About Us

History

Dr. Ariel louwrier, 3rd Dan, started his martial arts education in karate with professor Stephen Chan, at the university of Kent at Canterbury in the UK in 1989. The university club, trained and coached by Stephen Chan and Wayne Otto, rose to become the most successful karate club in UK university history within 2 years, sweeping awards and breaking all records at the UK student championships. Wayne Otto went on to win his first world championship in 1990. Now retired from competition, he has amassed 5 world championship gold medals, has won the world championship and world games three times in succession as well as having won 9 European championships during his career. Both Stephen and Wayne were honored with the order of the British empire (obe) in recent years. Stephen, now at 8th Dan continues to teach international relations at the university of London, UK. Wayne, 5th Dan,continues to teach karate and gives seminars all over the world in kumite and ranks as one of the most successful karate fighters of all time. Ariel has continued karate over the years and coached the Massachusetts institute of technology (USA) karate team in 1994-5 to their first successful north eastern championships, and has since helped out at other clubs over the last 7 years.

Jindokai

Professor Stephen Chan started the jindokai organization in 2012. With dojos in numerous countries. ‘Jin’ is a Confucian value to do with ‘benevolence’, and expresses Stephens commitment to the martial arts as a form of outreach and sharing. ‘Jin’ is a Confucian equivalent of Aristotle idea of happiness being the performance of public good. In both traditions, the educated person has an obligation to be benevolent. The core karate style of jindokai is shorin ryu. Its antecedent form is as shorin ryu was practiced in the seidokan dojo of shian toma in Okinawa. Just as shian tome and his deputies have themselves, over the years, developed variations in practice, the jindokai recognizes that the style is not static. It therefore accepts variation but does so within a core rendition of the traditional kata, which may be said to emanate from kata practice within toma-dojo in the mid to late-1980s. Promotion within shorin ryu is possible to 8 Dan.

The Vision

My aim is to provide a safe and fun-filled environment for children and adults to learn karate at their own speed. Although the teachings include basic techniques and combinations, kata (formal forms) and kumite (fighting) we strive as much as possible to introduce the concept of team interaction and dependence, personal excellence and to strive to be humble in our learnings yet strong in our application. Arrogance and ego is left at the door of the dojo upon entrance. In conjunction with st. Luke's church we are able to provide this environment at negligible cost.

Furthermore, I enjoy and encourage the core aspects of jindokai, which include the acceptance of other styles and their knowledge, integration of aspects those styles to complete our own. There are many instances in kata and kumite that are open to interpretation and improvement. Our aim is to increase our knowledge and not stay within artificial limits.

We do begin to integrate weapons training but at a later stage once maturity in form and technique are sufficient to apply safe learnings. At some point in the future I expect that the international dimension of this style and its well learned practitioners may grace our shores and deliver new techniques and teachings.