Interview de Randa Mai

This interview was conducted by Osada Steve in 2000, and published in Secret Magazine in 2002. A German version of this interview appeared in Schlagzeilen in 2000. An online version has resided on Asanawa.com since 2000. Part one of two.

Randa Mai prefers black (part I)

Not Chrome Hearts or any of the fashionable get-ups. And definitely no fancy latex perv wear. He wears baggy pants and worn-out shirts. He sports a three-day-old beard, dons sunglasses, chews gum and removes his shoes and socks for each performance. The latter allowing him to feel the ropes should he step on them. This nawashi (rope artist) even boasts a fourth dan in shorinji kempo, a Japanese fighting style of Chinese origin, but doesn’t look anything mildly approaching the threatening type. Randa Mai is of humble demeanor. A quiet man, he is considerate to others.

“The nawashi should stay in the background. The center of a performance is the woman who is being manipulated by rope — much like puppets brought to life by invisible puppeteers. I like to compare myself to the kuroko, those men in black that control the puppets in traditional Japanese bunraku theater.”

An interesting parallel. But what about the female fans. Don’t they want to see how the sensei, the master, interacts with the girl? How he weaves his magic? How he moves? “Well, of course, I can’t make myself completely invisible. Firstly, because of the stage (in most clubs the performance unfolds in the middle of the room) and, secondly, because of the lighting (every club has its own light show).

“But, in principle, my goal is to present the girl in her full beauty and to make her suffer in an erotic dance where pleasure and pain are as one. Plus, I want to show the rope techniques, the style, the level of difficulty and the intricacy that is all going into it. For all of these I can stay outside the center of attention.”

It has been many years since Randa Mai made the transition to professional nawashi. It’s a transition which now enables him to earn the entirety of his income from Japanese bondage. Between performances he collaborates on various film productions, an involvement committing him to more than a hundred videos a year, sometimes as director or producer, but always as actor-cum-rope-artist.

“Naturally, I need to be conscious about what the audience will see. Simply speaking, I can’t stand with my back to the camera blocking the view of the model. At live performances you often have people sitting or standing on all sides. That’s why I hardly stay in one place. Instead, I am kind of dancing around my victim all the time.” Perhaps that’s the reason for choosing Randa Mai (Wild Dancer) as his nom de rope?

“The more space I have, the larger the circles I can run and the more I can get into it.” And, indeed, once this nawashi is in full tilt, the ropes are flying all over the place, seemingly having a life all their own: loose ends are sent darting through the air, decorating customers and tables alike, drinks go a-tumbling and the female guests can’t contain their shrieking.

And what would Randa Mai say were the major differences between live performances and video work? “Live and video are two completely different art forms. With video you repeat scenes, keep changing the sets and have frequent breaks. There are cuts, new camera angles, new locations, even more cuts and then even more new camera angles.

“The actresses often come straight from the adult video scene and are being booked via agencies. They do not necessarily have a taste for bondage or S&M. In videos, the sex part takes priority, whereas bondage comes second. And, of course, you have the whole day to shoot. There’s enough time to play all kinds of games from intercourse to enemas, from whipping and cuffing to suspension bondage — all the time punctuated with a heavy dose of sexual action. You meet the woman on the set, do your thing, and the next day can’t remember her name. During the actual work there is very little room for real pleasure.”

Everything is staged, so to speak. Does this mean during a live performance everything is for real? “In a certain sense, yes. To satisfy the audience I need to send my girl on a complete journey. I can’t deliver half measures or something that’s incomplete. That’s why I only do shows with girls I know. They must be genuine masochists and I must have built a relationship with them. These are my girls and I don’t let any other performer touch them.” This is not to say his girls can’t still work and earn good money as rental slaves in clubs or pose nude for magazines or even participate in videos. But one thing is sure: a live show is a very intimate affair for Randa Mai. So how does a sensei spend his private time? “The highest pleasure is of course the real S&M play, play which is in private, at home, in a rental dungeon or at an S&M love hotel.” And as for how some of the more well-known sensei are either monogamous or married, sometimes even to a “normal” woman, whilst others cannot separate bondage from sex? “I am not so particular about this,” confides Randa Mai.

“I can spend the night with a woman without ropes or have sex with one ‘slave’ one day and with another the very next. However, nothing beats an intense relationship, an intimate partnership with an m-woman.” Suffice it to say that the number of available women dwindles only to a select handful once love enters the equation.

Does a man have to be a sadist in order to become a good nawashi? “The most important point is having an affinity towards rope. You have to love the rope. How it feels, how it smells, the sound it makes. You must fully appreciate the almost boundless possibilities it offers up for satisfying women. The rope artist must be able to listen into the woman and the communication must be there. During the bondage he is fully accountable for the woman’s physical and mental state. Why would a non-sadist ever take on such a complicated responsibility?”

Each to his own, so the adage goes. M-women included. There are those who like rope and only rope, others who like pain. Some women want to be slaves all the time, others just during play. Which would Randa Mai say was the best type for him? “There must be balance in everything. The girl must be a little bit of a slave, must enjoy just the right amount of pain, must love a lot of rope, must like kissing and tenderness, must like sex and I must like her enough to enjoy her company beyond the bedroom. She must be my friend, my girlfriend, and my lover.”

Who then are these girls that blossom under the whip and turn into almost angelic figures once hopelessly restrained? Almost all of them are “heart sick,” as Randa Mai puts it. Most are under a lot of pressure, a lot of stress, and have chanced upon a means of relieving this by submitting themselves completely for a few minutes, a few hours, a full night. Only about 10 percent of them are atama okashi (crazy in their heads) according to Randa Mai’s estimation. The majority have learned to turn pain into pleasure and almost none of them consider the rope as something intrusive or something to fear, but rather a good friend that hugs and protects their body, that makes them feel comfortable and cared for.

How about the breakdowns after a girl has endured a particularly hard session? One moment you have a mature woman in ropes, the next she has changed into a four-year-old child unsure of herself or where she is. “Things like that happen. That’s why you always need to set aside time for after-care, to huddle and to talk after a session. It can be a tough gig to bring a girl back down to earth, a girl who is crying uncontrollably and utterly helpless. But I like it when it happens. I enjoy it. And I am prepared to change it into a good experience for all.”

Upon close inspection, it would appear that the art of Japanese rope bondage is relatively limited in its number of techniques. In shorinji kempo, ninjutsu and some other martial arts you may have thousands of unique waza (techniques), but for a nawashi ? “Correct. There are only something like thirty base patterns. Of course, once you start with combinations and variations you can wind up with almost endless possibilities.”

Today’s sensei and performers may even choose to take on deshi (disciples) and one of Randa Mai’s previous students is Mira Kurumi, the great hope of the younger generation of bondage enthusiasts. Mira is pursuing an S&M illusionist approach, where he incorporates magic acts into his bondage performances. Nevertheless, Randa Mai, who prefers the term “S&M entertainer” over the more esoteric “nawashi”, is a self-taught rope artist, as, admittedly, are most of the other senior performers in Tokyo.

Can his initial curiosity with rope be put down to anything in particular? Certainly. Randa Mai explains that his first encounter with S&M came at the tender age of ten when he stumbled upon a manga book depicting a bondage scene. The rest, as they say, is history.

Even though Randa Mai has practiced bondage for twenty-five years, he readily admits that he is still learning and still busy honing his craft. After all, it is more difficult than it looks. “You need to remember that you are dealing with the comfort (or discomfort) of another human being. One small mistake and a rope with a load might slip, possibly leading to permanent marks or serious injury.”

Assuming a more or less equal number of male sadists and female masochists, there are still relatively few men who possess the skill set and technique to qualify as masters over women. As a result, many m-women are remaining unfulfilled. Is this one of the reasons why the more visible rope sensei tend to have fairly large harems of m-women?

“Maybe so. A good master must be part psychologist, part therapist. He must be able to recognize the individual requirements of each woman in order to open doors for her, to send her on pleasurable journeys, to provide relief through strict treatment.” The master as the good uncle then? “Relationships can assume many different shades. But speaking for myself, I am a very caring person, and, yes, I am providing my girls with a great deal of caring and love.”

Toys, girls, music (part II)

As behooves a professional nawashi, Randa Mai always brings his own toys and equipment, his own girls, and his own music. There are his ropes (about eight seven-meter-long asanawa, the traditional Japanese kinbaku rope made of jute), one or two candles, one or two whips, one or two carabiner hooks. These tools are neatly prepared and put within easy reach on the stage. At the beginning of each show, the kimono-clad model will assume a slave position, mentally preparing herself for things to come, waiting for her master to enter the stage, all the while Randa does a final few calisthenics before joining his girl — barefoot as usual.

Randa Mai is not a brute, and he’s not in a hurry either. From the rear he puts his arms around the girl, slowly touching and feeling her entire body, hugging her, making her feel calm, loved and protected. He takes his time undressing her, puts her arms behind her back and commences with simple upper-torso bondage (takatekote), the main building block in shibari, using first one, then two ropes. This is done slowly, calmly, deliberately, without struggle, without any force. The girl loves to be bound and is ready to receive the rope.

Both partners are sitting on the floor. Randa is still behind his girl, hardly visible, as he wraps the rope around her breasts. As the excitement grows and the music increases a beat, Randa’s moves now accelerate, the knots being tied more resolutely, yet never violently. He makes the girl get onto her feet and secures her with a single rope (called the main suspension line or tsurinawa) on a hook hanging from the ceiling. By this time the girl has already started the journey into her personal dream world. The main suspension line will prevent her from falling and allows her to drift from consciousness as the nawashi now proceeds to apply a further rope to her waist in preparation for a full suspension bondage.

The upper body is now parallel to the floor, the girl herself hanging by the ropes, enjoying the safety afforded by a harness of hemp. Meanwhile, the nawashi is busy putting another rope around her left leg, pulling it up until the toes of the girl’s right leg barely touch the floor. As Randa Mai picks up the other leg and fastens it against her waist, the woman now becomes totally suspended and delights in the sensation of weightlessness while the nawashi is putting the final touches to this human installation — an aesthetically pleasing sight for some, a painful and alarming sight for others.

Ever turned on your feet like a dervish and, after stopping, lost balance and orientation? Well, nothing beats hanging suspended by ropes and being turned in mid-air. Slowly, Randa Mai turns his girl whilst the rope bearing the main load is being wound up like the spring of a clock. Once the master lets go, the body will rotate counterclockwise in ever faster circles. Powerless, helpless, an out-of-body experience, under the complete control of her master, the woman now enters an imaginary kingdom that only she can visit, and to which only her master has the key. Perhaps later that night she will rest in her master’s arms and whisper to him about her journey and share her discoveries of the unknown, discoveries only a few lucky masochists are ever privy to.

An exceptionally joyous Randa Mai may choose to express his playful mood by jumping onto the human carousel, to both the surprise and delight of the audience. If there were ever any doubters that the rope could safely hold the woman, Randa is up there to prove or disprove any theories of gravity.

But the show must go on and a good nawashi owes it to his fans to present more than one technique. With approximately forty minutes to fill, the girl is now lowered and de-roped only to have four new ropes applied to her ankles and wrists, finally being pulled up hunter-style like a captured animal. It should be mentioned that hanging in such a fashion causes a large amount of strain, especially to the wrists, so the model is well- advised to gain extra support by grasping the ropes with both hands. Contrary to the previous suspension bondage, the girl is now fully conscious as she must handle the strenuous and painful position by smartly adjusting her center of gravity. Good for her that she’s such a cute and tiny little girl and that her wrists and ankles only have to support her lightweight 45kg body. Whatever your size, though, you want to avoid hanging in such a position for too long, especially if you are not the athletic type. Of course, this hanging position does offer a few gratifying opportunities for her master: Legs up and wide-spread, pelvis exposed and receptive to penetration, hands up and breasts lying bare to be sprinkled with hot wax or receptive to the master’s whip.

This is the horror-type of submissive situation and when the pain comes hurtling towards the alabaster-white skin of the girl, she can only wriggle and fight so much. But this is just the start of the tanuki technique, where the woman is suspended by all fours, the back up-facing. This is achieved by her master forcing her hips through her arms, the result being an even more painful position.

While certain types of bondage, even suspension, can be endured for relatively long periods, the tanuki (badger) technique should only last a minute or two. And when the act is over, the model will be exhausted, elated and tired, but happy.

Fewer people would be watching his shows if every performance were identical. Thus, the nawashi always offers variety in his suspension bondage. The bondage aficionado will notice that the position of the rope’s knot on the right leg of the model is on the side of the thigh, taking into account the intended flying suspension pattern. Needless to say, one type of suspension can lead to another simply by adjusting and manipulating the various ropes under load — handling the gear not unlike professional yachtsmen or mountaineers.

The essence of Japanese rope bondage is the neatness and beauty inherent in the very application of a rope to a woman. A closer look reveals that Randa Mai also excels in this department. Should a technique have extra rope left over, there are dozens of ways to neatly fashion the loose ends into striking patterns.

Just to prove that there is more than one way to truss a person up, a tight bondage is woven around the sitting woman in a modified ebi (shrimp) style, before she is eventually heaved up with her back to the floor.

Perhaps just to provide a little extra eye candy for his fans, Randa Mai suspends his girl this time with the support of just one of her ankles. Such acrobatics may not be for everyone, and it takes a special kind of bondage to involve the heel so as to distribute the load around the foot as evenly as possible.

One of Randa Mai’s strongest points is his prowess in locating the weight balance in his subjects, his awareness of the center of gravity at all times so as not to require excessive strength to lift his girl, and also to spare his captive any undue physical stress. Consequently, all his techniques appear easy and his girl seems to float above the floor just like a feather. There is nothing awkward or unbalanced in his suspensions. Suspension is easy, but making it look good is what separates the men from the boys, the masters from the amateurs.

Références

• Interview de Randa Mai par Osada Steve part I - TokyoBound.com
• Interview de Randa Mai par Osada Steve part II - TokyoBound.com