Shorin Ryuu

Amen.

Yeah, but the syllables are short on each one. Not koooooo and taaaaaaay (exaggerating for effect)

I just type in "blue" "fingers" "Iraq" "Election". I don't use google images, just the regular web search to find pictures embedded in articles and such (usually blogs, since main stream media has much less of a selection of these kind of positive news items). Edit: Yeah, there is focus, but relaxed. Not a tightening towards completion.

I think the aggression that builds up in some people doesn't necessarily have to be channeled by the act of fighting itself, which is why I disagree with the crux of your argument. Of course, people do need to get things out of their system. That's why people take up hobbies or sports (although some people take this too far in terms of channeling aggression, perhaps) or whatever. But having to fight simply to relieve aggression is wrong, in my opinion. The other thing you said was a good clean fight to resolve an argument. What I don't like about this is "right and wrong" can not be decided by the outcome of a fight. A person who is right will be right, regardless of whether they beat the person who is wrong or not. Sometimes it is the lamentable case where the person who is right has to use force in order to stop the person who is wrong. However, it isn't ever to simply "prove" a point, because the notion of right and wrong isn't relative...(And I'm not going to get started on the prevalence of moral relativism I see in much of today's society). It is because it has to be done. Sometimes the person who is wrong has to be confronted by someone who is right, not to convince them ideologically, but because their actions are unallowable. In those cases, yes, a fight is warranted. But not because people don't like each other. Edit: In the case of two schoolkids, we aren't exactly talking about two rational adults or people with a developed sense of moral reasoning, so yeah, they might just fight anyway.

Well of course you have to apply the common sense test to things you do. I'm sure your Taiji background is coming into play here, which really stresses the avoidance of injurious or conflicting things. But that's pretty much common sense, isn't it. And slightly related but not relating directly to martial arts, why do people eat junk food? They certainly like it, and they know it isn't good for them, but they do it anyway. I choose not to, but that's my choice. Of course there are many things people do because they like, even it if isn't necessarily good for them. Back on topic, I think if a martial art can't be done your whole life, there's something wrong with it.

From Killer Miller's description, I don't think they do either.

I am unsure, but you may have the option of dowloading the asian support from the microsoft website?

I thought the first was the best, if not just for novelty purposes. The second one I watched and got a sort of "iffy" reaction. I watched it again, and it really benefited from a second viewing. I actually like the way they took it in a "deeper" direction and it had a lot of potential for bigger and better things. All that potential died horribly in the trainwreck they called the third movie. It's like they got bored and just decided to end it. They could have ended it exactly the same way plot-wise, but do a much better job getting there.

In katakana, it's used to extend the vowel sound.

I think you should start learning with wooden ones. Sure, they may hurt. However, you are learning to use a weapon, not a circus toy. Emphasis on WEAPON. You should learn with a proper mindset. Yes, I've hit myself a few times. But only a few times. It's very self-correcting. I will say I don't have razor-sharp kama. Why? Because the injury sustained by a razor sharp kama are far less forgiving. However, the weight and balance are not affected by using dull blades. With foam nunchaku, you're only learning how not to use them.

I don't think that's the answer. If anything, the core of lethal or seriously damaging techniques present in traditional arts makes it less likely to be used in the street. I personally will not use my martial arts (other than the obvious dodging, parrying, maybe restraining a drunk, things like that) unless I feel the person really is trying to seriously hurt me. Anything else, and it's simply not worth it. Ethically, spiritually, legally. If you are really good at painful but not necessarily deadly techniques (punching, kicking), you are more likely to use them. And I'll take this example from a Stephen King story. Bees have less of a tendency to sting you because they can only do it once. Wasps will sting you over and over because it doesn't kill them to do so. Therefore, I think keeping the knowledge of lethal and critically injuring techniques is important. And weapon in the hands of an ethically flawed person is dangerous. It doesn't mean we should rid ourselves of them. I think some watering down has occurred simply because of the reason you mentioned. Times have changed. People don't fight as much unarmed between each other (at least in more civilized portions of the world), but personal violence will not appear. If anything, the need to know personal combat increases because there are less people walking around with weapons openly in society. Therefore it makes a confrontation more likely to happen while you are minimally or completely unarmed. It always pains me to know that a few people with boxcutters were able to hijack a plane... The other reason martial arts became very sport-like is because in the case of Okinawan karate, it was simply dying out. Many people weren't practicing it. With the Meiji Restoration and the official annexation of Okinawan by Japan, there wasn't a warrior/nobility class anymore. The introduction of it into the school system required the watering down of techniques so they wouldn't hurt each other. Naturally, like any thing in school, it turned towards competition and sport. And another thing, if it was being taught in public schools, there was no way for quality control. Sometimes it was watered down simply because the teacher didn't know that much. Karate was never meant to be mass-produced in the first place, anyway. But the short answer is..."No."

Yeah. The first character is "Jyo" or simply "Jo", which is a combination of "Ji" and a small "yo". The next character is "ni". The character after that is the long dash.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying Kyokushin is ineffective per se. It's just that you don't get as much bang for your buck. Certainly you get quite a lot of bang out of Kyokushin. However, you have to invest quite a lot more buck to do it, if you get my drift. As usual, this is the whole "tournament environment" versus "street fight" environment debate for me, at least. I certainly don't want to fight a Kyokushin guy in a tournament. If I screw up, I'm sure I'd be seeing stars. However, what Sauzin and I were saying (if I may presume to talk for him), there is less of an emphasis in Kyokushin in general (individual dojo will mitigate this) on the whole range of fighting, which is what we were addressing. We weren't addressing whether or not it would hurt if some Kyokushin guy hit you.

If you are training for self-defense, it does matter. If that really isn't your main goal, it doesn't matter. For example, I wouldn't criticize you for playing basketball just because it isn't self-defense oriented (although I've seen some games that would make you think otherwise)... A problem arises when you are taking something less than practical for self-defense with the express purpose of self-defense. Is it my duty to warn these people what they do may be potentially dangerous and change their minds? Not really. I can advise them, but if they say "no", then there's not much I can do. It's their choice, after all.

Perhaps the site made the assumption that you already knew how it would be pronounced and you just wanted to know the actual characters. But ja-ni would be 3 characters (or would it be four?), actually...J ya -- Ni The Ja is actually "Ji" combined with a small "ya" to make "Jya". ジャー二 edit3: For crying out loud, JEM was right...it's Jyoni- "Jyo ni --" ジョニー I just wasted a bunch of time...

Um. It just literally means "crossing hands" or "meeting hands" or that kind of thing. Asking if it has some kind of story is like asking if the word "tsuki" (strike) has a story. It's just what they called it. In the old days, they didn't do free-sparring. It taught too many bad habits since they did it for life and death, or at the bare minimum, with the possibility of severe injury even if the merely wanted to control the opponent. With this in mind, I actually prefer yakusoku kumite to free sparring. Sure, free sparring is fun and it builds reaction speed, but you can do that with just drills and yakusoku kumite as well without a continuous atmosphere of "holding back". At best, free sparring in my opinion should start at the stand-up and end in the take down (whether or not you go down with the opponent is dependent on your style, I suppose...). But like I said, I think free sparring creates too many bad habits. Edit: Primarily because the attacks and defenses you do in free sparring are usually never what you would "want" to do in a real fight. I'm sure someone would say "Well, you're just not sparring correctly." But my assertion still stands. You can be the best sparring person in the world and get beat in a street fight. You can be the best street fighter in the world and get beat in a sparring match.

Probably not, because I have a trip at the end of August I have to make room for. If it comes down to it, go with a date that makes others happy, since I'm not even sure if I can make this one yet...

Not really. They would most likely pronounce it "Jaw-knee". The characters would be Ja-ni or jani. It really depends how you pronounce "Johnny". I put the dash "-" in there because that's how they extend the sound of a character in katakana. What you put was the literal characters, but they do it based on sound, not the actual roman characters as their katakana/hiragana is syllabic rather than phonetic.

Is it on the inside or the outside? Top or bottom? I may know the one you are talking about. There are two that are in that general area. I think the one you may be talking can easily be found by flexing your forearm muscles with your palm face down. Depending on your muscularity (I'm pretty toned when it comes to the forearm), you can see somewhat of a wedge-shaped muscle pointing down from your elbow region in the middle of your forearm. It should be at the end of this muscle (extensor carpi ulnaris muscle, I think). Striking or pressing this point against the ulnar bone makes it harder to tense the fist (in effect, causing him to release the grip in his hand for a second or two). There's also the ones just a little bit down and on the inside of the forearm (thumb side) that can have a similar effect. Hitting those works fine. They are also pretty sensitive to a "rubbing" motion from a hard part of your body. To be honest, with pressure points on the forearm, you can easily experiment using your own arm. Just don't hurt yourself...too much...

On the forearm, there are many specific nerves and various ways of hitting them...please be more specific? And before people go off on the whole pressure points are good/pressure points are worthless debate, let me just say they are a good tool to have. Not to rely on for success, but as an added layer of skill. If it it doesn't work, darn. But your techniques should be structured that even if you mess up on pressure points, it will still work due to the structural soundness (which I will use as a blanket term to mean many things) of that technique. At the very least, if it fails, you shouldn't be completely vulnerable.

Well, once again, what it represents in English (junior or probationary black belt) may have little to do with the actual character. 保-this character "ho" is used in 保護司 (probation officer) and 保護観察 (probation). But, like I said, these terms are especially vague and though I may be wrong, it sounds more like an American innovation so it may be kind of random in terms of kanji assignation (the general meaning is there, but they could have chosen many possible kanji for it).

Sorry for your condition. I know how you feel. I've torn my ACL, didn't have surgery, hurt the same knee, and then had surgery. That all added up to a lot of time spent not doing karate. Hang in there. Maybe you can get some good reading in.

Well, first of all, I think that person was merely being facetious and sarcastic rather than serious. As far as hitting hard objects to "harden" your body, that is actually meant to strengthen, not harden (a subtle but important difference). In terms of things like the classical Okinawan makiwara, it had give in order to prevent actual damage to the hand and joints within the body. All training was meant to to be done very gradually and very patiently, avoiding injury at all times. Many Japanese people, after the introduction of karate to Japan in the early 1900s, saw the makiwara and would pound away relentlessly and recklessly from the get go. I used to, till I wisened up (after a few months of hitting it sometimes literally a thousand times a day, I figured squishy knuckles WEREN'T healthy). Some of these Japanese people would purposely break the knuckles, thinking it would grow back stronger than before. All they got for their trouble were large misshapened and unusable hands. The purpose isn't to build knobby knuckles (which you can, I suppose), but to have the practice of hitting something (as opposed to air), practice using techniques that required contact with an entity beyond yourself and energy transfer, and to train form. I think the experience of pain (but not injury) is perhaps necessary to get you used to the feel of it so it doesn't paralyze you in a fight. This isn't an advocacy of going extreme and overboard like many people do, however. I agree with most all of your other statements, however.

I'd put my money on the 20 year karateka. Because after 20 years of being an iron fist boxer, you'd be pretty jacked up health-wise. I've posted on this topic before, but I really think it boils down to what kind of karate (Japanese? Okinawan? Sport?) and what kind of fight they are in. I may lose to a boxer in sparring or maybe I won't. However, I am far, far more confident in the outcome if it's simply a no-holds barred fight.

Ask if you can take a picture of him and other people together. Or him and you and others. That makes it less suspicious.