Hello again from Kusanku, ancient and wizened practitioner of martial arts.
But first, thanks to Rory for the enlightening description of the contents of Sosuishi Ryu Jiujitsu, an ancient and venarable not to mention effective from all I hear, style.
As far as I know allJiujitsu, including Gracie, is taught in a step by step prearranged manner which later one changes to fit the applications.
Judo too has kata, and I notice Asoka did not respond to this.
Karate does have two person kata, yes it odoes, but not all styles teach it, not all others teach it openly or to everyone.
In Shorin ryu we actually have bunkai kata done with a nuber of opponents in a prearranged manner. Matsubayashi ryu guys are free to back this up, here.
We also have prearranged kumite , but designed to teach seven principles of kumite.
Not contest kumite but fighting.
Goju ryu usually teaches a whole set of bunkaifor each kata, usually thre per session. Asoka was obviously not shown these.
One can only wonder if it was lack of knowledge on art of the teacher or something else.
Many karate styles have two person kata, some are called prearranged kumite, some are called two man fighting forms. In China almost all styles have these except ones that have forgeotten them. In Okinawan,styles, sometimes these are present and sometimes they are not, sometimes they are more recent inventions and sometimes not.
Often, and in all Okinawan stlyes I ever studied personally(I am not an Uevchi practitioner for instance) m a jiujitsu like self defense series or even a complete art s taught parallel to the basic karate techniques. These in English we often called 'grb arts' or just self defense.
They are very effective.They incorporate escape, reversals, locks, holds, and strikes, and sometimes throws. Only later does one find the techniques and there underlying principles come from the kata f the art.
Asoka says his teacher told him kata means only a one man excercise with strikes, blocks, punches and kicks.
What can I tell you? That is wrong.Kata includes that, but also includes two person drills.
In my shorin ryu there is no free sparring, only kata, techniques, one and two and more person drills and kumite excercises, prearranged and semi feree style.
When you defend yourself you move just as you train, fast, light and unpredicatable.
If you come at me straight, I bisect your angle of attack and move into your blind spot.Or I take the other side and attack the center.
Both hands come up to guard and I unbalance the attacker, get position and execute. And I mean
Execute.:-)
It s not an art used to attck people simply because it is designed as a reactive art.
A lot of karate used to be like that but tournament emphasis changed it.We didn't change.
Kta means all formal practice . Kata is not all rigid or always done the same order. Here Asoka shows what level he ddidn't reach.
In our kata basic level the kata are done in a fixd way. Intermediate level is done with a different timing facilitating different apps. Advanced level is different timing and dfferent order odf techniques, finally ending in a spontaneous karta performance. People whi reach this level are dangerous to attack because they will create a technique or sequence to deal with the attack without conscious thought, as a spontaneous act of defense.If they don't know what they are going to do, you sure don't!
Now having said this, it is at this level that one must be sure to have mastered what comes earlier.Otherwise you may have a clever move that does not work, where the other guy may throw a right hook, which is not necessarily clever but which may work, (thanks to Larry Niven for the words).It is here that the REGULAR AND RELENTLESS PRACTICE OF KATA pays off.
But with thre times the twelve yerars of experience, I was lucky to find this out.
Or maybe I'm just a dumb traditionalis that doesn't know about fighting. I wish I didn't.
Rory there does, though, don't you, Rory?When its your job, its your job.
How come is that, you and me got the same idea about kata practice, be it jiujitsu or whatever?
But that is the way its taught, kata, and there is a reason for it.
Kusanku.(Anybody seen, my old Friend Genjumin, he was on here now he's gone:-)
situation that calls for "real" self defense, one has to stop the threat. In the most basic instance, either low block, middle block, or rising block, followed by lunge "punch" (aargh) are movements that can be applied as startle reflex parries, powerful strikes to nerves, leverage combined with kyusho to release joints for dislocation, escapes from holds followed by general mayhem, and could even be used as outright assassination applications when applied to the head and neck, using release points.
I don't know whether to laugh or cry! You should go back and try to get a refund.
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