Your Kiai.

[Spirit At Choice]

Two funny stories...

A white belt was performing a kata when an unaware instructor was walking past, and she let loose with a loud "Hai!!!" right in his unsuspecting ear. He jumped, and stammered, "Yeah, well, 'Hi' back." It was pretty funny.

And

We have a few girls in our class of white belts who I suspect are there for reasons other than that they have a passion for martial arts. (Maybe mom or dad made them come?) They often give embarrassed, barely vocalized kiais, or they just roll their eyes and say "kiai" instead. One gal realized after executing a punch in Kata One that she'd forgotten to kiai, so a split second after punching she said, "Ooops!" and it looked like that was her kiai. Without missing a beat, our sensei said, "'Ooops' is not a kiai!"

[KarateK]

I think it must be hereditary (is that spelt right?). Mine sounds an awful lot like my mum's, its like an eeeeeessssss. Then again my daughter actually says Kiai, possibly an age thing though!!

[lordtariel]

Mine's kind of deeper and comes more from the gut, but it's more of an EEHH-AAAAAAA

[Isshinryu_heart]

My kiai sort of sounds like the word "high" or "higha", but the h is more of a cough

There's this one woman in the adult class whose kiai is a really loud HUP...and there's a teenage girl who just squeaks really loud and high pitched...both are extremely funny especially if you knew the person who was doing it

[KarateK]

Childish as this may sound I find it hard not to laugh at some kiai at times. As a woman I think my kiai is quite aggressive, it certainly surprises people!

[Wadokin]

Mine is a loud sharp HA! As if I'm about to start laughing.

Sounds strange to me, but I suppose it accompleshied its purpose.

[Orion]

Mine is a huh!!!

My girlfriend is a tay

and one of the children in the class before screams DIE.

[aruder]

I used to always do "Zoot" or just "Zoo"

Now I vary it up, usually two syllables. "OoSa" is a good one

"Suehap" for a high pitched

One Shodan at my school always says "Yes!" or something that mysteriously sounds like profanity...

[KarateK]

and one of the children in the class before screams DIE.

Hmm slightly worrying!!

[Shadow90]

and one of the children in the class before screams DIE.

'O_o

Mine was ''heee''. I dont like noise really so I didnt liked this kiai stuff. My sensei said that I sounded too cute and I need to do something about it. I dont want to be cute >.<

Now I love it really. Its ''HAY''. Its short and, now I am the loudest one in my class.