Funakoshi Karate Tongerlo

	Karate comes from Okinawa, one of the Ryukyu islands who form the stepping-stones chain between Japan and china.
	Because they are situated halfway, it’s there where the Japanese and Chinese culture meet. The native population of Okinawa consisted of some spies from a political operation. From time to time Japanese forces occupied their island. The Japanese leaders deprived the population of Okinawa their right to carry weapons. This was a normal Japanese custom, that follows a strict ritual (hierarchic), only the warriors were allowed to carry weapons. On Okinawa there were also military and cultural missions from china. They occupied fixed locations, known as "the nine villages". From time to time, members of these missions demonstrated some Chinese fight arts in front of the population. Thanks to these demonstrations, the inhabitants of Okinawa could analyse the techniques and ideas, which were used as completion to their own system. Two distinguished Chinese who still are famous are chinto and waishinzan. The first one is famous because he lends his name to a kata. Some sources also name a Chinese visitor called ku shanku. Even if he existed, it’s very interesting to speculate if he indeed contributed to the kata, which has the similar sounding name.
	Another possible way for introducing new techniques is the great number of foreign seaman who arrived in Okinawa. It is certain that they introduced new weapon techniques and maybe even the weapons!Three new schools came into existence on Okinawa, all aimed for the most important territories. They became famous as Naka-te, Tomari-te, and Shuri-te. (-te means hand). In the evolution phases, allsorts of names were used, but the word hand was always mentioned.
	In spite of the mystery, which surrounds the study of the hand of Okinawa, different rumours started to go around about the appearance of some masters. From one person it was said that he could master the claw hand technique so well that he could loosen the bark of a tree in just a few seconds! From another person it was said that he could thrust so hard, he could even thrust his underarm up to the elbow into the solid ground.
	One of the old masters from Okinawa-te was karate sakugawa. It’s interesting to see it’s first use (in this case it means Chinese hand). The measure how Chinese fight arts influenced Okinawa cannot be known but there’s a definite awarable effect.
	At the end of the 19^th century and at the start of the 20^th, student masters from Okinawa travelled to china to continue their studies. Precise studies of modern, from Okinawa originating karate, show some similarities with the southern Chinese shoaling systems. To be honest the fighting possibilities for hands and feet are quite limited. There fore it’s clear that some similarities can’t return to a common source. It doesn’t really matter where all these techniques came from, in any case there was a great interest for the study of the hand of Okinawa and like always this interest came into the supervision of Japan. The Japanese navy was very interested in Okinawa-te and looked for contact with a practiser with kind manners, a developed poet and schoolteachers, called Gichin Funakoshi. He was asked to give a demonstration and made such an impression in front of the admirals who were visiting, that they immediately organized a demonstration in presence of the emperor of Japan! Around the turn of century, the Japanese became more tolerant versus the Okinawa population who practised the fight arts. From Funakoshi manuscripts we can conclude that he was 100´% loyal to the emperor and wasn’t the type of person who wouldn’t obey the emperor’s orders. Japan speeded up its evolution in 20^th century where many old values where thrown overboard. Funakoshi was treated well in Japan and it’s there where he founded the first karate school. It was known as Shotokan or Shoto’s club. Shoto was Funakoshi’s pseudonym he used it while writing poems. Initially he called his art Ruykyu Kempo, this has caused a lot of confusion as there was already a Kempo known in Japan. The Japanese Kempo was in some cases similar to the Okinawa variant, who concentrated on giving thrusts and kicks with the only purpose to hurt the opponent. It formed one of the Jiu Jitsu during and because of the bad effects, it study was forbidden by the Japanese government. Maybe that’s why Funakoshi adopted the name Karate-do. At that time Jugaro Kano developed the Judo – “the way of the giving” - also originates from the Japanese Jiu Jitsu art.
	Funakoshi saw the Japanese Kempo and the popularity of the Judo’s faith. That’s why he changed his course in the Okinawa art; just like his masters Azato and Itosu had taught him. He turned his back on the dangerous techniques and founded a more acceptable form for the Japanese government. Just before the break out of WW II, an anti-Chinese atmosphere started to develop in Japan. Through minimal changes in the calligraphy, the pictogram of karate-do, the technique of the Chinese hand, changed in karate-do, the technique of the empty hand. Together with these changes came other changes in technical names, so that the program looked Japanese. Because he had to teach very large groups he was forced to use split methods with the result that Funakoshi’s karate-so deviated a lot from the way the art was taught to him. During the development of karate-do, Funakoshi was helped by his 2 sons Yoshitaki and Yoshihide. The basic positions from where the karate techniques were practised became lower and lower. The form of the frontal fist thrust changed and the forward kick was practised with the ball of the foot instead of the retracted toes. Some of these later changes were totally against funakoshi’s original methods. He still exercised with a long round stick, known as Bo, where many moves in his school were based on. He described how force loses from qualification in a fight. He told how an old man, when he came eye to eye with young criminal, charged by griping his testicles.
	In spite of this clear example of effective karate, his school continued with the dissection of movements and easier to train series. A couple of older students realized that the original karate went lost. As a result, the Japanese Karate Association (JKA), which originates from the Shotokan, lost some of its older teachers. These teachers formed the Shotokai or Shoto’s technique, a group who’s devoted to the principles for amateurs. Funakoshi’s grip on Karate-do decreased, according to his age. He was continuously aware of the dangers of the original martial art on Okinawa, that’s why he forbade the free fighting, where 2 contestants fight against each other. This interdiction wasn’t taken seriously and informal, bloody training practises between different karate schools continued while the older students of Funakoshi worked on faster forms of pre-programmed free fighting (Jiyu Kumite). This reached its limit when the education plan demanded the black belt (1st Dan). This was a milestone in the development of karate-do. Funakoshi believed that kata’s were the only way to perform Karate techniques and even though he deviated from his original practise, he considered it as the only martial art. Although his students tested Karate by doing Jiyu Kumite, it was clear that some regulations had to be made. By drawing-up these regulations, karate-do took another step away from it’s original, effective system.