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On being tied in ‘Naka style’ by Naka-san
Have you ever been in the middle of something when you realised that it’s your dream coming true, only you didn’t even know you had such a dream? It happened to me. And it made me cry in ropes for the first time. (…)
The moment he invited me on stage to kneel in front of him, I finally understood what was happening. I also realised that no matter how many pictures and videos of his rope I’ve seen and no matter that I did a workshop with him and Iroha-san and had seen them perform, he was a stranger to me.
Rope gives meaning to my pain
I sometimes wonder, or get asked, why do I like to get tied. It is a difficult question to answer because I like it with different people for different reasons. I like to be under the power of dominant men and suffering in their ropes is a way to express my devotion to them. I like to feel helpless and abused and rope is a great tool for my partners to make me feel this way. I like to serve, to please people with my being. I like it when people enjoy me. There is one reason, however, that is the strongest, deepest and most personal of all. It is so deeply ingrained in my being that I believe that, in some way, it always shows up, even if my partners use it in different ways.
Rope bondage is my laboratory for investigating vulnerability.
Everything you ever wanted to know about (female) rope modelling outfits but you were afraid to ask
I put quite a lot of attention to what I am wearing for a rope scene because I believe that it has a big influence on my interaction with the rigger. Like with everything, learning what that influence actually is has been a journey for me. Rope fashion is not a topic as deep as exploring limits, losing control, eroticism, handling rejection, or being patient which I have explored in the past. However, that does not mean that it doesn’t have a significant impact on the way I receive rope. Or that it is less important.
When the time comes I want to be empty for You so that You can fill me in
I’ve been recently shedding off more and more of my expectations and (what I think are) my needs, in rope, in BDSM and in life in general. I began to realize that they are clouding my experience of what is right in front of me. Instead of living my life in the shape that it is having at this moment, and learning from it, I dream almost constantly about the things that might happen or about the things that I miss. The fact is, though, that no need or desire fulfilled in my dreams is better than the most mundane reality. Because nothing beats direct experience.
On how Akane-san gave us everything she had
Recently, I had the pleasure to participate in an unique rope event, Onawa Asobi festival in Antwerp. Originally organised by Yoi Yoshida in Tokyo, Japan, this year it was brought to Europe as a joint effort of BeShibari, shibarista_jesss and Yoi-san.
The idea of the festival is to bring together amateur and professional Shibari enthusiasts and to allow them to present to the audience their way of practicing rope. In 2 days, 14 performances, 30 minutes each, were held during the day, while in the evenings free tying took place during ropejams.
My sacrifice is a solitary space
I’ve been thinking recently about my ways to receive ropes. I say ways because they are different depending on who I tie with, my mood, their mood, the dynamics between us in that particular moment, the style that we tie in and many other factors. There are certain experiences that I crave and seek more than others, however. One of them is the feeling of sacrificing myself for the rigger.
Rope bottoming reflections after the EURIX Round Table - vol.1 Empowerment and authenticity
During the last Eurix, in the Fall of ‘19, I selfishly organized a round table discussion on rope modelling. I say selfishly because I felt a need for better defining what rope bottoming is about, what are the different ways to approach it, and what are the skills that people see as valuable and worth practising as a rope model (if any), and I wanted to use that discussion to find the answers to at least some of these questions.
Rope as a tool for opening up one’s heart
Lately, I haven't been tied that much. For a number of reasons.
Not that much means once every two weeks when it used to be twice every week. That means a fourfold decrease in frequency. A couple of months ago, it would be devastating to me. Right now, it's interesting.
It's interesting because it allows me to observe my reactions to these new circumstances and learn more about myself and my relation to rope bondage. As it turns out, the opportunities to learn and deepen your practice are abundant if your mind is open to it.
To me, rope is about eroticism
I feel like I've been circling around this topic a lot, but I've never directly expressed it. So here I say it, to me rope bondage is an erotic activity. It can be more or less sexual depending on the circumstances but an element of eroticism is always there.
On handling rejection in rope
I do have a lot of experience with rejection in tango because the specifics of this dance and the social norms surrounding it are basically built around the notion of rejection. I think that my experience from tango can be really well translated into rope reality and can be helpful to some people. It certainly has been for me as I think that it is one of the reasons why I can quite often avoid rejection altogether and I handle it pretty well if it happens.
To me, rope is about losing control
I started bottoming in a community where the presence of active power bottoms was very prominent. (…) In the beginning, I was trying to become like those models as they were the only role models that I’ve had. However, after some attempts, I started feeling like there is something in their approach that did not fit my personality and the reasons why I loved rope. (…) It was leaving too much control in the hands of the model (at least seemingly) and that was the opposite of what I wanted.
To me, rope is about exploring the limits of the mind
I am currently trying to define what drives me in rope bondage so that I can understand better where I stand in the realm of rope bottoming and (hopefully) make it easier for people who hear my thoughts on it to interpret them and find a place for them within their own definitions. (…) These are some of my reasons for doing rope bondage and my personal approach to it. I hope that you will have some pleasure from reading it and take from it what you feel like.
On the merit of patience in rope models
I haven’t always been a patient model. In fact, I used to be a very impatient and annoying one. I used to be a model that would always want to be played with and entertained and couldn’t stand rope tops practising things on her. (…) I became a very patient and obedient model. (…) I would like to share here the realizations that brought me to that mindset, as I do think that patience is one of the most important qualities for creating beautiful kinbaku that a model can have and that it doesn't only benefit the riggers but also the models themselves.
Thoughts upon recovering from a rope injury
I've been tied a lot lately and I think that I can finally say that I'm back to my full physical fitness from before the injury. It feels great to be able to be in ropes again without constant vigilance over what's happening in my body. To be able to let go like I used to do.
Thoughts on my approach to rope modelling after my first ever public rope performance
I can't even express how privileged I feel to have given my first rope performance as a model of amazing Soptik in the School of rope run by Kirigami and Tenshiko in Milan. It was a small and intimate show, intended for the audience to experience a real session that could happen between the two of us in private. Around 40 people were allowed to have a peek into our dynamic (almost) without a filter. And I believe that for some it was an intense experience. Maybe even as intense as it was for me.
My thoughts on objectification in Japanese rope bondage and the differences between the ways that the Japanese and the Westerners do rope
Some time ago, I’ve been teaching a workshop on objectification in rope with Soptik and during one of the feedback rounds an interesting statement was made by one of the participants. They indicated that they are currently mainly practising Naka style and therefore objectification was a very unnatural (but also interesting) way for them to treat their model. I was extremely surprised by this statement because the way that I see Naka style is that it is extremely objectifying.
What I want to experience in rope is You
I tie with different riggers who have very different styles, but there is a conviction amongst the people who know me that my prefered style of being tied in, is the more traditional Japanese rope bondage, let’s call it kinbaku (I realize that it is a vague term, but I think that most of the people reading this post will have some idea of what I mean). Therefore, often when I say that I enjoyed tying with someone who doesn’t fit into that box, I get very surprised reactions.
Going through a rope injury-induced existential crisis
What was bound to happen, has happened. I got injured when doing rope. It’s not your typical wrist drop, but some weird strain of the muscles in my shoulder, which in turn compresses my nerves. At least that is what the physiotherapist told me. The technicalities are beside the point of this writing though (although I do realize that it is an interesting topic in itself). What I want to talk about is how it makes me feel, because writing about stuff usually helps me get over it and in this case getting over it is highly advisable as I am going a bit crazy.