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The Deadly Art Of The Okinawans
Author: Terry Hill, 4th Dan
WHETHER YOU are the best fighter in the world today, or a novice in the Martial Arts, I put this question to you: 'What would you rather do in a real fight'? Spend 15 to 30 mins punching, kicking, biting. grappling, and rolling around on the ground, or finish it with one shof)' If you don't pick the latter, you're kidding yourself. If you have a choice - especially in self defence - take the quickest way out.
Fifteen minutes per fight is what the Thai Boxers train for in competition (and they're the 'Kings of the Square Ring'); 24 minutes for a World Kickboxing title fight; three minutes for a Kyokushin Contact Karate bout. and an even two minutes for your standard Karate Kumite match.
But all this is totally irrelevant to real fighting! Why'? Because in the competitive arena rounds, time limits, rules, ring areas, referees and judges, all playa significant part in your ability to win. In reality it should, and would, be allover in the first few seconds; none of the latter would have time to come into it. I I' someone can take your best shots and keep on corning, or hits you with a lucky punch. that's it. Because. lucky or not. even if you're the best fighter in the world -- you lose!
The single technique the epitome of allihe Japanese fighting arts, is the ultimate answer. To be able to take an opponent out, first time, is what Karate is all about. Isn't it'?
You have all heard stories of the Old Masters from Okinawa, having the ability to defeat opponents with a single blow. You've heard about, or seen the reports regarding Mas Oyama. killing a bull with his bare hands. How'? What are these "mystical" techniques? There's nothing mystical about them. The answers have always been with you - in the Kata, or more precisely, BlIl1kui, the application of the Kata.
To Okinawan stylists Bunkai arc nothing new. The Goju Ryu and Shorin Ryu systems, along with Uechi Ryu etc, have been practising them for years; literally hundreds of years. But over the years the real meaning of the kata have become watered-down, lost and changed. In the transition from Okinawa to Japan, Karate lost a lot of the killing art, and developed more of the Jo - or asthetic 'way'. What we have today arc kicking and punching variations (basically a form of Kickboxing), on what was once a deadly fighting skill. We now have very few people who know, or arc willing to share, the true application of these arts. In the Western world two such people exist, who do know and also teach, a speciality art relative to any style of Karate's kata, or Bunkai. They are. from the USA. (via Okinawa) Seiyu Oyata. And, also from America, George Dillman.
Oyata Sensei is undoubtedly the most experienced man in the world (that we know of), teaching this formerly secret Okinawan art of Tuite - or the more expansive name, KyuSho Jutsu. But this article is not about him. It is about a man who trained with him, and who has gone on to further research, study and rekindle the flame of this ancient fighting art. (For those of you who have never heard of or seen Tuite, the tuite exponents have the ability to knock people out with a single 'touch'). Today, one man is unreservedly showing this art to the world. His nameGeorge Dillman.
To many of you, the mere mention of his name will provoke some reaction. For those of you who have not seen or witnessed his artistry, you will probably switch off about now. No matter, your loss and everybody else's gain.
For those of you who keep reading, you're in for an education, an acquisition of knowledge ...
Let me tell you of my own personal experience with this world-renowned expert of KyuSho Jutsu. I, like most of you probably are, was skeptical. Hell, I just didn't believe it. In fact, I wanted to challenge Mr Dillman when I first heard his claims of knocking people out with one touch. Now I've wrestled, boxed, done a bit of Kickboxing. I am a 4th Dan in Karate (Okinawan Goju-Ryu) and do more than my share of research into the various Martial Arts around the world. I was pretty confident I could look after myself. After all, I've done quite a bit of the real thing once or twice as well, and I'm still good looking .... Aren't I?
Anyway, I went along to my first seminar just to watch and, shit, he was knocking people outl Now I was thinking twice about the challenge. This guy does seem to know his stuff. I watched, I listened, and absorbed. Mr Dillman did a lot of talking, a lot of hitting, and a lot of people were falling over. But there must be something more to this, I'm thinking, maybe he hypnotises them? Ignorance prevailed.
Next time he came back I swallowed my pride (or more accurately my ignorance) and went along. "I'm still tough," I thought. "If he talks a lot of bullshit, and makes a lot of floating statements, I'll jump on him!" But I was, first and foremost, there to learn. And boy, did I learn.
Now most of what you hear other people saying is either exaggerated, taken out of context, or just plain old lies. Don't believe anything you're told, until you see or hear it for yourself. Mr Dillman talked a lot, but he didn't spout the utterings of, "I can beat anyone in the world", and "I'm the baddest man to walk the planet", like others have said he had. What he did say was relevant to what he taught, and showed, and was very interesting in regard to his system of RyuKyu Kempo.
If you don't like talkers, fine, then don't buy a used car off this man. But everybody likes a doer. When Mike Tyson kicks arse and people are lying down, looking like they died from a shotgun blast, you believe it. Actions speak louder than words. When you see George Dillman knocking them down from a touch on the chin, you should believe it too. You better believe it. If you don't, ask him for a demonstration. It will be an education for you and a further' acquisition' for him. If you don't believe Tyson does it for real, either, call him a sissy. Both will produce dramatic results! Mr Dillman does have an amazing speciality. Love him or hate him - he can take you out with a single shot. This is the basis of his tuite, which is the advanced teaching of his Ryukyu Kempo system.
To demonstrate this point, at the last seminar I attended (to learn at, remember) Dillman walked in and showed an application from one of the Goju-Ryu Kata, Seiyunchin, and then had everybody practising it. Again, no big deal for Okinawan stylists, we do this all the time. His interpretation was different from ours: interesting, but basically the same. He next got one medium rare - nah ... built! - Black Belt from Taekwondo up and hit him on the arm. He knocked him out - on the arm! Good attention gainer. ..
Now everybody has been punched, kicked, or blocked on the arm, at some point of their Martial Arts career. How many of you have ever been knocked out after having been struck on the arm!?
This is pretty amazing stuff. Don't knock it (excuse the pun), learn from it. Or more precisely, learn from Dillman. Noone else is teaching this in Australasia. Now, I've seen Higaonna Sensei of the Goju-Ryu and an old master of Fukien White Crane Chuan, hit people on the arm and then on the face during demonstration of Kata Bunkai. The initial strike (to the arm) went completely over my head, as I'm sure it did with nearly everybody else. But it is important for the correct application, otherwise why would they do it? They obviously know. I didn't. Here we have George Dillman explaining that this technique (on the arm) is as important to the whole application, as the finishing strike to the face. Then he goes on to show us how it's done. Mr Dillman then went on to explain some very amusing anecdotes, concerning the American approach to kata.
He also explained who and where he got his art from. George Dillman had been training and practising Karate for quite some time. An American Kata Champion, he is widely known in Martial Arts circles. His acquaintances read like a 'Who's Who' of Martial Arts: Bruce Lee (you can't do any better than that), Wally Jay (Ju Jitsu Master), Remy Presas (Kali expert extrodinaire). He has mixed in some pretty good company, but his own credentials speak for themselves. He K.O.'s everyone.
Some years ago Mr Dillman had come into contact with an elderly Okinawan Karate Master, by the name of Hohan Soken. Soken Sensei gave Dillman some very rare notes on Okinawan kata and their Bunkai. The notes also showed how and where to apply the Bunkai. The old man also told him what the true meaning of some of his kata techniques were. Dillman was impressed, and went away wiser. He kept the notes and filed them away for safekeeping - after all it was in Japanese and Dillman, not reading or speaking Japanese, decided their value was more as a collector's edition. Then, years later, Mr Dillman attended a seminar given by another Okinawan Master, Seiyu Oyata. Oyata was demonstrating KyuSho Jutsu, the art of pressure point striking. Dillman was impressed, and remembered the notes Soken had left him! After studying a short while with Oyata, Dillman delved deeply into the research of his notes. Armed with the knowledge of his years of training, the analytical study of his notes and the teaching of Oyata, Dillman probed and prodded - and has unlocked the secrets of KyuShoJutsu, ormore specifically, Tuite.
He is still developing and researching (the more puritan of you will be glad to know - through a number of prominent universities in the United States, and not some mystical temple in far-off Tibet) the
art of KyuSho Jutsu. In his own words:
"My work is far from completed. There is a long way to go".
But then Karate is a lifetime study. For some of us, one lifetime is not enough, but we must persevere.
The 1990s may prove to be the reckoning ground for Martial Arts. Only the strongest will survive. Those with the insights and knowledge, like Mr Dillman, are assured to be still standing when it's all over. You must seek, and you will find; learn, and you will know; abosorb, and you will understand. (Remember G. S. Halifax's words: "The struggling for knowledge has a pleasure in it, like that of wrestling with a fine woman"). The KyuSho Jutsu holds the knowledge, and the Tuite has the answer.
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