Zaine

I forgot to update! Wednesday was fine so maybe 5 days is the sweet spot? I will say that I didn't get a flu shot last Saturday, but when I did receive one the month before I was fine. I have heard a few people say that the 3rd shot wasn't anything bad for them so maybe I just drew the short straw this go around.

Welcome to KF! It's great to have you!

I think this really nails it. If you are worried about it, invest in some good elbow or knee pads. If the instructor doesn't let you wear them, invest in a new instructor.

In my original dojo, we exclusively did English. Our CI didn't want to use any Japanese terminology so that he could "dispel the mysticism around karate," whatever that meant. As such, now that I'm going through the ranks again, I find myself struggling to remember the names of different techniques. I literally have flash cards on my desk to help me memorize the information. Now, when I assist with teaching the beginners in the dojo, I take care to do like you suggest here. I say the English name, and then the Japanese name. So, for example, if we're doing stuff in Horse, I will say "go to horse stance, kiba-dachi," with the Japanese name acting as the command.

I have 1 friend who is in to karate, but we don't really speak much anymore. In my day-to-day life, I don't have anyone to talk about martial arts in person with. That's part of the reason that I like this community so much! There are so many awesome people here to nerd out with! Otherwise, I am friendly with the people in my dojo, and I would consider them my friends, but much like work friends we only gather in one place (COVID certainly doesn't help there, though). I do have some friends who, in the past, have taken karate and made it, at most, to 5th kyu before waning. They sometimes "talk shop" with me about it but can't go as deep into the conversation because I've stuck with it and have a much broader scope of knowledge. Maybe one day!

To this point, my current dojo makes a distinction between jodan uke and age uke. Jodan uke is a technique that meets the strike with force. Age uke is a technique that meets the strike with redirection.

On Saturday, I got my 2nd COVID vaccine booster. The first 2 were really nothing, and I was able to take part in intense workouts the day after. As a point of fact (and to be a little braggy) the day after my second shot I ran a 5k. Super casual. No big deal. Felt a little more winded than I might have normally, but altogether not so winded that it was worrisome. Anyway, the pharmacist who administered my 3rd shot this Saturday mentioned that she, too, had very little issues with the previous 2 shots, but the 3rd really knocked her on her butt. On Saturday, after the shot, I was quite taken out and ended up sleeping for 4 hours, waking up for a quick bite, and then slept the night through. Sunday I a little tired, but fine. Yesterday, I felt fine and was exciting for Monday night karate. I noticed some lethargy, but overall was fine. Until I got to class. Monday's are particularly intense when it comes to cardio. We really earn our lumps these days, as it were, and I do 2 classes. Within the first 10 minutes, I know that I had made a mistake. I was entirely more winded than I normally would be. Doing kata was borderline nausea inducing as well. The rapid movements and twisting was a lot. I stuck it out for the whole 2 hours, but I maybe should not have. Long story short, take it from me: do as I say and not as I did. 2 days after the 2nd booster, if you get it, is not enough recovery time for exercise. Maybe by tomorrow I will be tip-top, I'll let y'all know if 5 days is sufficient. Sufficed to say, today is a rest day.

Welcome to KF! It's great to have you!

I totally forgot about the Tekken series! I love playing Tekken but I don't often play the karate-style fighters so I guess it just slipped my mind!

This is a great question! There aren't many specific karateka in fictional stories, it feels like. It's either that they do "martial arts" or they do kung fu. I think for my it's probably Ryu from the Street Fighter franchise. Although he isn't my go to character in the games, I do enjoy that it looks like he's doing karate when you use him.

I recently did a good amount of research into the history of Korean Martial Arts because of another thread on the forum and my understanding is also that by-and-large we have lost Taekkyeon and what we have no is a reconstruction based of what material we have that survived Japanese occupation in an attempt to reclaim lost cultural practices. I live in DFW, which is huge, and as such I have access to just about every MA style you could think of, but when I looked around I couldn't find a dojang that does Taekkyeon. Being that Taekyyeon is largely a reconstruction, you might have better luck finding a place where techniques and information is posted freely (or for a price if you can swing it) and work with a group to practice it.

Another movie that I introduced my kiddo to over the pandemic was the Ghostbusters franchise. She is super excited to see the new one!

This sums it up really nicely. The first sentence affirms, I think, what any good teacher would tell any student. We're not giving you a test that we don't think that you will pass with flying colors. Tests are largely a formality. Can you fail tests that you would otherwise pass? Absolutely! But in general, I have found that these people didn't lack the skill necessary to rank up, but rather showed a lack of the proper attitude during the test to be considered for the rank. Here's an example. Matsumura-Seito has a Nunchaku Training Kata that you learn at Ikkyu (1st kyu). I dislike this kata greatly. There is nothing about it that I enjoy, therefore, I practiced it daily. I wanted to do a good job on it for my test. During my test, 5 moves in, the kata just leaves my brain. I had forgotten it completely. TO THIS DAY, I could not do the kata for you. I practiced it until I wanted to throw my nunchaku out of the window, but during the test? Gone. So I improvised. I did something that was close to the kata without missing a beat. At the end, my testing board gave me compliments on the kata, said that my technique looked good. Then my Sensei, with a grin on his face, asked if I would be able to do that again. I smiled back and said "No, Sensei, I forgot the kata 5 moves in. I think nerves got to me and I lost the movements." When I passed this test, this moment was cited as one of the reasons. It was not only my ability to improvise effectively without giving away my mistake in the moment, but the humility that I had to admit that I failed on an aspect of my overall training. All of that to say, tests are tests. They are nerve wracking and anxiety inducing. However, a good teacher isn't going to set up students for failure. They know you know the material. If you want to stay at a certain level, great, but an effective teacher will continue to push you forward because it reflects positively on them to have students who meet the expectations of a certain rank. Will they also respect wishes to stay at Shodan? Certainly! You're paying them to learn and at the end of the day if the customer wants something that is easily achievable by the business then why not?

Well as we all know assailants as notoriously kind when confronting you in the street. There's always going to be that one guy who takes it too far, but what are they going to do, ACTUALLY hurt you?!

Keep an open mind, my suspicion is that by the time you get to Shodan that you will feel differently. An adage that we like to repeat, both here and as Karateka in general, is that Shodan is just the beginning. Testing anxiety does suck, but we all feel it. I've been doing Martial Arts for 19 years and a I just tested for gokyu (green belt) and I was anxious. I've been a gokyu before, I've been a Shodan for over a decade, I practiced, and I new I had nothing worry about; but I was still worried. A good sensei does not test students who they don't know aren't ready to move up.

I would be interested

Congrats Bob!

What a fun movie. My kid and I loved it. She immediately starting trying to mimic the moves after the credits.

I'm literally sitting down to watch it with my kiddo right now! We're both so excited.

Welcome to KF! It's great to have you.

So I have a few hypotheses here, so bear with me. The first is that Japanese Karate isn't as influential as some claim. Korean Martial Arts has been around for much longer than Japan's occupation of Korea. We know that there were systems of what we think of as Subak and Taekkyon that were existing in Korea around the 1st century CE. It's likely that Korea, much like Japan, got some form of codified martial arts system from the Chinese, who systems of Kung Fu can be traced to before 1000 BCE. So it's not entirely correct to say that the Japanese taught the Koreans Karate, Korea already had codified systems. What they did do, however, was ban the practice of native Martial Arts in Korea. This, in turn, did everything but kill the native Martial Arts today. This leads us your question. Why would the Japanese teach the Koreans karate if they were an oppressive force. I'm not entirely sure, but I do have a few guess based on my understanding of history. The first guess is that either they didn't, or it was done by some sympathetic Japanese nationals in secret. I don't think that this is very likely, as something like this tends to make its way into the mythos of a system. Japanese relations with China was constantly tense but our systems still venerate people like Kusanku and Chinto, so it stands to reason that there would be a little more overt veneration of some specific Japanese figure in Korean systems (and maybe there is, I'm not as familiar with Korean lineage as I am with Japanese). The second guess is that the Japanese were trying to assimilate Koreans into their cultural practices and, essentially, make Korea a second Japan. This is what I think is the most historically sound reason that Japanese style karate made its way in to Korean culture. If the idea was to erase Korean nationality and create a Korea that was just a Japanese country, then it makes sense that they would outlaw expressions of Korean nationalism and insert their own. This includes martial arts. So in that, the Japanese weren't doing the Korean people a favor, they were trying to erase the lineages of Korean martial arts and replace it with their own.

You and I agree with one another here, I didn't think that you were lauding Dillman in any way.

That is also the story of Dillman as posted by James Coffman. Knowing what I know of Dillman, I'm more inclined to believe that than Dillman's account. I remember first encountering Dillman via a documentary about chi, in which he gave some stories about how he could use it. I also know that he claims that he learned it from Soken himself with 3 other black belts, but as those people haven't confirmed the story, I think that it's just something he says.

I'm really bad with Japanese terminology, I didn't learn it when I was first learning karate, but this is a side block, right? I Googled it. In Matsumura Seito we did two different uchi uke. Mostly, the stuff that came from the Matsumura lineage had the uchi uke with the thumb facing inward toward our bodies. Anything that we did from Shorinji-Ryu was thumb facing outward. That said, having the palm facing toward your opponent is interesting. Our open hand blocks and shuto uke did this, but I don't think we ever did it with a closed hand. That's an interesting way to do it, I'll have to play around with it.

Welcome to KF! It's great to have you!