joesteph

Dojang closed till January 5 Yesterday w/ the boys: I was able to review the four original wrist grab defenses they had to know to become orange belts, having learned how to help their little hands "control" my adult-sized hand and wrist from our instructor. Today w/ the boys: I was able to review the first three of the four new wrist grab defenses they have to know, but that fourth one needs our instructor to work with them. I can't review them on that one until they know it better. ______________ Leg stretches Ki Cho Hyungs (Il, E, Sam Bu) Pyung Ahn Cho Dan Chil Sung E Ro Hyung

Although I didn't have formal nunchaku training when I was younger, I had a friend who introduced me to them. He favored string over chain, and that's what I worked with. It hit my elbows more times than I care to remember, so I learned the hard way; I can see you're saving your elbows grief by having foam-covered wood. I never did practice with the bo, but with the shorter staff, the jo. I liked it, finding I could practice for fun from movements in a book. I could get away with nunchaku indoors, but the jo meant the backyard. I still have the nunchaku, my favorites being a pair made of rosewood. I also have two jo staffs. I'm saving them for the future, hoping my sons will like to try them someday. And welcome to KarateForums!

A former boxer, stationed on Okinawa with the Marine Corps. Well, Kuma, you'll feel right at home at KarateForums! Welcome!

Ki Cho Hyungs (Il, E, Sam Bu) Pyung Ahn Cho Dan Chil Sung E Ro Hyung

I found the fight scene on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3SlFNB_-s_o I wouldn't doubt that Lee liked it!

Do you think this will change as students start martial arts earlier, Michi? That there'll be too much time between promotions and the danger of losing students? Or do you find that in Wado there's a tendency for the students to be older (no younger than teenage years), so it's unlikely that it could change?

Leg raises Leg stretches Front Swing Kicks Kicking exercises lying on one side, then other, on floor: - roundhouse and side kicks (done slowly) Sparring exercises; self-defense techniques Ki Cho Hyungs (Il, E, Sam Bu) Pyung Ahn Cho Dan Chil Sung E Ro Hyung

Perhaps some false memories are rooted in dreams. There are those who say they don't dream, but we all go through dreams during the sleep cycles (four stages and REM, then it starts again). It seems to be the ones that occur closest to when we awake that we tend to remember. I wonder if the more "practical" or "real-life" setting a dream is in, as opposed to one that is fantasy, gives it creater credence, and can be stored, locked within our memory, and comes out later as a false memory.

Yes! The two photos at the bottom of the page, of Sensei alone and then the class as a whole, are what I was speaking of. I found that one challenge was to keep the traps relaxed, to allow the neck and shoulders to relax. Another was not to "overrelax," so that the "embracing arms" begin to come together, and your hands wind up touching. So much of it is posture and controlled breathing that your mind doesn't have the opportunity to drift, or that, as can happen in a seated position, you begin to slump over as you want to go to sleep!

Leg stretches Front Swing Kicks Kicking exercises lying on one side, then other, on floor: - roundhouse and side kicks (done slowly)

I thought prices were high where I live, in the NYC metropolitan area, but that last figure is a complete surprise. Is it in an affluent community? Are the prices so high where you are now because of rent and other expenses? I pay $90 for the first family member, $85 for the second, and $80 for the third, and mine is a middle-class community. That's $255 for three people in the NYC metropolitan area, compared with $400 for two people where you live in Southern California. And it's not easy to pay what I do as I'm not in the "affluent" category. Good luck with starting your school.

I'm sorry, Kuma, but I can't find Ikken as meditation on the Web. I keep coming up with it as "Ikken Hissatsu: To kill with one blow," which may mean it's part of an overall karate system. How did you perform this standing meditation? I remember being introduced to a form of standing meditation when doing Taiji in that I was to stand as though "embracing" a tree. (I'm not kidding; it's the way it was explained to me.)

At http://www.fightingmaster.com/fighters/rutten/index.htm it says: While Bas prefers fighting he actually believes in kata (prearranged martial arts movements) which is unusual among most UFC fighters. He believes that it is very good for controlling your breathing. To go through 45 movements and have your last kick be as powerful is very difficult. That site includes that his asthma started from when he was a child. I think it all depends on the individual. They help me as a lower belt for reasons I've mentioned, posted above, but I know that dan level hyungs would not be to my liking; instead, I'd prefer, as I'm already seeing bunkai "peeking out" in the hyungs I'm performing, or watching higher belts perform, to learn at least one bunkai per move/set of moves, and then string them together as a hyung. Incidentally, my instructor's teacher was heavily into dance until she was twenty-seven, then took up karate. Rising up through the belt ranks, she told me she really enjoyed hyungs more than the fighting aspect; it's during her dan years that, while she continued learning hyungs, she became much more focused on the "wail away" facet.

I watched and recognized moves from when I've observed higher belts practicing a certain hyung in my Korean art, Soo Bahk Do. The above are the ones I bookmarked. - The instructor in the first of these had a silent audience when going slowly and stopping at a certain point with his partner, then the noise level rose as they went at it at greater speed and to bunkai conclusion. - This one was easier for me to understand the bunkai applications. - When the instructor and partner were in street clothes, it was more evident to me how you've got to move--and move fast--than I believe if they were in uniform. Never claiming to have been a martial arts prodigy, I have to admit that watching familiar moves, as in the Gichin Funakoshi video, I'd likely have never arrived at the multi-faceted bunkai I saw in the videos. I wonder if the higher belts I watch in the dojang who are performing these same moves as they practice the hyung that contains them know what the applications are? The system is likely to have students learn all the moves first, then go back and gradually learn what they're for, over a length of time. It's not that the student learns individual moves, with, say, one bunkai application for each move, and then they're interwoven as a kata/hyung. This is why someone has to explain/demonstrate what's "hidden within"--or it's lost. Thanks, Night Owl.

Ki Cho Hyungs (Il, E, Sam Bu) Pyung Ahn Cho Dan Chil Sung E Ro Hyung

In "Comprehensive Karate" by Michael Rosenbaum, available by a free download from Iain Abernethy's site at: http://www.iainabernethy.com/Comprehensive_Karate_Michael_Rosenbaum on p. 87 it states: All Fights Go To The Ground: This mantra has been perpetuated by the popularity of MMA events. However, during hand-to-hand combat, the first person going to the ground is usually the first to be killed. This maxim is thousands of years old and is found in all systems of mortal combat, from the ancient Greeks to the United States Marine Corps Martial Arts program.

I'm not sure of the age of the girl, Heidi, but is it completely the parents, or is it that there's been a change in her, and her parents have dealt with it in this smoke-and-mirrors manner? (E.g., "frequent family emergencies" and "It is not fair, you just don't like her.") I wonder that if she would have made first dan, then that would have been the end of her martial arts journey anyway? Could it be that the parents wanted her to continue until she reached that point? Were there family arguments that you're unaware of? Again, I don't know her age, and girls mature much faster than boys, meaning social events take on greater significance earlier.

What we call self-defense techniques (Ho Sin Sool) in class are required defense against wrist grab techniques. What's good about them is that, if you don't pay too much attention to the idea that you're defending yourself against a wrist grab, it opens the door for you to see how to defend yourself in more real-life situations, in the broader application of the movements of the technique. The required one-step sparring exercises (Il Soo Sik Dae Ryun) have their strengths and weaknesses, meaning some are quite understandably productive, and others are, IMO, there only to incorporate certain MA movements together, likely to practice them. The sparring techniques that are not required, that my instructor has us do for variety, open up more in terms of self-defense training and have even caused me to better look out for "incoming," as well as give a good response. One, the other, or both can be found in just about every class session.

I don't know if you've ever thought of taking up a second martial art, Tori, but if you ever have the inclination, you sound like someone perfect for Taiji. It's movements are slow, but you concentrate more on doing them with a goal of perfection. There are many martial arts applications in Taiji. Everything is hidden. Everything is to be revealed. Maybe you've got an "analytical mind" and that's what causes you to enjoy finding bunkai in kata.

I'm not a dan member, but my instructor is a fourth dan. She's been on a judging panel (I believe it's three judges) for those who seek promotion to dan or higher dan ranking, and she has told me that these forms do become quite long, quite involved, with advancement. This brings up a question that has been asked at another time in the forums, Why do many end their studies at shodan? Could a contributory reason be that the individual who has already spent so much time with forms now must spend so much more time with them, that ending studies at this "high point" seems the logical conclusion?

Many people likely think of traditional as meaning there's a long history to that MA, but I think Night Owl's right that an art may have a relatively short history when compared with other martial arts, and yet may still be considered "traditional." Non-practitioners of that art would be unaware, thinking the art is centuries old; practitioners would look for certain components of the art that say "tradition" to them. We do tend to think of traditional, as Cross pointed out, when we refer to Eastern origins; wrestling and boxing have existed in the West since the Classical Civilizations of Greece and Rome, but "tradition" does not bring them to mind. We look for the katas, deep stances, gis, and belt ranks that make us think Eastern and even Eastern=traditional. Tallgeese's reference to the horse stance, for example, would make anyone think of a karateka in uniform holding such a stance, perhaps with fists clenched one on each side, palms up and elbows back. I wonder if an art is "fundamentally" traditional when it resists change, its aim being to preserve the art as the founder established it. Other arts are discovered to have their treasures, such as the Muay Thai roundhouse that uses the shin, but these are discouraged regarding inclusion in the traditional art. The founder, if alive in later years, would perhaps not approve the refusal, but the successors do not think this would be so, meaning the more an art is steeped in tradition, the more stagnant it can become. This may be done in the name of keeping the art "pure." By that last reasoning, pure=true in their minds. Then does true=pure? Tradition is the illusion of permanence. Knowing what is traditional in your art, respecting it, and knowing when a change must be embraced are all tricky to juggle. We might ask ourselves if something can be "true" today, but not "true" tomorrow, or have been "true" in the past, but time has marched on.

My instructor has had us do limited grappling with both students starting from a kneeling position as an intro to grappling and a training exercise in isolating how we utilize our own, and redirect our opponent's, force.

You've got some interesting insights into kata here, Night Owl. The reference to "show moves and that is it" makes me think of my posting that, as a lower belt, it's helpful. I've wondered if there should be a point in which kata/hyungs are no longer required, say after reaching first dan. I've watched dan members practicing for promotion in my school; from what I've observed, and from what my instructor has told me, these are quite long. You've referred to "forms becom[ing] a pursuit in themselves." I wonder if the highest dans see themselves as perpetuating the "artistic" in the "art," as less concern about actual combat ability is present, but a weaving of the combat applications becomes a goal. It would be interesting if a schism occurred in a martial art, with the breakaways mining all the bunkai they possibly can from the forms and using these for training and dan requirements, while those who remain with the original retain the forms for dan requirements, and reveal the bunkai traditionally, depending on dan level.

Iain Abernethy's web site at http://www.iainabernethy.com has a free ebook by Michael Rosenbaum available. It's title is "Comprehensive Karate: From Beginner to Black Belt," and chapters 7 and 8 specifically deal with kata. It's downloadable w/o cost at: http://www.iainabernethy.com/Comprehensive_Karate_Michael_Rosenbaum.asp These chapters contain text, photos, and even a special diagram regarding kata.

Karatefighter, would this video be of interest to you? It refers to the Japan Self-Defense Force's training.