With the grand launch of the International Karate Organization’s Karate Academy of Guyana taking place recently at the New Thriving Restaurant on Main Street, Georgetown, local karatekas have already begun to benefit from a much higher level of martial arts training in the country.
Students of the Springlands Dojo with Shihan Jeffrey Wong, 7th Dan Black Belt, after the grading session last Sunday
The branch of the IKO Karate Academy of Guyana that is located at Springlands, Corriverton, Upper Corentyne Berbice (Region 6), conducted in collaboration with the Radha Krishna Foundation and with more than 50 students who have been training for several months now, held its first grading examinations last Sunday. It was a very successful affair.
Speaking to the karatekas, who were clearly exhausted after a gruelling grading session, the Chief Instructor and Vice Chief Instructor warned the students that, with the IKO Karate Academy, testing would not be a proverbial walk in the park, but students must first have gained the appropriate amount of continuous experience at their current rank, fulfill the certification requirements, and successfully complete the testing procedure before they are promoted.
There will be no undue haste to promote karatekas from one belt rank to another; there would rarely be the skipping of belts; and kyu rank examinations would be conducted every six months, rather than the three months allowed by some other karate schools.
For the Dan-grading sessions, traditional time requirements would be enforced, like a sixth dan having to wait seven years at sixth dan before being tested for seventh dan ranking.
The world karate governing body is the International Karate-Do Organization that is headquartered in Miami, Florida. It is headed by American Eighth Dan Black Belt Shihan Adrian Ellis, a seven time United States National Champion, World Champion, Gold Medallist in the Goodwill Games, and an inductee into the Hall of Fame; who has been involved in martial arts for over forty years, and has taken the decision to found a traditional Shotokan karate academy in Guyana to propagate the goals of Master Funakoshi, the father of modern karate.
Unlike many karate clubs and organizations which are currently operating locally with just one or two centrally located dojos — a situation which often forces their students to travel long distances in order to train, much to their inconvenience — the International Karate Organization’s Karate Academy of Guyana has opted instead to take karate-do to the people, and shall be setting up multiple dojos in all ten regions of Guyana to make karate-do accessible to all Guyanese.
The dojo in Springlands is just one of several which would be established in Berbice in a relatively short span of time.
The IKO Karate Academy of Guyana has as its Chief Instructor and Chairman Seventh Degree Black Belt Shihan Jeffrey Wong, a respected and highly active Shotokan Karate practitioner and instructor for more than fifty years. He is ably assisted by Professor Aubrey Mendonca, the Vice Chief Instructor and Vice Chairman.
Together, their plans for the new academy include having special ‘Kinder Karate’ classes that would focus on children between the ages of four and 12 years old; dedicated ‘Teen Karate’ classes that would cater for youths between the ages of 13 and 19; scheduled ‘Adult Karate’ classes for persons 20 years old and above; and specially arranged ‘Senior Karate’ training for mature persons who wish to become involved in, and benefit from, the fitness and self-defense advantages that participants derive from this combat sport.
Additionally, plans have been put in place to provide special corporate karate training to persons in the private and public sectors, and the expatriate community; training to schools countrywide, both public and private, whereby instructors would visit and conduct training at the schools’ facilities, since Karate-Do is a part of the syllabus of the Physical Education subject of the Caribbean Secondary Examination Council [CSEC]; and the academy would also be providing special training to schools and NGOs, including youth correctional facilities, orphanages etc.
Because Shihan Wong resides in Guyana, he intends to routinely visit all IKO Guyana Dojos and personally provide expert training to all karatekas, with the assistance of other skilled instructors attending each of the academies all year round, whilst Shihan Ellis shall be making consistent visits to the dojos in Guyana with the key objective being to sustain the high IKO standards throughout the entire local system.
