with aching muscle tissues, or leverage their heft to develop into safety guards.
‘Inferiority complicated’
However looking to get started over when non-sumo friends is usually a decade or extra right into a profession monitor is continuously demoralizing. Saito mentioned he evolved an “inferiority complicated” and located the enjoy of jobhunting some distance harsher than the harsh self-discipline of his lifestyles as a rikishi. “In sumo, the strong grasp was once all the time there to give protection to us,” he mentioned, including that his former strong grasp presented him a spot to stick, foods and garments till his discovered his ft.
Many wrestlers depart the game with very little financial savings, as a result of salaries are simplest paid to the ten p.c of rikishi within the recreation’s two most sensible divisions. Decrease-ranking wrestlers get not anything however room, board and match bills. Saito sought after to be his personal boss and made up our minds to develop into an administrative scrivener, a felony skilled who can get ready professional record and supply felony recommendation.
The qualifying examination is notoriously tricky, and when Saito handed he opted to concentrate on procedures associated with eating places, hoping to lend a hand different former wrestlers. His first consumer was once Tomohiko Yamaguchi, a pal within the eating place business with an beginner sumo background. “The sumo international may be very distinctive and I believe that outsiders can’t realize it,” Yamaguchi informed AFP, suggesting society can every now and then prejudge rikishi. Wrestlers who cross from being stopped for footage and showered with presents too can combat with fading into obscurity. A unprecedented few would possibly finally end up with tv gigs that stay them within the public eye, however for many, the limelight strikes on.
‘Very robust, very reassuring’
Keisuke Kamikawa joined the sumo international at 15, “earlier than even graduating highschool, with none enjoy of grownup lifestyles within the out of doors international,” he informed AFP. Nowadays, the 44-year-old heads SumoPro, a skill company for former wrestlers that is helping with casting and different appearances, but in addition runs two day facilities for the aged, staffed partly through retired rikishi. “It’s an absolutely other international from sumo, however rikishi are used to being thoughtful and being concerned” as a result of lower-ranked wrestlers serve the ones within the higher echelons, defined Kamikawa.
Shuji Nakaita, a former wrestler now operating at one among Kamikawa’s care facilities, spent years serving to famed sumo champion Terunofuji. “I ready his foods, I scrubbed his again within the tub… there are similarities with care of the aged,” he mentioned after a recreation of playing cards with two guests to the middle. And whilst the sight of hulking former rikishi round diminutive aged women and men would possibly seem incongruous, the retired wrestlers are fashionable.
“They’re very robust, very reassuring and mild,” smiled Mitsutoshi Ito, a 70-year-old who says he enjoys the risk to talk about sumo with former wrestlers. Kamikawa has additionally arrange a bunch that gives recommendation on post-sumo careers to wrestlers and households anxious their sons aren’t making plans for his or her long run. “Sumo is an international the place it’s a must to be in a position to position your lifestyles at risk to win a combat,” mentioned Hideo Ito, an acupuncturist who has labored with rikishi for over twenty years. “For those wrestlers who’re giving it their all, desirous about the longer term can appear to be a weak point of their armor.” – AFP