March 4, 2024
These new techniques, footwork, steps, mindsets, strategies, tactics, and positions used in today’s sports-karate’s kumite illustrate best the discipline’s far-reaching separation from karate-jutsu’s kata: there is no kata anymore in sports-karate’s kumite.
7 Min. Read
February 19, 2024
Advanced level karateka understand concepts, including all their hidden options, and realize all the big pictures in combat where these concepts may be applied, whereas beginners narrowly see a technique to be used for only one specific application.
9 Min. Read
January 29, 2024
Twenty-twenty-four marks the Year of the Wood Dragon in the Chinese zodiac. YMAA Staff Writer Gene Ching, who was born under the sign of the Dragon and bears the Buddhist Shaolin name ‘dragon,’ shares some insights on the mythology behind Chinese dragons and the element of wood.
Reading Time 8 minutes.
December 4, 2023
Reflections from Dr. Hermann Bayer and his attendance at “Day of Karate” October 25, 2023 Naha, Okinawa, Japan.
September 25, 2023
If you practice Chinese martial arts or qigong, how important is it to understand Daoism? YMAA Staff Writer Gene Ching ruminates on this by reflecting upon his own personal history as a practitioner who is not Daoist.
For many practitioners, the phrase “martial arts” doesn’t do a particularly good job of encompassing the complexity of the systems we study. There is also a certain oxymoronic tension between things martial and things arty and serious trainees often prefer to emphasize the physical efficacy of these systems.
In the early part of the twentieth century, when Okinawan karate teachers were first asked to provide names for their karate by the Butokukai in Japan, they struggled to come up with a name that did justice to the martial art they practiced.
Most non-Chinese people (Westerners) call the Spring Festival 'Chinese New Year.' The 2014 Chinese Spring Festival falls on January 31 continuing through February 6. According to the Chinese zodiac it is the Year of the Wooded Horse. In Chinese Five Element theory, Horse is in the Fire group, which is the strongest fire animal in twelve zodiacs.
Personal research requires you to look inward towards your own nature, and to take responsibility for your karate; to step out of your comfort zone. You can do this by attending events like open courses if you like, but in truth, such challenges do little to aid your progress.
“Karate training is easy!” Now there’s a statement to get your head around. But is there any truth to it; is training in karate easy? Well, children, the unfit, the lazy, and folks of dubious character…all seem to have no problem being awarded a black belt in karate these days, so the training must be easy…right?
Over a period of about eight years, beginning in the early 1990s, I began taking a closer look around the world at the various religious and philosophical beliefs people held, and saw in many of them much to be admired. I also noticed there was quite a lot of common ground. I was initially astonished to discover, for example, how the sacred text of Judaism, the Torah, tells the same story as the first five books of the Bible, known to Christians as the books of the Old Testament.
A long time ago, there was a family that owned a small farm. The father worked very hard to make the farm successful so that he would be able to leave it to his two sons when he died. The elder son, who was married, was named Der-Shin, while the younger son, who was not married, was named Der-Yi.
I realized fairly early in life that different people learn and process information in different ways. When teaching and learning styles misalign, students progress slowly, if at all. As a child, I had the opportunity to take judo instruction from a former national champion who was the highest-ranking black belt in the United States at that time.
It’s ironic that the world’s best-known karate master never existed. The much-loved Mr. Miyagi from the Karate Kid movies is the product of a Hollywood scriptwriter, and just one more example of how the public’s view of martial arts has more to do with fantasy than reality.
At a little over 26 degrees north of the equator, Okinawa enjoys a subtropical climate, and for much of the year its inhabitants live under clear blue skies. However, during the early summer months, typhoons sweep in off the Pacific Ocean bringing with them strong winds and huge seas often resulting in damage to property, and sometimes loss of life.
When I was a boy, my grandmother and my martial arts teachers told me many stories. This was very common in China, especially in the old days before television and radio, and especially in previous centuries when the vast majority of the population could not read. While these stories were a main source of entertainment, they also played an important role in the moral and cultural education of the children.
Those who enter a dojo for the purpose of maintaining good health engage in a training routine that may look similar to those engaged in budo karate, but this similarity exists only on the surface.
The Chinese year 4711 begins on February 10, 2013. According to the Chinese zodiac it will be the Year of the Snake, euphemistically referred to as the 'little dragon'.
Daoist monk Zhou, Xuan-Yun grew up in a small village, Liu Gang Zu, in Henan Province with about 100 residents. The following are his memories and comments about the Spring Festival.
Understanding your place in life is always a good thing. However, in the world of martial arts some times it can be hard to know. In the real world, the employer and employee are clearly defined; parent, child is another example. However, the martial arts are based on skills.
"My sensei is a 5th dan," said one young man. "Oh yeh, my sensei is 6th," said the other. "My sensei has black belts in four different martial arts." "Well, my sensei is a master of weapons!"
The size of an Okinawan karate dojo is likely to be smaller than its counterpart in America or Europe. It is also more likely to be attached to or form a part of the sensei’s home. Space on the island is at a premium and few families can afford the luxury of leaving large sections of their home vacant and unused for most of the day.
In karate, when your sporting days are over, you might, like many others, make the false assumption that you can simply move across to budo karate: if you do, you’re making a big mistake!
There were only two combatants involved, but it took eight of us to break up the fight without hurting anyone, four officers, three security guards, and myself. Once we got the participants separated we began sorting out what happened.
For many people training in karate these days, there seems to be only one way to train … their way! Like other martial arts, karate has not escaped the glare of commercialism, and with that, the packaging and branding of each school, style, or association.