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Its a question about equipment, meaning you will probably get the most/best replies if it is in the equipment section of the forum.

For light sparring i would use: http://www.karatedepot.com/pr-pu-04.html For heavy sparring i would use any of the following: http://www.karatedepot.com/boxinggloves.html

Like Mu Ryuk said, hai means yes. In our school we generally say hai rather than osu. Osu is taken from the words osae(to press or keep) and shinobu(patience). So when you say osu what you basically mean is "I am keeping my patience and doing my best to understand, to train, and to work with you." When your late to class the general rule is: If you arrive during warm-ups, perform a standing bow and join to class. or... If training has already started, kneel in seiza at the edge of the floor and wait for the instructor to invite you to join in. Then perform a seated bow, and join the class.

We learn grappling at our school also. Basically all the techniques are taken out of the kata we do and usually geared towards either maintaining control of the opponent with a potential to attack them with other techniques (strikes with your free hand/leg) or simply to hurt them badly.

Next time your training why dont you do a little test and then come back and tell us all how it went. Get your sempai or one of the better students to put on your boxing gloves(so they dont hurt your face) an do a mock fighting situation. Ask the person to try and hit you in the face as hard and fast as he can when HE is ready without telling you first. Start arguing or whatever not at sparring distance, but right in each others face. When he throws his technique, (im talking about a proper pre-emptive punch here, not a chambered punch that falls short before it hits you.) Try and defend against it and counter attack. I can almost guarentee that you will be eating leather. Seriously do this and tell us how you go. Then you can even switch roles and attack your opponent when your ready. Even if you do it a few times to make sure it wasnt a fluke, you will find that the person attacking will land the punch alot more times than you can defend against it effectively, so you may not win a fight everytime if you attack first but it dramatically increases your chances.

I think everyone agrees that its best to avoid the fight if possible. We are talking about a situation where talking your way out of it hasnt worked.

You could put padding on the wall i suppose, but thats not great for hitting hard over a long period because walls generally dont have much "give".

I think the only problem you would come across wearing boxers while training would be "stretching" of the part in question. You can have the opposite problem if your under clothes are 2 tight. I guess it comes down to personal preference. If boxers dont work for you wear normal underwear.

Its good to practice your striking applications from your fighting stance on the bag so the techniques will translate almost directly to sparring and self defence.

There are a number of different ways you can go about bag training. A few things you can do include: 1. Try and improve your techniques mechanicals and power etc. by focusing on one or 2 techniques. 2. You can work on your cardio by hitting the bag hard and fast until you cant hit it will good technique anymore. 3. You can work on footwork by moving round the bag alot throwing a few techniques. 4. You can adapt and practice striking techniques from your forms/katas. 5. You can practice your weapons striking on the bag lightly. The list is almost endless, but these few things should keep you busy for a long while if your creative.

Theres nothing wrong with being independent, i am also a very independent person. You just need to remember that you go to training so you can learn new skills. You can do whatever you want when your at home.

I think there needs to be a good balance of both orders and self "exploration". It depends what type of orders your talking about, but generally the person telling you will only be trying to help you improve, they are not doing it to put you down. One thing you need to remember is that you are going to a martial arts school and paying for lessons so that you can LEARN something, not because you already know everything and want to show it off. You need to have an open mind to what you are being taught and when you advance enough at the technique you can use it how you like and develop your own interpretation(i.e. think for yourself). If your instructors teaching method is giving orders then you need to deal with it. Either accept it, talk with your instructor about it, or leave.

http://www.askmen.com/fashion/how_to/pictures/56b_how_to.JPG I found this picture which shows a position similar to the one im talking about. Hands dont stay still in this position, they move slightly making gestures as you talk.

You can edit the second post anytime you double post rather than making another post just to say "sorry double post" meaning you actually did a TRIPLE POST!!!!

It started by you saying you carry tonfa around everywhere. Back to the topic at hand.

I dont care much for people who thing they can beat up 8 baseball bat weilding guys with a tonfa.

Ever watched baseball? the bats seem to go pretty fast to me. No, i dont care how much of a 'tonfa master' a person is, theres not much you can do against 8 guys with baseball bats.

I do kobudo, i know what tonfa are. Rock-fight was asking.....

You could just go: http://images.google.com.au/images?q=tonfa&hl=en

The boxing stance protects both. A combination of techniques and footwork keeps a good distance.

I wouldnt worry to much about this, its expected that the higher rank students have a grasp on a larger number of techniques or principles and should also be able to help you out when it comes to the basics. His frustration is not your fault. Everyone has to start somewhere and remember, one day he/she would have been the white belt trying to learn things from a higher ranked student. Once again, everyone starts out being "not very good". I believe that them teaching you, will benifit their own training. Im sure that most will agree with me when i say you learn alot more about a technique or a principle you have been using once you have to actually explain it in detail to another person (you often pick-up finer points or things you may not have seen and thought of before). You need to have a good mix of training with white belts AND higher grades. If you spend your whole time training with people at the same skill level you will never get better because you wont be forced to increase your own skills by facing someone better at the art than yourself.

Once again... if we are still theoretically speaking about a "proper" gang, a tonfa isnt really going to be a match for their baseball bats, knives and guns.

Follow the above steps without running away. i.e. just keep hitting them, with weapons if you find them in your surroundings. This is real life, not a martial arts movie. Call the police, get some tough friends, stop annoying people who are in gangs, get a gun etc etc etc. Any of those will work pretty well depending on what extremes you want to go to. Chances are if they are a "proper" gang, beating them up isnt going to strike fear into them. It will most probably give them reason to get more friends, bigger and more powerful weapons, and come after you.

What happens if you find out that they are capable off knocking you out? and they actually do it? There's no second chances. I would say that anytime you find yourself "waiting" in a fight you are doing the wrong thing. You should either be getting yourself into a better position for escape or stopping the other guy from hurting you.

Forget blocking... keeping hitting has hard and fast as you can until you find a chance to run.(if your lucky).