There are a lot of cool martial arts movies, and I was looking at a martial arts equipment website called www.karatemart.com which made me think that I would like to take karate or kung fu or something.  There are a few schools around me that offer that so I might have to look into it.  I have never done anything like that before so I would probably have to stretch a lot and not be very flexible.  I’ve seen some guys who can kick as high as their own head but there’s no way I could do that!  A lot of the forms and stuff that people do are really cool looking, too, especially when they are doing the jump kicks and spinning around and stuff.  Breaking boards is another cool one although I know it’s just done as a test and demonstration of power.  Breaking a board probably requires some mental toughness as well as physical strength, and I’m sure it requires the right kind of training so you don’t hurt yourself.

It would be cool, though, to be able to do that stuff.  I don’t even mean you have to go to tournaments and compete and stuff, but just learning the style and stuff would be fun I bet.  Another thing is you probably learn some culture along with it, too.  I have heard that some of the stuff that happens in a class is based on the traditions of the country where the art is from.  For example, I’ve heard that people bow to their instructors as a show of respect, and I think that’s pretty prominent throughout many Asian countries.  We don’t really bow here in America as part of our normal routine.  So that could be kind of an awesome experience, too, to learn about another culture.

Anyway, that’s something I’m going to have to look more into because I know there are differences between the styles but I’m not really too positive I know what they are and I would want to be in a style that is a good fit for me.  Even watching demonstrations and stuff you can see that there is sometimes a big difference between styles.  I think some might have changed a bit and become a bit more for show and the only reason I say that because I don’t really have that much familiarity with them but it just seems like jumping around a lot and doing some fantastic looking techniques might be a bit more for demonstration purposes than for actually defending yourself from an opponent.