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Taekwondo It's a martial art and you get many positive advantages from it. (1) You can kick people in the
head. Add to this the benefits of acting within a positive group dynamic through synchronised shouting and marching. Tae = kick Therefore, Taekwondo = the way of punching and kicking. Does being good at it mean that you're an unstoppable killing machine on the street? No. However, doing it will probably lead to you walking about more confidently, turning fear and uncertainty into self-assurance. Does it work? The camera never
lies. :) As a progression from this you may do free sparring in which you face an opponent and fight slightly out of range without contact just to show off your techniques. There are a few more advanced sparring techniques called 3-step, 2-step and 1-step as well as some self defence. In 3-step, one partner advances with a punch on each of three steps forward. There are 10 responses to this that you need to learn. The first, for example, is middle block, middle block, middle block, punch them back. In 2 step, one partner advances with more complex attacks that are random meaning that you need to find appropriate responses to block and retaliate. In 1 step, one punch must be answered by a few blocks and retaliations of your choice. And there's actual sparring.
This is done with helmets, gloves and pads, and - although in
tournaments people go for it quite hard - in class the danger
depends on what students have mutually decided to do. You could grin
challengingly and whack someone then leap back to see what happens
next, or you could both agree to take it easy like an exercise.
Injuries are rare.
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A certain amount of time is
spent doing press-ups, racing around, doing squat-thrusts, jumping
jacks, etc. Do you have to split bricks with your face? No. Although a certain amount of breaking may take place among higher grades who will have special boards designed to snap when hit and which can then be reassembled to go again. The main target is often an imaginary opponent. Try not to imagine a very tall one because if you kick him in the nose you'll probably fall on your back. Another big activity in Taekwondo is patterns. There are 24 patterns which are like martial art dances. They progress from Saja-Jirugi (which is a pre-pattern pattern for beginners and not counted as part of the 24) with increasing complexity.
To become a black belt you only need to know around nine of these and beyond that, progressing through further Dan grades, you might do more. At some point somebody asks you why you do it. I always stay with my 'before' and 'after' argument. You can also win stuff.
Before
After
Medal for hitting people So stop smoking those pipes and playing that crazy rock and roll music, kids! Get down to your local Taekwondo club and find out for yourself the pleasures of casual violence and being all you can be. You know you want to. Go on. Just get out of here. Your pencil necks and flabby elbows sicken me. Away with you, now!
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Links:
http://sonkal.taekwondo.cz/index-en.html This is the only link you really need! The patterns are there with wonderful videos, diagrams, names of moves in Korean and everything you should need. It's just the most useful place to fix up your patterns. This is a handy list of Korean terms although the spelling might not always be perfect:. |
Other topics today: Prince - what a twat. A bunch of really good videos
People
being much stupider
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