Karate

Part I

History of Karate
   Karate and other fighting arts have been practiced for many years.  What we call karate today may have begun in ancient India almost two thousand years ago.  Many people believe karate was practiced by Buddhist monks in China to protect themselves against bandits.  One Buddhist monk, Bodhidharma, traveled from India to China around the year A.D. 520.  He settled at the Shaolin Monastery in China and taught Zen Buddhism to the monks there.  He taught his fighting art to them as well.  In time, the monks at Shaolin Monastery became strong fighters.
    Over the next centuries, karate spread throughout China and was practiced by many people.  A number of different karate-like styles developed during this time, and karate became well known.  In China, people who practiced karate called it chuan'fa or kung-fu.
    The Chinese did a lot of trading with the Okinawan people, whose island-home is only a few hundred miles off the coast of southern China.  In time the people of Okinawa learned some of the fighting techniques from the Chinese and combined them with their own fighting system, called te,  Since the Okinawans were ruled by the Japanese and not allowed to have weapons, they practiced karate to protect themselves.  The development of karate continued on Okinawa until about 1900.  At the beginning of the twentieth century, they started reaching karate in the Okinawan schools.
    Okinawa has many famous karate masters.  Perhaps the best known today is Giehin Funakoshi.  Master Funakoshi was a school teacher.  He traveled to Japan in 1922 and gave a demonstration of Okinawan karate at a national sports show.  After that, he was asked to stay in Japan to teach karate.  He never gave his style an official name, he just called it "karate," which means "empty hand" or fighting with weapons.  His students named it "Shokotan," and so karate had a new name in Japan.  Other famous teachers came to Japan from Okinawa and started other styles of karate.  Today, the most popular karate styles in Japan are Shokotan, Shito Ryu, Goju Ryu and Wado Ryu.  However many people practice other kinds of karate as well.  Some other kinds of karate are Chito Ryu , Shorin Ryu, Sudokan, and Shirinji Kempo.
    Karate spread to the United States after Workd War II.  Many servicemen were stationed in Okinawa and Japan in the 1950s and 1960s and studied karate in their free time.  About that time, many Okinawan and Japanese people who knew karate came to the United States.  They began to teach karate in the US.  Since that time, karate has become very popular in the US.  In almost every small town, there is at least one karate club, and in big cities there are usually very many.

Why should I learn Karate?
    The most popular reason for learning karate is self-defense.  Have you ever felt bullied or physically threatened by someone?  Learning karate is a great way to feel confident that you can protect yourself in such situations.  Notice that I said the idea is to protect yourself, not to harm others.  If you want to practice karate so that you can hurt another person, then you are practicing for wrong reason.
    Karate is also a good way to develop self-control and physical fitness.  To succeed in karate, you must discipline yourself to practice regularly and to listen carefully to what your instructor tells you.  Though practicing karate can be a lot of hard work, the benefits make it worthwhile.  After a couple of weeks of practice, you'll feel stronger and calmer, and you'll see your karate skills improve.

Getting ready for the Karate
      Karate is a martial arts, but it is very athletic.  Therefore, body conditioning is important.  In order to get the most from a training session, it is necessary to work as hard as possible and push yourself to the limit.  You must pay close attewntion to the messages that your body sends.  If you do not feel right during karate practice, it is good idea to checxk with your doctor to make sure that your weight is within the correct range.  Remember that your body is growing and needs proper nutrition in order to perform at its best.

Part 2

The Uniform

What you should wear
     In karate, everyone wears the same uniform for training.  The special uniform is called a karate gi.  The traditional karate gi is all white, and most groups wear a patch to show which club or group they belong to.  Sometimes you see colored gis or ones with fancy patterns like stars and stripes.  
     Karate gis are made up of pants and a jacket.  The pants have either a drawstring or elastic waist.  If you have a drawstring waist, after pulling the pants on, the string on either side is pulled until the waist is tight.  It is then tied through the small loop in front of the pants.
      The jacket has no buttons.  It is fastened by strings on eighter side of the bottom.  When you put the jacket on, make sure that the left side goes on the outside, so that the lapel goes from upper left to bottom right.  Tie the strings on the bottom sides of the  jacket with a square knot.  This will keep the jacket from coming off.  The belt is tied over the karate gi at the waist and holds everything together.

How to tie the Belt
     An important part of the karate uniform is the belt. The belt that comes with your karate gi is very long.  It is tied in a special way.  You must learn to tie the belt correctly, otherwise is may come untied in the middle of practice, and you will have to stop and tie it again.
     To tie your karate belt correctly, fidt he middle of the belt and hold it in front of the  you with hands about a foot apart.  Place the middle of the belt at your waist and wrap it around each side of the your body.  Pass the ends of the belt behind you and around to the front.  Hold the belt together in front of you as you tie the knot.  To tie the knot, hold the left part on the top of the right.  Pass the left section under both parts of the belt in front of your stomach.  The belt will show be half tied.  Take the part of the belt on the bottom and do the same thing again.  (This is called a square knot.)  When you are finished, both ends of the belt should be the same length and the belt ends should fall about halfway between your waist and knees.  Some people like their belts longer or shorter, but it doesn't matter.  The belt is there is keep your uniform together.

What the Different Colors Mean
     It shows their rank and how good they are at doing karate.  Different groups use slightly different belt colors for the lower ranks, but from brown belt and above, the belt colors are pretty much the same in all schools.  Remember - - it is not important if the school you join has different belt colors for the lower ranks.  What is important is that you practice hard and pay close attention to what the instructor tells you.
     Let's see how the belt rank system works by looking at the International Shokotan Karate Federation (ISKF), a large group in North and South America that is a branch of the Japan Karate Association (JKA) in Japan.  They all practice Shokotan karate.  There are two kinds of ranks, those that are above black belt and those below black belt.  The ranks below black belt are called kyu grades, and the ranks of black belt, and the above are called dan grades. The kyu grades start at eight and go down to one.  So an eighth kyu is pretty much a beginner, but a first kyu is getting ready to take the test for black belt.  In the ISKF, ungraded students wear white belts.  Students who are eighth kyu wear yellow belts, Green belts are worn by sixth kyu students, and those who have trained long enough to be a fifth or fourth kyu wear purple belts.  Third, second, and first kyu students wear brown belts.  In some other groups, lower ranking students wear stripes on the tip of their belt to show that they are getting close to the next rank.
     Black belt ranks start at one and go as high as ten.  In the ISKF and the JKA, all the dan holders just wear black belts.  In some other groups, those are sixth, seventh, or eight dans wear a red and white belt, and those who are ninth or tenth degrees wear a solid red belt.  Usually the instructors who are sixth degree and above are older then forty, and those are are eighth degree and above are usually in their fifties and sixties at least.  An instructor who is a ninth degree is usually very old.  Tenth degree holders are also very and old and there are not very many in the Okinawan/Japanese karate organizations.
     When you are passing through the kyu ranks on the way to black belt, you may change your belt colors several times in a couple of years.  Black belt holders wait years between their promotions, and their belt color never changes.