At Ohana Karate we are always innovating and developing our dojo. We need to continually change and learn to make sure we are the best martial arts, character development and leadership program in the nation!

You will probably notice a significant change starting this week. We are going to start incorporating the Japanese language even more into all our classes.

Not only are we well positioned to teach Japanese but we really cannot pass up this unique learning opportunity as an Okinawan Karate Dojo. It is just part of our identity, culture and heritage.

The one key difference is we are not just going to teach “karate” Japanese. The goal is to teach conversational Japanese so if you travel or meet a Japanese speaker you can converse.

The new training theme is a simple greeting in Japanese. We will do this in three stages (also depending on the student's age). At first we will start with a simple:

“Kon’nichiwa, my name is ______.”

(Good afternoon, my name is ______.)

The second stage we will add on:

“Kon’nichiwa, watashino namae wa ______ desu.”

(Good afternoon, my name is ______.)

(phonetically pronounced: wa ta she no – na me eh wa _______ des)

Then for the final stage (more for the adults and advanced students) changing the first word depending of the time of day:

“Ohayogozaimasu” – Good morning

“Kon’nichiwa” – Good afternoon

“Konbanwa” – Good evening

We will return to the regular rounds of Training Themes after this one then add a “Japanese Phrase of the Week” program.

The discipline and expectation is for every instructor, student and parent greet each other upon first seeing each other in the dojo with this Japanese phrase! So parents, you need to learn this too!

Gambatte Kudasai,

Sensei