Martial Arts Background

I thought I might post a brief couple of things about myself so that anyone who cares can get to know something about me. My two passions in life (apart from family) are martial arts and magic which are a very strange combination. In this post I’ll give a background on my martial arts training and talk about magic in another post…..

When I was in primary school I was like most boys, and would flail my arms and legs around in attempts at Karate type kicks and punches. So at the end of primary school I was enrolled in a term of Karate at a local school. I absolutely hated it. Mostly because the sensei (teacher) would tell me off for not moving fast enough, or not punching strongly enough. Also the guy never smiled and had the personality of one of the wooden boards he would often break. After this experience I swore off Karate and thought about other martial arts in early high school which was when I set myself the goal of getting a black belt. Next I enrolled in Ninjutsu with (as far as I’m concerned) the only remaining 800 year old traditional school. But only stayed with it for year or two because one of the teachers was a complete tool (eg. After whacking me in the shins with a bamboo training weapon he explained that it didn’t hurt cause it was a training weapon. Well the black bruises that soon appeared would suggest that it did). After that I reluctantly agreed to check out a new Karate school that was building an international reputation and found to my surprise that it wasn’t too bad. In fact 5 or 6 years later I achieved my goal of getting a black belt. I even taught at the club for 3 years and achieved my 2^nd Dan grade (One step up from a normal black belt). Towards the end of my Karate career I became a little disillusioned with it and its limitations (no grappling, no weapons, some impractical techniques, focus on physical strength, etc), so I did some Aikido, but only for a few months cause it was an expensive class and the training was a little too stylized. In about 2003 I went back to Ninjutsu (outdated website), but with a different club and haven’t looked back (though I don’t get to training as much as I’d like). I have my brown belt in it currently and if I get my butt into gear should be able to get black belt in that in a year or so.