Ok, we've all heard the classic "you're ripping his nuts off" from Bassai Dai, but what other implausible gems have you come across in your training that have been given to explain kata moves?

One of my faves was the opening to sepai being the drawing of a sword, which then magically disappeared for the next move, but reappeared later in the kata to 'explain' another move.


So what's your favourite bit of kata bs?

Ripping someone's head off at the end of saifa wins for me. Still.

Linking the "vertical wrist twist" to decanting a bottle of wine

Taigyoko Shodan - turn left and block a front kick down in long forward stance.

Saifa, the sequence with the knee strike: You stand on one leg while blocking a kick from an attacker on the right side, then turn to face another attacker in front of you and sort him out with a mae geri.

I take it you mean the ones that are given in the firm belief they're true and not the ones where you're battling a rogue crocodile or the ever-nefarious seashell?


Mick

Gosh, bunkai BS? There's so much to choose from I hardly know where to start? Probably just about everything I learnt about bunkai in the first few years of training was crap. Then came the 'kyusho years' - lots of people came up with all sorts of whacky ideas, some of it certainly bore fruit but some stuff I once thought was great just makes me quizzically raise an eyebrow now.

I love all the 'traditional' stuff about blocking one person then turning to block the next person. Gee, it would be great if, on the occasions when I have faced multiple opponents, they really had politely waited their turn to be blocked. I think my favourite though has got to be the explanations people come up with for naihanchi kata. For those that don't know it, in the basic stance the feet are parallel and you just move from side to side. This has spawned some really creative explanations:
1. Your fighting in a paddy field between the rows of planted rice (you have to do the weird stepping so you're feet don't get stuck in the mud.
2. You're fighting on a narrow bridge
3. You're stood in a canoe and your opponent is in another canoe alongside yours
4. You're fighting within the narrow confines of the Shuri castle walls

But I think that by far the most imaginitive, whacked out trip to bunkai fantasy island was that taken recently by Bruce Clayton in his book 'Shotokan Secrets'. Dr Clayton's hypothesis is that the shape of the Shorin kata (actually the Shotokan kata even though the Shotokan kata clearly didn't exist at that point) is dictated largely by the needs of the Okinawan royal bodyguards to spirit away the king in times of danger. Whilst in principle this seems sound enough Dr Clayton's suggested bunkai is generally pretty comical, even down to directions you move in kata matching the direction you'd need to go in to get to the stairs in the royal banquet hall. I also love the bit about the long Shotokan stances being useful for getting down low, punching your way through a crowd of tall American Navy men, being so low that they fail to notice you. Definitely a case of 'too much LDS back in the sixties' if you ask me.

Mike

Now I am totally disillusioned and will have no clue what to do if I have to fight in a rice paddy, narrow bridge, canoe or inside Shuri castle. I will have to run crab-wise away.


Mick

Perhaps Naihanchi should be renamed the 'Dr Zoidberg kata'?

Mike

wow!
we do catch the punch then catch the kick (any type). the blocking a kick from right side is kneeing under the blocked/ trapped kick. Then the mae geri.

all i can say is learn every type then test them to see what actually works.

unfortunatelly i dont have a suspension bridge nearby so i might just do it on the back pavers. sorry.

cheers