miguksaram

I agree Akima...

No, I believe he still mainitained a certain standard for his students. I believe it was all the other paper tigers who walked through the door that he opened, that began the McDojo'ing of TKD

Congratulations you just experienced flight or fight. The fear drove your adrenaline to a point that you were frozen. Now that you know what fear can do, you better start learing how to deal with it or you will freeze up an no amount of training in any art is going to save your butt. This doesn't make you weak, so don't misconstrude my message. This is a natural response that you need to learn how to deal with. Do you sparr in class? If not, you need to start. MonkeyGirl, do you actually believe an attacker is going to give you forewarning? He froze, though he heard the person, he stopped to think, he did not react. Remember "Fear will cause hesitation and hesitation will cause your worst fear to come true". Anyone puttzing around 3 am in the morning is not usually out for a nice stroll. The best thing you did was get back inside, into a secured place. In the future, I would recommend 3 am kata training to be done inside the house.

Though I don't have access to them, there are pictures of KSN with DJN Choi. Yes KSN, did learn from his grandfather, but he was also part of the HKD family no matter how much he would like to protest it. Both him and SGM Lee were students of Choi, if not directly, then indirectly. There are pictures to prove this.

What type of Kenpo are we talking about? Kosho, Shaolin, American, Combat, Ryukyu...there are too many to name. You need to figure out which philosophy of Kenpo and which philosophy of Ju jitsu...Then take you butt to the schools train and figure out which one you like best.

If you truely want to be proficient, you should learn directly under an Iaido teacher, Kumdo teacher, or Kendo teacher. Learning the sword properly can really be done via video. I have spen 4+ years in Kumdo and Kumsul and I am still correcting mistakes and trying to get it right.

Good question. That I do not know. I am assuming that they train mostly with their individual schools and see each other at the tournaments and travel together for the tournaments. However, I could be wrong.

"Isn't Jhoon Rhee the father of American Tae Kwon Do?" Yes, he was dubbed the Father of American TKD because he was the first to market the art of TKD not Korean Karate, which was already established prior to GM Rhee's presence in America. My point was that he wasn't the first Korean to teach over here, just the first to start teaching Taekwondo as Taekwondo, not Korean Karate.

You have to look at the timeline in which we were talking about. Hapkido was only a couple of years old and never ventured out of Korea. Kuk Sul Won is one of its off shoots so it was not around yet. The main influx of Korean martial arts at that time would have been Oh Do Kwan and Chung Do Kwan people. They were all Karate. Keep in mind that Kwan means School not system. Their system was Kong Soo Do (aka Karate). Tang Soo Do was spread by the Americans but that was early 60's. Joohn Rhee is marked as the Father of TKD because he was the first to teach it as TKD however, I believe that GM Sun Duk Song was here teaching before GM Rhee. As for older Korean arts, you will be hard pressed to find any.

I don't think she was saying that Karate was developed in America, I believe she was referring to how developed once it was here.

The main advantadge is the fact that when you are on a team like Team Paul Mitchell, is that your fees and travel are paid for. They are a sponsor for your group. Now keep in mind that sort of team is different than say a local school team, Team XYZ Martial Art school. In that case it is the best of your school competing in certain events. Some schools will foot the bill for the tournaments however your spoils go to the school.

22 years (23 in October) in the martial arts. 19 years focused on the Korean arts of Taekwondo, Tang Soo Do, Jidokwan, Hapkido, Daehan Kumdo, I have been to Korea several times spending 1-2 months each visitation. I love the country. I have been to KKW once during those trips, however, if you want to see good TKD, go out to the country side away from the big cities. That is where you will find some hard core schools.

"Korean karate evolved into American karate since the sharing of other styles and techniques was easily accepted, appreciated, and encouraged. " Sorry, but that is wrong. Back in the eary development of martial arts, the Korean instructors, believed, and some still do, that you do not practice other arts outside of the school. If you told an instructor that you were learning chinese si lum pai, you would be asked to quit that system or leave the school. They were not keen on sharing their students.

" think the confusion lies in the point made by Dahmanegi. When the Korean arts came to the U.S., they were frequently called "Korean Karate" in an attempt to capitalize on the popularity of Japanese and Okinawan Karate that had become familiar to a lot of Americans already. " The reason why it was called Korean Karate, was because that is what it was. Remember that the roots of TKD is Japanese Shotokan and Shudokan. The Korean masters that came over in the 50's were part of a kwan system which practiced Kong Soo Do (Korean term for Karate), the name Taekwondo was still young and up in the air, which I believe at that time it was called Taesoodo. So what they learned was Karate not Taekwondo. They were not trying to capitalize on anything, just calling it what people would understand.