Rateh

IMHO that sounds on the low end of normal for the areas I have lived in. And by on the low end, I mean that the school would be charging the cheapest in the area but not be raising any eyebrows. (This is assuming they own their own training area, if he/she is teaching out of a school, church, rec center, etc, then the price would be considered quite steep)

Welcome!

Well, I'm no expert at all, but from what I understand, the karate gi comes from the judo gi. And the judo gi was originally made from unbleached cotton, which I'm assuming is an off-white color. Therefor bleaching it so that it is a more pure white wouldn't have been a big step. Again, I'm not exactly an expert on the history of the gi.

Welcome back!

Welcome!

Mine cost around $200 from a regular american store, Derwentbob. Thats why I buy online. Online mine cost $30.

Welcome to the forums!

I wear glasses, and I have tried contacts but they didn't work for me. My vision is such that I cannot see the big E on the eye chart without my glasses on. I have tried buying sports goggle that are used in other contact sports, you can get them with your perscription. These did not work for me, because the head gear in martial arts is soft, so everytime I got hit in the side of the head, my goggles would move and stay at that new position. I have found that the easist way for me to deal with my glasses, is to buy a pair of cheap glasses that are durable to wear during sparring. If they get broken, well its no big deal. And when they do get skewed, they take only a few seconds to fix, whereas the goggles involved taking off my head gear to fix them. I buy the glasses online from china, you can buy a pair for as little as $8. Not necessarily stylish...but they are for sparring, not fashion. When I know that the match is going to involve a lot of contact, I take them off, and warn my partner that my control is not as good without them, as I have difficulty judging distances.

"Moooooom! Abby is breathing my air!!" *Punches sister* You mean like that? I agree though, great job on handling the situation.

Then look up the term "Sempai". There is only 1 sensei. Having only one sensei may be the way it works at your school. But for us we did not use the title of sempai, any instructor was a sensei regardless of rank, and class assistants did not hold any title. What i am referring to is that Sensei means "teacher". Whoever teaching the class is "Sensei" and the senior student, or assistant is the sempai. So there is only one sensei in your school who teaches all of the classes? There are no other instructors who also teach class? (as I did and that was when I was called sensei). When I stated that teaching a class gave someone the title of sensei, I did not mean assisting in the class...otherwise I would have said so. I meant teaching the class as the instructor for that class.

Although I have always hated the stress of testing, I have found that it has helped me in other areas of my life where I would normally experience stress. I have found in the job interviews I have been going to recently that I am always quite calm, where I would otherwise have expected to feel anxiety. I think the stress of performing in tournaments has also been benificial. On the other hand, I have often thought, when I had a stressful test coming up...isn't martial arts supposed to be something that brings us peace? My first instructor told me that one of the great benifits of training was to throw out all the worries of the world and just focus on the here and now, and tests themselves bring a lot MORE worries to my world. Then again, if we do not forge ourselves in the fire, how will we ever become the best we can be? Where does strength of character come from, if not from adversity? In the end, I don't know if one way is necissarily better than the other, just different. It depends on what you want your students (and what they want for themselves) to gain from their training, and how you want to help them achieve this.

Then look up the term "Sempai". There is only 1 sensei. Having only one sensei may be the way it works at your school. But for us we did not use the title of sempai, any instructor was a sensei regardless of rank, and class assistants did not hold any title.

Congrats!

I became a sensei as a brown belt with 4 years of training. This is because in the school I attended sensei simply was what you called someone who regularly taught a class. For me this was the beginner childrens classes. Since this is my background, to me sensei just means teacher, so anyone who is teaching a martial art would be a sensei in my mind, even if that wasn't their title (Of course I would call them by whatever title was appropriate to them).

I find it interesting that so many people equate the term master with perfection. If you look up the definition of master, not a single one of them says perfection. The closest the word comes to meaning perfection is "highly skilled". And in my opinion there are plenty of martial artists that I would feel very comfortable terming "highly skilled".

When I tested for my 1st degree I made eight goals to achieve before my 2nd (which I will test for in September of 2011). The goals have VERY SPECIFIC parts/segments. But for the purposes of this thread I will just write the general goals. Goal 1 - Kicks: Increase my speed, balance, and technique in all of my kicks. Goal 2 - Weapons: Perform all block & strike forms 50x each (they are around 8-10 moves per form). Be able to perform my weapon manipulations 20-30x in a row. Learn 10 new nunchaku techniques. Goal 3 - Sparring Combinations: Understand what the attacker and defender are doing in the combinations. Create my own combinations that utilize the principles of the style. Practice each combination 50x. And master 5 combinations by practicing them 200x. Goal 4 - Board Breaking: Perform specific hand and foot breaks (I have a specific goal of # of boards for each technique). Goal 5 - Bunkai: Discover 4 to 6 bunkai for each of the 21 forms learned to 2nd degree. These can be learned from books, movies, and the internet besides my own brain. Goal 6 - Jump Kicks: Perform each jump kick 240x (160 on the left and 80 on the right). Be able to perform multiple jump kicks in a row without stopping. Goal 7 - Basics & Forms: Get critiqued on all forms and basics during private lessons. Perform all basics 100x and all forms 100x. Goal 8 - Self Defense: Work with at least 3 different instructors on all of the grab escapes and knife defenses for greater understanding.

My dad always gets us books for christmas, this year I got "TNT The Power Within You", "The Traveler's Gift", and "The Way of Kata". My sibling gift was the first season of "mental" not to be confused with "the mentalist". From my mom/santa I got two rebreakable boards, a pair of chucks, and a slanket (kind of like a snuggy).

Welcome!

Welcome!

Congratulations!

Congratulations!

Congratulations!

Congratulations!

Yes, happy thanksgiving!

I've always enjoyed practicing while cooking. A kick here, a stance there, it really works! I performed side kicks every time I cooked for months...now my side kick is my best kick. If you're going to be practicing in the kitchen though, make sure you practice slow and focused techniques...speed, jumps, etc are a sure way to injure yourself in the kitchen! Just because you can't set aside time to practice, doesn't mean that you cant practice. If every time you stand up you do one particular technique you need practice on....well you'll end up doing that technique a whole lot, and it won't take any time from your regular day to day activities. Find one thing that you do regularly (like standing up, cooking, walking down the hallway, going to the bathroom, waking up, opening a book, etc) and pair it with something you need work on, then you will get plenty of practice in.