What you're going to need
 After
you decide if you wish to continue training, you will need to do two things:
register as a student with Hombu. This is an annual membership of about
150Nkr. The second thing you'll need is a gi. This is the Japanese
term for a martial arts training uniform. The uniforms we use are black.
Why do we use these instead of street clothes? The easiest answer
to this is to avoid destroying your regular clothes! Our art includes a
lot
of throws, rolls, grappling and sweating... normal clothing just doesn't stand
up. Personally, I also find that putting on my gi puts me in the right
frame of mind for training.
As part of our uniform, we wear a form of Japanese shoe, called tabi.
There are outdoor and indoor versions. The outdoor tabi has a rubber sole,
while the indoor version does not.
 Why
don't we just go barefoot like in Tae Kwon Do? Although most of our training
is indoors, we will occasionally do some "field" work. Tabi work very well
for our needs, and are actually quite comfortable after you get used to them.
The provide a margin of safety for our feet during training both indoors and
out.
Ok.. so why do I need leggings? Because I said so! Seriously, you
don't NEED leggings, but our
martial art is NOT a sport. We do not train to fight in a ring, with a
judge. The lovely sounding "snap" of your pants when you perform a kick has
absolutely no place in the real world. By binding down the pants, we
reduce noise, as well as avoid having our pants get caught when we're trying to
do a roll, kick or avoid some object.
Eventually, you will also need to acquire training weapons. These include
the 6ft (182cm) bo, 4ft (122cm) jo, 3ft (91.5cm) hanbo, shinai (bamboo training
sword), bokken (wooden training sword), and various other implements. I
recommend getting the best quality training gear possible. These items
usually take a beating, and cheap one's tend to break.
The items we need for training are ordered through me from
www.fighter.no or from
www.gido.no. For a really
good (RECOMMENDED) bokken, check out
Tombo
Supplies. It's expensive, but absolutely worth the investment! |
