DWx

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If you spend those 10 000 hours doing the kick correctly. Sloppy or bad form for 10 000 hours would just ingrain bad habits which would take more time to correct. Yes but are those 10,000 not the point of correcting the sloppy or bad form? You start sloppy or not so good and then through aquisition of feel you become more and more coordinated. The more you play with the technique the more you can get it to work. Well that's my approach anyway. I like to make small changes when I feel like it to try and get the technique to work better. Well yeah that's what you should be doing. Correcting yourself and all as you go along. My point was that if you spend those 10 000 hours doing rubbish kicks you'll just learn how to kick rubbish. Not necessarily quantity but quality training. So maybe the answer to Dobie's question is that if you spend those 10 000 hours training wisely and perfecting the motions then you'll become a "master" of it.

Welcome Kita

If you spend those 10 000 hours doing the kick correctly. Sloppy or bad form for 10 000 hours would just ingrain bad habits which would take more time to correct.

Do you mix it or just spread it in layers? and how on earth did you get that combo? When I make a sandwich peanut butter and mayo aren't the first things I think to mix! ROFL! First I put 2 heaping teaspoonful of pb; spread it out. Then I put 1 level teaspoonful of mayo on top of the pb; spread it out. Then ENJOY IT! My brother came up with this one day when we were teens, and we ran out of jelly and bologna...so...a little experimenting later and PRESTO...one lovely can't resist sandwhich....YAHOO! Oh yeah...toasted or not, it doesn't matter....it's all in the mood. = me drolling twice You ran out of jelly and bologna? Please don't tell me you were eating those two together

My annoyance and distraction is more about my own perception. They didn't look nor sound Japanese to me, even when speaking English with a Japanese accent, or at least trying to. Then again, maybe I was fooled by my own expectations, knowing that they were Chinese. I don't remember particularly liking the movie, but I don't think the casting was a big part of that. And you're right. Many actors play characters from other cultures, and if they do it well, it's fine. I think Hugh Laurie on House plays an American very well, but haven't we all heard actors do bad Southern accents, or Brooklyn, or whatever. If Sir Anthony Hopkins were cast as Scarface, Tony Montana, it would take some serious acting and makeup to make it believable. Back on topic, assuming the lead characters in Air Bender were supposed to be from an Asian culture, I think using Asian actors would make it feel more real. Then again, it's a fantasy world! People can look however the creator wants. Well, when it comes to a movie, maybe the creator isn't the one in control. In any case, the movie was made the way someone wanted it to be. If they're right, and it makes more money this way, that's fine. If they're wrong, and it would've been better with Asian actors, I hope they learn this. I don't agree that people need to protest this movie, but if enough others do, their voices should be heard. Oh I totally agree that the actor has to be able to pull it off well first and foremost. Hugh Laurie's normal accent is about as English as you can get, if you've ever watched Jeeves and Wooster or any of his over stuff with Stephen Fry its pretty impressive how he manages such a convincing American accent. On the other side Leonardo DiCaprio in Blood Diamond is one that really annoys me; his South African accent is awful and really spoilt that film for me. Maybe its because I'm not tuned in that much to the differences in the Japanese and Chinese accents that it didn't bother me all that much. Or that I watch far more Chinese films that Japanese films/shows so the Chinese accent is something I'm more used to on films. In any case I think that that is a reason for specifically casting actors who aren't necessarily from the same culture as the character they are portraying. If you cast primarily on where the person is from or where they grew up you've limited your pool of talented actors to use. Ok so there may be some awesome Japanese actors out there but you can't deny that Michelle Yeoh and Zhang Ziyi are talented and IMO played the characters well. Isn't this a general Hollywood movie though? at least based on how much they've spent making it and how well they expect it to do at the Box office. And I agree Memoirs of a Geisha would have been better in Japanese throughout. First time I watched it I was pretty surprised when it swapped to English 10 mins in. I don't know but maybe for Avatar they thought that having the different actors and a whole host of different cultures would make it appeal to more people because they can relate to it. I think if they'd had a whole Asian cast it might have been more of niche film that only fans of the series or fans of Asian cinema would be interested in seeing. As it is most people I know aren't all that interested in foreign culturally rich films (they're also , they want big explosions and Hollywood action. Maybe I'm completely wrong about the reasons why but I think that this cast will make it more accessible to your average movie-goer and ultimately bring in more money.

Goofed up in class this evening We were having a bit of fun doing jump kicks against a target, instructor demonstrates two-directional kick hitting targets perfectly. Then my turn. jumped up did the kick... then slid and fell flat on my back in front of the whole class!

We lift the heel in ITF TKD. For the same reasons already mentioned: hip rotation and pivoting. If you watch our forms we do a funny thing we call "sine wave" which is used to ingrain this movement. In short, you soften the knees and raise the back heel to aid in pivoting on that foot so you can turn the hip. You have to have the heel on the floor at the end of each technique in order to ground yourself though. All this translates directly over to our sparring: heels up and knees softened whilst between strikes/blocks, heels down to ground the technique (or yourself).

Welcome Nick

Welcome Andrew

Heh I guess a lot of what I eat is weird food. Mainly because my family's from all over the place. I'm 3rd generation Chinese but my mum grew up in Guyana so that means South American/Caribbean food and the other half of the family is German. Plus I always try things at least once. I guess most of it is weird meat: eaten goat, pig's ears, feet, tail, beef tongue, gravlax (Swedish raw salmon), eel.. trying to think what else. Cassava is pretty good, its a root plant, toxic if you don't cook it properly. Anyone eaten any Indian sweets? Jalebi is really good, deep fried batter in syrup.

Do you mix it or just spread it in layers? and how on earth did you get that combo? When I make a sandwich peanut butter and mayo aren't the first things I think to mix!

If you enjoy Wado I think you should stick with it. Your teacher should understand. No-one should expect you to be at the same level as you were, especially if you've had your knee immobilised. Maybe its not so similar but I kinda feel the same way about my training and ability at the moment. During term-time at uni I get to train once a fortnight maybe. I come back to my old school in the holidays and I really suck and (at least in my mind) don't look like someone at the same grade as me should. And I forget a ton of terminology theory stuff. But my instructor knows this and as long as I try hard its enough.

Welcome happyzap

You could always try that! A couple of guys in my first year at uni did that to the main staircase in our block. They got hold of a rope long enough to hang down the 5 floors and took it in turns to belay each other to the top... they were both v experienced climbers though (and very stupid).

The pepper and mango is actually a "traditional" dish from where my mum is from (Guyana) or at least she says so. Apparently they used to eat it as kids. Works well with a bit of salt and pepper mixed into the chilli and under-ripe mango. Only one I think is really weird in that article is the peanut butter and bacon one. Don't think I'd want to try that One of my friends used to dip Quavers (a type of cheesy potato chip) into Slush Puppies. Trying to think of the weird things I eat but they seem normal to me! Gravy on stir-fried veg? Sorry Bob but mayo and peanut butter sounds horrible!

It is only 3 weight classes: http://www.london2012.com/games/olympic-sports/boxing.php That sucks for anyone in the in-between classes or higher that 165 or lower than 106 lbs. I guess its because its the 1st time.

I don't think this is a fair arguement to make for children not earning black belts. Its true that children are easily overpowered by adults. What you have to look at is what the child knows and can do as compared to other children his/her same age. The child vs. adult agrument isn't much different than making a professional MMA fighter vs. average adult black belt argument. The two are just too different to try to compare. But, does the inability for an average adult black belt to beat a professional MMA fighter mean that person isn't deserving of his/her rank? I don't believe so. Thoughts? As i said, it depends on the style taught and mainly on the individuals objectives, if that particular child wanted to fight in a competitive environment with rules i.e same age opponents then by all means prove their knowledge with the belt. However the thing that bugs me, i was observing a karate lesson recently at my local gym and two of the assistant instructors both maybe 13-15 were helping some of the students with kicking from zenkustu dachi, now i'd see nothing wrong with this apart from the fact that these two black belt instructors were not locking down into the stance and were both firing off kicks that pulled them off balance and caused them to wobble, now the kick in question was a mae geri, that along with the zenkutsu dachi is right up with the first stances and techniques most students learn and as such a black belt should be very familiar with them. To sum it up, i've no problem with a black belt who clearly knows the syllabus and can perform it to that level, but seeing a black belt unable to perform yellow belt techniques bugs me, it seems as though they've been given the belt simply because they've been there longer than anyone else. I don't think that demonstrates the fact that children shouldn't have blackbelts, more that that school's standards are low. If they aren't demanding high standards from all students, including children blackbelts, then maybe none of them should have the belt regardless of the age. Or if they are being lenient on children because they are younger then the school is at fault. Going back to your earlier point about a 10 - 12 yr old stopping a man abducting them, a 5 foot, 100 lb woman is also going to have difficulty doing that.

TBH though, how different is this from English actors playing American characters or vice-versa? Or any other actor, black, white, Asian, whatever playing a character that is from somewhere different to their own culture?Plenty of them do it.

Simple right hand straight punch. Probably my strongest technique and the one that I use most often. Usually like throwing it square in the other person's face. Or its good to get them in the chest if they're leaning back for whatever reason as it knocks them off balance.

I second needing the impact. It's called Wolff's Law. If you keep taking impact at the point you want to condition, gradually the bone will become denser. I don't know if Karate has a similar practice but we have what we call "knocking". With a partner you are basically blocking hard and making contact with their arms. Can either do it standing still or in a step-sparring way. On your own you're hitting forearm to forearm.

So much for my little saying... "White belt is the most important rank because without white belt, there's can be no other colored belts; no black belt." So, I guess that the Kukkiwon has no regards whatsoever for any Gup ranks? That's so sad! I don't think that's so bad. The ITF doesn't keep track of kup ranks either. If you think about it, both of these orgs have tens of thousands of people and to keep track of everyone's coloured belt grade would be such an immense task. Especially given how you can be expected to grade every 3 - 6 months. Just keeping a full record of dan members and what courses they've attended, what umpire/examiner class they have etc. is probably really difficult given the numbers of people again. If they work the same way we do, the national governing body will record who has what colour belt and then when they grade to 1st dan the information can get passed on to the continental org and the international one. TBH the international org doesn't need to know about coloured belts really anyway as at this level the training is fairly personal, usually under one instructor and you don't necessarily attend the bigger seminars and courses.

Joe has some great advice. We did have an ADD boy in our class a few years back. Hid mum made it known the instructors he had problems focusing so every class the assistant would be there working with him and to prompt him in the same ways Joe said. Normally in class we line up in grade order so, as a beginner, this meant he was right at the back usually at the end of the lines. This was great if the assistant instructor was free to line up beside him but when she wasn't, he was moved up the lines so he could be surrounded with people and one of them could take over the prompting. He definitely improved though. After a few months he could do the first form by himself and was picking up the Korean terminology too. Unfortunately we had to change venues and I think the new one was a bit too far away for his mum to bring him.

You mean you can't?!? We got taught that at blue belt. Follows on nicely from the lightening strikes. I agree Google would be your best bet to finding a school. You may also want to look at videos of Bajiquan on YouTube or in person because its unlikely you're going to be taught what you see in video games.

First off, JiuJitsuNation, I have a lot of respect for you. Obviously you know a hell of a lot and have years and years of experience. I don't think anyone on here doubts this. TBH I would actually love to learn BJJ, just waiting for someone to open up a good school round here I think isshinryu5toforever's post was spot on for me. If anything irritates me about BJJ its the few who have had a little bit of training in it and then start going on about how its the best and everything else is a waste of time. But I guess that's true for any style. I know a number of TKD people who think they're the best and that every other style is pathetic and useless.