isshinryu5toforever

A belt will fit each person differently. What kind of belt are you looking for? high end, low end, JC Penny?

That would probably be best left to your instructor. Standard colors are generally a yellow/gold color or red. Red will make your belt look like a Christmas tree. I suggest against it haha. Also, is it common for your school to have you buy and embroider your own belt? Usually, up to dan grades, schools just provide you with your belt, and if they want to get it embroidered usually do that for you as well. Just wondering, because I've been to a few places, and never seen kyu ranks do this. Just my 2 cents, I've never had a problem with my Shureido belt, even with heavy wear.

welcome

No offense to your teacher, but that makes very little sense. A kiai/kihap is just a forced exhalation of breath. It's mostly to help you get more power out of a technique, like the way power lifters or tennis players grunt. I don't think a loud grunt or yell is different in each language. Maybe you could elaborate a little bit more.

As far as I know, there is not a single person that can authentically prove their lineage in ninjitsu without a lot of leaps of faith. The last person who could authenticate his claims died nearly 50 years ago. This looks like a money making thing.

How do you get it out of your throat? Luck, some skill, often times they don't. It depends on how far down it gets stuck. That's why you need to make sure it's very well-chewed before you try to swallow it.

Welcome to the forum!

In Korea, Spam is like its own food group. They put it in so many things haha. I thought of another one: live octopus: You wrap it around a chopstick, kind of tie it so it can't squirm away, dip it in sauce and then chew vigorously so it doesn't try to crawl anywhere. It tastes like octopus tastes, but it tries to actively escape at first. Don't swallow too soon, or it'll use its tentacles to stick itself inside your throat. I guess I'm kind of like Andrew Zimmerman. I'll try just about anything once, as long as I'm pretty sure it won't kill me.

The summer months are definitely the slowest for the exact reasons sensei8 mentioned. My instructor has done a few things to try to remedy this, he holds movie nights, weekend camp-like activities, and actually got a movie theater to let them rent it out. He tries to keep the students, especially the kids, connected to the school by creating a fun atmosphere where they can hang out together outside of class. I'll have to ask him how all that worked this year.

This question is particular to what organization you're competing with. It's best left answered by your instructor. However, from what I know about Shotokan, mainly through interaction so don't take my word as law, the technique must be performed with great form, timing, and power to be considered worthy of garnering an ippon. My serious advice, once again, is to ask your instructor. He can answer you best, because he can actually show you. We can only send out lines of text here.

I was in the very fortunate situation when I was younger where the small dojo I was attending was extremely top heavy. 5 people in the dan grades, 3 ikkyu, 4 nikkyu, and a single, lonely gokyu. We got to play with the entire curriculum and figure out what worked for some, what didn't work for others, and what was kind of just junk. In an effort to stay "traditional," I think we lose the ability to evolve. I convinced my instructor to get rid of finger tip pushups, because it's been shown to actually weaken the joints over time. If you want to improve hand strength and gripping, the kami (weighted jars) is about as good as you can get. Sports science has been changing a lot of things, some things in the martial arts need to be updated, some don't.

Nothing truer has been said. That's an excellent way to put it. Unless we create a martial arts commission ala the Dai Nippon Budokai, or like the boxing commissions in each state...hmmm?

I would say go back as well. There's no embarrassment in it. I've been with my instructor for 19 years now. I've seen people come, go, and come back. It's completely ok. I am a comer and a goer myself these days. I live outside the US, so I see him when I can. I train on my own, which is something you can do outside classes to improve faster. I am also starting over in a new style of Karate, but I will continue training Isshinryu. I say, if you have an instructor, have had him or her for quite some time, and they are available to you, go back. It'll be like visiting an old friend, and a lot of the stuff you've forgotten will come back quicker than you think.

A huge part of mental preparation is physical preparation. To make your body instinctually react under stressful circumstances it has to be repeatedly put under those circumstances through training. That's why any military special operations soldier goes through a brutal mental thrashing when they go through training. The trainers know they can't just toss them in a war zone, but they can challenge them psychologically to deal with hunger, stress, limited resources, and sleep deprivation. We won't deal with those things in a self-defense situation, but you can train reactions. An untrained person relies purely on their in-born reaction. A trained person reacts in the way they've been taught to react. Teaching the reaction is part of being taught to defend yourself. I think we're actually having a bit of mis-communication. When you say self defense, are you talking about a specific set of pre-determined one to three step self defense setups? Because, if that's the case, then we are talking about different things. I can't speak for Bushido, but based on what we've both been saying, I think it's safe to say, we're talking about the whole package. All of the training you do in your classes from basics to forms (learning new techniques) to sparring should help your self defense skill set.

Ok, so we have a thread dedicated to strange combinations, but how about the strange foods we've eaten? My list, in no particular order: Lutefisk: Any Swede would likely be able to tell you about this. It's white fish, soaked in lye until it flakes, then the lye is drained, the fish is boiled, mixed with a white sauce, and served on it's own or with potatoes. Balut: A Filipino dish. It's a partially developed duck egg. You eat the partially formed chick. The bones are soft and cartilage-y. It tastes fine as long as you don't look at what you're eating too long. Bundaegi: Silk worm larvae, nuff said. Mice Wine: Yeah, yeah, it happened. An old guy wanted one of us to have a drink with him, I got volunteered, drank it, then saw the little baby mice in the liquor. Not my proudest moment. Stinky Tofu: Not that strange to me, but worth a mention. It's fermented tofu that's been fried in most cases. The pungent smell can be offputting, but overall, it's not a bad thing. I recommend giving it a shot. Uh, I'm sure I've eaten a lot of other strange stuff traveling, but that's what sticks out in my mind right at this moment.

I think people who say Karate doesn't work have seen a ton of bad Karate, because there's a ton of really bad Karate out there. They also get sick of the argument that the most effective techniques in Karate are killing techniques that aren't legal in the UFC. If they can't be practiced on a live human being, you don't know how really effective they are. For every person, and we've said it many times on here, the most effective techniques in the ring or in self defense are the ones you practice the most. That would be the basics every time: straight punches, front kick, side kick, round kick. Those techniques will be even better when you add full resistance and hard contact sparring to the mix. There's the old saying, "The hotter the fire, the harder the steel." That's why old school Gojuryu guys and Kyokushin (and it's many offshoots) get a lot of respect. They turn the fire up plenty high, and consistently produce good fighters.

Just looking at the clip, it doesn't look like anything effective was shown. A number of things are wrong with the video, mostly there is zero commitment by the attacker, and the defender looks like he's basically chain punching with a knife in his hand. I have my own issues with chain punching, but that's a different thread. Meanwhile, he should probably be getting stabbed in the neck while he's moving inside, because he doesn't care about controlling the knife hand, and he moves himself from outside the attack to inside. As someone said before, he seems to assume that by slicing the guy's arm first, he is disarming him. I think most knife defense taught is horrible, but it's because it's done for demonstrations and it looks cool. Very little of it looks like it's intended to work in a real situation. All in all, I'd listen to someone that does Kali in the Philippines before I'd listen to just about anyone else.

If you're just starting out, once a week should be adequate. It takes years to develop the ability (insanity?) to take repeated heavy blows to bones that weren't meant to.

Anyone willing to chime in on organizations and what they think of them? As of right now, there are no less than 5 Isshinryu Karate organizations in the United States: USIKA IIKA OIKKA WIKA American Budo Kai There are probably many other smaller organizations. It seems to me like there are far too many. That might be just my opinion though. What do you guys think?

Questions: 1] Which one is your style's organization a proponent of? Based on the definitions, my style is more a proponent of methodology. 2] Which one are you a proponent of? I am a proponent of methodology. I believe that martial arts is a field of study, and therefore does not influence society as a whole in the same way that a group ideology can. 3] Which one is your martial art based on? I'd say that's a question to ask Angi Uezu or one of the Shimabuku brothers. They'd have more a say on what their father-in-law or father respectively had to say about the matter, because they had daily interaction with him. I don't think Tatsuo Shimabuku ever definitively wrote down what his intention was in creating Isshinryu Karate. It has simply been interpreted by his students as they transmitted it to the United States. 4] Which one is your martial arts dependent on? See above. 5] Are they separate beliefs? They are not separate. They rely on each other in certain ways. An ideology will have a method for its transmittance. This is especially true of politics and social thought. A methodology will be influenced by the ideology of the society. This is true when the same martial art is viewed through different cultural lenses. Look at the discussions we have about what a black belt is on this forum. The methodology our different schools have dictate what black belt means. Through our social ideology, we believe that even the first rank of black belt has utmost importance. I would suspect that if we look back on things, most people who transmitted martial arts to the US were in the military at some point. This is especially true of Isshinryu. That being true, they would believe in the strict division of rank. Black belts could be seen as officers, where as the kyu ranks could be considered enlisted men. That has to do with the military ideology in the US. There is a sharp division there. When you look at belt discussions in Korea, they often revolve around the people at the top. The first rank of black belt here doesn't have that much importance. That is part of the social ideology here, that the people at the top are the most important in the rank structure, and everyone underneath is somewhat interchangeable. 6] Are they said same beliefs? They are not the same beliefs, because someone's methodology can change within the greater whole. Your methodology is influenced by all outside forces, not only the ideology of the country you are in. 7] Are they interchangeable? They are definitely not interchangeable. 8] Can ones belief survive without the other? This is where they are linked. You need a method to your ideology, likewise the social ideology helps shape your method. A simple example here would be corporal punishment in schools. It's frowned upon in the US where we value the individual, but used liberally in most parts of East Asia where conformity rules the day. 9] Can one become a prisoner of either belief? Definitely. 10] Does one belief or another truly matter? It can, especially when two parties don't share similar beliefs. Look at the discussions we all have about what martial arts are for. The teaching methodology our instructor uses will have a distinct influence on our impression of the martial arts as a whole. My instructor focused on hard contact sparring and proving that your techniques worked. Do all Isshinryu sensei do this? No.

I don't think students dating each other is a huge problem. I think an instructor dating a student could lead to some issues. If the instructor's significant other joins the class after they're already a couple, that's a whole different story. I know several couples where the man or the woman started martial arts after they got married to get a better perspective on a big part of their spouse's life. It's natural to take an interest in what your significant other does. I told my fiance though, that other than informal stuff outside a Karate school, I will not be the one teaching her Karate. That way, she can't tell me what a jerk I am when I'm putting people through the paces during conditioning exercises. I think it just works better that way haha.

I think this is a great argument, and agree 100%. That's why I have a hard time advocating against black belts for children. A 7 year old, ok, I can argue against that, but a 13 year old, that's a little different. In Korea a black belt in Taekwondo just means you know the basics and taeguk forms 1-8. That's it, period. From what I've heard about yudo (judo) here, it means you know a couple throws and you won't get hurt if they throw you full force. It means that they really do view first dan as simply a beginning. You're kind of a novice as a first dan. You know the basics, but you're not going to compete with the best. It's a far cry from what the US desires out of a black belt, or most people in the US.

I don't think any of those are strange, save maybe the yogurt and coffee. JohnASE, note on the egg thing. First, you'd smell if there salmonella problems with the egg itself, second, you can wash the outside in steaming hot water from the tap, and it'll kill the bacteria on the shell, which is where it lives. The egg inside is in a sterile environment, but it can rot as it's not in development anymore. It's a trick I learned from my bio teacher. So, just wash the eggs using extremely hot water, and you have no worries about eating them raw. As far as strange combinations I've seen: Kraft cheese on top of dumplings. My friend's roommate did this, and the description just made me go ew. Kraft cheese on top of ddukbokki. Ddukbokki is a Korean rice cake and fish cake dish. It's very spicy, and the cheese just tastes weird with the type of spice they use. Cracker salad. This one was relayed to me by a friend after he went to boot camp. Apparently, one of the guys in his boot camp group loved this. You take a full, Costco sized bottle of mayo, dump it in a bowl, and then take a full package of crackers and crush it up in to the mayo. Mix, and eat. I don't eat a ton of strange combined foods, but I have a long list of strange foods I've eaten.

The main difference is opportunity. I don't care about general Hollywood movies. If they want John Cho to play general Asian guy number 4 in the next Fast and the Furious movie, so be it. It's when they waste golden opportunities to actually do something relevant culturally that I get annoyed. Letters from Iwo Jima was a great movie, and I think if it had been done in English with a mix of generally East Asian actors it would have detracted from the film. I think Memoirs of a Geisha would have been better than it was, if it was done in Japanese. US studios have the pool of actors available to them to pull it off. This isn't the 60s, and we don't need any more Mickey Rooney "Breakfast at Tiffany's" moments. That's why Harold and Kumar was actually a culturally significant, and in a way, groundbreaking movie.

The impression I get is that gup ranks aren't that important, because so many people do Taekwondo, especially in Korea. Chodan (shodan) is kind of a starting point. You get it in a year or two, depending on age and ability, and if you stick around after that, it means you actually want to train. 2nd dan means you stuck around for another year, 3rd dan means you're more serious. 4th dan is where you start getting a lot more respect. That said, from what I know of the WTF, you need to be a 3rd dan to examine people for rank. 1st and 2nd dan students help run the belt testings, but they are not official examiners. 4th dan and above can grade for shodan up to one grade under their current rank until you get to 3rd dan. From 4th dan and above you need a panel of judges. The test is much more comprehensive. The reason, this is my opinion, the WTF/Kukkiwon only cares about dan grades is probably because they expect your teacher to care about the gup ranks. They're the governing body for international competitions. They only worry about fighters who fight in international competitions, and those people would all be black belts.