Okinawa Karate

[Brandon Fisher]

My Okinawan Karate background is mainly Shorin Ryu - Shorinkan under Renshi Tom Ward and his sensei Kyoshi Eddie Bethea Jr. Kyoshi Bethea is a direct student Shugoro Nakazato of Okinawa.

This past weekend I had a chance to spend all day Saturday training with Kiichi Nakamoto of Okinawa which to say the least was a real treat.

 

[rmclain]

i was wondering who on this board has study actual Okinawa Karate and who was your Teacher.

To answer my own question it would have been Master Drill Instructor W.R. Stoker Sr. for 19 years, every once in a while I will combine some of it to my TKD in a sparring matched and gey ask where did you learn that it is not part of TKD.
Terry

Hi Terry,

Who did your father study from in Okinawa, and which camp in Okinawa did he study?

I'm curious because I'll be in Okinawa with the 3rd Batt, 12th Marines at Camp Hanson in Okinawa in Novermber for two weeks.

R. McLain

 

[terryl965]

Hi Terry,

Who did your father study from in Okinawa, and which camp in Okinawa did he study?

I'm curious because I'll be in Okinawa with the 3rd Batt, 12th Marines at Camp Hanson in Okinawa in Novermber for two weeks.

R. McLain

Master McLain I'll look that up for you and send it later today.
Terry

 

[keri-waza]

i study isshinryu my instructor is under grandmaster harold mitchum , who is first generation student of tatsou shimabuku.

 

[keri-waza]

organization is uika

 

[Brother John]

Four, almost five, years in GoJu Ryu Karate-Do, Under 8th Dan Sam Price.


Your Brother
John

 

[Brother John]

The question is simple back in the 80's early on I was looking for a hard core place to train and the gym I found was TKD, I was not looking for a Mcdojo type gym and they where ebvery place out there.
Terry

HONESTLY: Not trying to second guess you here Terry! but with 19 years in a system shared with you by your father, why not simply continue w/that art and START your own "Hard-Core place to train"....non-McDojo???
That's a lot of time in one art.


Your Brother
John

 

[Al Martin]

Hello Folks My Name is Al Martin and Okinawan Shorin Ryu Karate is my way.

 

[twendkata71]

Welcome Mr. Martin. Are you the same Al Martin that is affiliated with Paul Hart?

Hello Folks My Name is Al Martin and Okinawan Shorin Ryu Karate is my way.

 

[Al Martin]

Is that a godd or bad thing?

 

[twendkata71]

No not bad. Just wondering if you were the same person that I saw on the web site. He seems to have a good Okinawan karate program. I studied Matsubayashi Shorin ryu for a while and I have studied several others since then.

 

[terryl965]

HONESTLY: Not trying to second guess you here Terry! but with 19 years in a system shared with you by your father, why not simply continue w/that art and START your own "Hard-Core place to train"....non-McDojo???
That's a lot of time in one art.


Your Brother
John

Brother John great question, here is the best answer I could give although I had 19 years in it most was from child to young adult. I was 23 fresh out of college got a job teaching and coaching in california and when I ask my father about training he said find someone hard that you like and train with him and I did GM Kim was a great instructor and gave me so much knowledge and in all fairness he called in Korean Karate so I thought it was a different style of Karate only years later did I fully understand I was in TKD and by then it was too late I was hooked.
Terry

 

[exile]

GM Kim was a great instructor and gave me so much knowledge and in all fairness he called in Korean Karate so I thought it was a different style of Karate only years later did I fully understand I was in TKD and by then it was too late I was hooked.

But you weren't necessarily wrong in thinking that, Terry---there's a school of thought which holds that TKD really is Korean karate (as clearly expressed in the title and content of S. Henry Cho's great book on TKD etc etc etc...

 

[terryl965]

But you weren't necessarily wrong in thinking that, Terry---there's a school of thought which holds that TKD really is Korean karate (as clearly expressed in the title and content of S. Henry Cho's great book on TKD etc etc etc...

I know just answer Brother Johns question
Terry

 

[terryl965]

Exile you made a point about Korean Karate being the same as TKD or so close to itm can you explain what you mean please.
Terry

 

[exile]

Exile you made a point about Korean Karate being the same as TKD or so close to itm can you explain what you mean please.
Terry

Hi Terry---really, my comment was just an aside in this thread; I'm responding to your query, but I don't want the orignal question that started the thread to be derailed. All I was getting at is that the core techniques of TKD, as reflected in the poomsae, are essentially the same as those of the karate styles that the original kwan founders brought back from Japan with them. Lee Won Kuk (Chung Do Kwan founder), Ro Pyong Chik (Song Moo Kwan) ,Yoon Pyung In, (Chang Moo Kwan founder), General Choi Hong Hi (Oh Do Kwan founder and main propagator of TKD as a military combat system) and others learned Karate in Japan and brought it back to Korea; Hwang Kee (Moo Duk Kwan founder) build his hyungs around Itosu's katas, especially the Pinan forms, and so on. S. Henry Cho's 1968 classic manual simply identifies Taekwondo as Korean karate---the local adaptation in Korea of the fighting strategies and techniques that grew out of the Okinawan synthesis of Chinese combat systems with local fighting methods, travelled to Japan with Funakoshi and others, and then to Korea where it developed its own local character---but still, as Cho insists, essentially Karate. It's become something of a cliche that there are Korean striking arts which actually identify themselves as karate by the names their founder gave them---Tang Soo Do and Kong Soo Do (differing by how Japanese `kara' is translated), and so on. We even have two different Moo Duk Kwan martial arts, one calling itself TKD and one calling itself by one of those Korean translations of `karate', but so far as I know---I could be very wrong on this, IGWS---they are technically essentially the same, at least the way Richard Chun presents MDK in his books. I know there are people who disagree with this assessment of TKD; my comment was just based on the content of the TKD hyungs, which, even after the Pinans were replaced by the Palgwes and the Palgwes by the Taegeuks in the colored belt series, still contain huge chunks of the original Okinawan/Japanese technique sequences---and, as Simon O'Neil strongly argues, have essentially parallel bunkai (or whatever the appropriate Korean translation of this word in this sense would be).

That's really all I was getting at---that there is a very strong case to be made that the core technical content of TKD puts it in comfortably in family of closely related fighting systems that go by the name karate, but that there are Korean variants, distinct from Okinawan (which has its own notable variants), and Japanese (same again). I myself was curious to know what was the particular aspect of the difference between TKD and Okinawan karate that the guy you mentioned in your first post picked up on?

Does this get at what you were asking?

 

[terryl965]

Hi Terry---really, my comment was just an aside in this thread; I'm responding to your query, but I don't want the orignal question that started the thread to be derailed. All I was getting at is that the core techniques of TKD, as reflected in the poomsae, are essentially the same as those of the karate styles that the original kwan founders brought back from Japan with them. Lee Won Kuk (Chung Do Kwan founder), Ro Pyong Chik (Song Moo Kwan) ,Yoon Pyung In, (Chang Moo Kwan founder), General Choi Hong Hi (Oh Do Kwan founder and main propagator of TKD as a military combat system) and others learned Karate in Japan and brought it back to Korea; Hwang Kee (Moo Duk Kwan founder) build his hyungs around Itosu's katas, especially the Pinan forms, and so on. S. Henry Cho's 1968 classic manual simply identifies Taekwondo as Korean karate---the local adaptation in Korea of the fighting strategies and techniques that grew out of the Okinawan synthesis of Chinese combat systems with local fighting methods, travelled to Japan with Funakoshi and others, and then to Korea where it developed its own local character---but still, as Cho insists, essentially Karate. It's become something of a cliche that there are Korean striking arts which actually identify themselves as karate by the names their founder gave them---Tang Soo Do and Kong Soo Do (differing by how Japanese `kara' is translated), and so on. We even have two different Moo Duk Kwan martial arts, one calling itself TKD and one calling itself by one of those Korean translations of `karate', but so far as I know---I could be very wrong on this, IGWS---they are technically essentially the same, at least the way Richard Chun presents MDK in his books. I know there are people who disagree with this assessment of TKD; my comment was just based on the content of the TKD hyungs, which, even after the Pinans were replaced by the Palgwes and the Palgwes by the Taegeuks in the colored belt series, still contain huge chunks of the original Okinawan/Japanese technique sequences---and, as Simon O'Neil strongly argues, have essentially parallel bunkai (or whatever the appropriate Korean translation of this word in this sense would be).

That's really all I was getting at---that there is a very strong case to be made that the core technical content of TKD puts it in comfortably in family of closely related fighting systems that go by the name karate, but that there are Korean variants, distinct from Okinawan (which has its own notable variants), and Japanese (same again). I myself was curious to know what was the particular aspect of the difference between TKD and Okinawan karate that the guy you mentioned in your first post picked up on?

Does this get at what you were asking?

Exile in all my years between Okinawa karate and TKD has anybody been so elaborate in there beliefs and the similaritys between them Great Job.
Terry

 

[exile]

Exile in all my years between Okinawa karate and TKD has anybody been so elaborate in there beliefs and the similaritys between them Great Job.
Terry

Hey Terry, thanks for the kind words---but really, a lot of this stuff has come from some of the guys now working on kata/hyung application, and a lot from my Instructor, whose lineage is Song Moo Kwan and who has been thinking about the wider connections of SMK for quite a bit. I like thinking about TKD this way because it makes me really connected to the rest of Asian martial arts... anyway, thanks again---like, we all share a common platform...

 

[Al Martin]

Yes, Paul and I are Good friends, with similar views on Karate though sometimes we may disagree on somethings most of the time we agree or at least agree to disagree!!

--Al Martin

 

[Al Martin]

If you go back further to the Chonji kata of General Choi's Tae Kwon Do you will find a part of the Old Channan Kata. From what I understand Tae Kwon Do is Funakoshi's Shotokan Blended with the Kicks of Taekyon by General Choi in 1945 to form Tae Kwon Do. So my thought is yes Korean Karate. The story I was to is that General Choi was once a house servant for funakoshi while he went to school in Japan. That is how General Choi learned Okinawan Karate!