braverrouge

Hi CDNinKS

Congrats to your new Civic and I hope you enjoy it a lot.

As for the tires, very good choice.

I totally forgot about Yokohama until you mentioned

I was reading in a nother post that Hondas Service center can upload/update Garmin.

Hoiw they do it is still a miracle for me.

Took delivery on April 10. The total cost to upgrade from 16 inch to 17 inch wheels and tires turned out to be about 30,000 Baht. Was worth it in my opinion, really makes the car look totally different. I went for Yokohama tires over the Bridgestone on a few recommendations, seem very good so far.

The GPS is in fact as Braverrouge quoted. All menus, voice, etc are in English, however the street, town names are all in Thai. Not really a problem for me as my GF can translate as needed. I am still trying to find out how to update the software however. There must be a card slot somewhere as if you look thru the GPS files, you find that HONDA has loaded all the Honda dealers locations on a separate card. As this is Garmin based there must be a way to load the English version of the Thai maps from Garmin.

I will keep working on finding how to do this as I want the Malaysian and Singapore maps as well.

A GREAT book on Aikido is Angry White Pajamas by Robert Twigger. It won an award for being the best book about sports in 25 years!

A very weird title for a book that is related to Aikido but I will give it a shoot and try to get some reviews on this book.

Tks

The root of Aikido came from Aikijutsu, however after many years of training O'sense (The founder of Aikido) realized that thrue martial arts was not to defeat each others. This was the turning point for Aikido to become what it is today.

Aikido is the realization of Love.

If you think that ``martial art'' means to have opponents and enemies and to be strong and defeat them, you are mistaken. The true spirit of the martial arts is to be one with the universe and have no enemies. The essence of the martial arts is the spirit of loving protection of all beings in the universe.

Morihei Ueshiba

As for Seagall, I can't recall the name of his master but know that the master bacame his later father in law.

Now Grass Hopper I will tell you a story: (sorry I could not help using this old clisshae(spelling ?))

This is a story told to me by Sensie Takashi Kushida. Sensei Kushida is unquestionably one of the best Aikido Senseis in the world. He is Japanese and teaches all races in Aikido Yoshokai, Genbu Sotojitsu, Aikido sword, Jo, and Boken.

A long time ago their was a famous Samurai Martial Arts Master. He was well known by his reputation as warrior, and Samurai. He would travel all over Japan. One day while traveling in a small boat on a lake. He was confronted by a young Samurai. This young man wanted to make himself a reputation by fighting, defeating, and perhaps even killing the other Samurai. He asked the other Samurai what is your style of fighting? He said No Fighting Win Style! Emboldened the other Samurai challenged him to a fight. This challenge was accepted. So he poled the boat to an island on the lake. The younger Samurai quickly jumped out, thinking that he would take the advantage by positioning himself first. The other Samurai quickly and stongly poled himself away from the island into the deep water. He yelled back at the other Samurai, NO FIGHT WIN STYLE!!

I don't tell this story as well as Sensei Kushida does. I guess you could just pick my words apart if you wanted to in a sarcastic cynical manner. I hope that I have been able to convey some small insight in my very inadequate way.

I can recomend a book by Gozo Shioda, the name of the book is Dynamic Aikido.

In the past I have also heard Sensei Kushida say that "in the old days we used to do this, but we don't do it now". When I say this I am referring to what I call the extra step. Something the Braverrouge says that he has heard his Sensie say. I smile too myself when I hear this.

Thanks for the nice story.

Yes, Dynamic Aikido is a good book. I happen to have this book as well.

Been quoted 23,000 B to exchange the 16 inch wheels for the 17 inch. That does not include tires. Have a tire shop that will exchange the 16 inch tires for 17 in for another 10,000. So total of 33,000. Not cheap, but still is about 100,000 less than the EL model.

Yup, 17" wheels & tires aren't cheap at all.

My advise to you is to use "Bridgestone Turanza" tires.

I'd been using these tires on my old Cefiro and must say that those are the most comfortable tires you can buy.

All the "executive" cars are using Turanza.

I'd also made some researches on most common problems with the Civic and how to fix them:

Problem: Smelly A/C

Can happen after 2-3,000 kms (it didn't happen to my car yet)

Cause of problem: Installed airflow filter was stocked too long at the factory and my has caught some smell from the store room ???

How to solve: Exchange airflow filter (Free at Honda dealer - Falls under car warranty criteria)

Problem: Noisy brakes

Can happen after a 2-3,000 kms, depends on the brake pads age (I just got the change out)

Cause of problem: Moister and/or low quality brake pads from the factory

How to solve: Change to new ones (Free at Honda dealer - Falls under car warranty criteria)

Problem: Car is pulling left

Mostly detected shortly after after leaving the showroom (Didn't happen to me but heard of others)

Cause of problem: Lack of factory QA/QC

How to solve: Wheel allignement (Free at Honda dealer - Falls under car warranty criteria)

Problem: Engine shaking (light vibration) when A/C is switching on

Usually happens within 1-2,000 kms

Cause of problem: A/C unit is taking to much electricity resources / Factory installed battery is 35A only

How to solve: Change the battery to 45A (THB 1,500 - 2,500 depending on brand)

Jellymeister, Thanks for posting the link about Gozo Shioda. I remember reading this article a while ago and must admit that I telling all my "adult" students that in situations where your attacker doesn't leaves you any choices, you will need to harm them in such a way that they won't get the idea to attack you again.

However, my intention wasn't to open up a discussion board to see who's right or wrong in aspect of martial arts/Aikido.

My intention was more or less to get peoples attention and to let them know that there's actually a small group of people practicing Aikido in Pattaya.

Learning how to defend yourself and, maybe, gaining inner calmes is what most Aikido practicioners can archive.

Tks

While Segal might not get an acting job as with a Shakspearian Acting Troupe! LOL! (Bet he makes more money than

proper actors! )

To the point, people make jokes re Segals movies, however, I do think Steven Segal was one of the few

non-Japanese to have a fully running & recognized Aikido in Japan of his own, I think for 15 years. And

either had his own, or was one of the senior people of a USA Aikido organization, I do recall years back, (15 years!+)

reading in Black Belt Mag, about Segal instructing good aikido lessons at various seminars then & over the years.

I think he is or was consider to be be highly skilled in Aikido world?

I cannot provide references to this, but again years back, I was reading an article on Aikido by a

respected Master (cannot remember name, but certainly was known internationally.)

I am open to correction on this, but I do for sure remember reading, that O Sensei once said

the real way to defeat an attacker was to use Atemi Waza (which basically means striking)?

I had once a very old Judo book probably one of the early western books I guess written on

the Art of Judo, & the last 2 chapters of the book were all about Atemi Waza (striking vital points)

in Judo. (was a judo book, I m not getting confused with jujitsu. )

I think its like a dog chasing its tail, when I see on many forums, "which style is better" general

debates. On the street the "style that is better" is the style of the person left standing after the

street attack..... usually that person is a master of a style called being a "violent street criminal"

& they win by any means possible, usually by deception & setting the victim up.

Here is a link to a free online ebook by Geoff Thompson who is an expert on Reality Street Self Protection

& was mainly a Shotokan Karate man. (he cross trained in many styles, rates boxing highly).

The PRE FIGHT information in this online resource, is potentially a Life Saver in itself...

Dead or Alive Geoff Thompson online thanks to Fight Times Mag

see http://www.fighttimes.com/magazine/magazine.asp?columnid=14

Gerry, Thanks for your comments and the link.

The root of Aikido came from Aikijutsu, however after many years of training O'sense (The founder of Aikido) realized that thrue martial arts was not to defeat each others. This was the turning point for Aikido to become what it is today.

Aikido is the realization of Love.

If you think that ``martial art'' means to have opponents and enemies and to be strong and defeat them, you are mistaken. The true spirit of the martial arts is to be one with the universe and have no enemies. The essence of the martial arts is the spirit of loving protection of all beings in the universe.

Morihei Ueshiba

As for Seagall, I can't recall the name of his master but know that the master bacame his later father in law.

aikido is a good mental physical spiritual practise however you will never be a killing machine.

Don't tell that to Stephen Seagall!

I never had a chance to train with him but from some old seminar clips a would say that he's a very skilled man.

I wouldn't say he's a killing machine but I'm sure that he would be the last I want to try stealing the wallet from his pocket

aikido is a good mental physical spiritual practise however you will never be a killing machine. As has been previosly stated orginal aikido along with tai chi judo etc were taught and practised to disfigure maime and kill.

there is a video on youtube of an aikido master who bet $5000.00 of his own money he could beat any mma fighter.................. he was $5000.00 poorer within minutes

I saw that video too but if you had watched a little closer to the "fighters" and not on the title you would have realized that it was another martial art and not Aikido at all.

I'm not really sure but if I'm not wrong it's a Kyoshu guy, who knows ...

I'm not trolling here; I am genuinely interested in the answer to this question:

If a martial art doesn't teach you how to fight, then what does it teach you?

It teaches you peace and harmony and self defense. It is one step from actual fighting.

This is nonsense. Aikido was originally devised as a killing art.....it was only after the Japanese defeat of world war 2 and the ban on all martial arts in Japan that it became about peace and harmony....after which it was hijacked by a bunch of western hippie types who liked to claim it was "one step from fighting"...the way it is practiced today by the OP and his ilk is little better than a choreographed dance routine...if it is studied old-style with a proper teacher, then there may be some credibility....however finding such a teacher is very difficult....and for westerner nigh impossible....

However, one of aikido's biggest merits, if studied correctly, is that it is largely a self-study based on life-death contemplation, as were many original samurai arts, and not to be considered a sport......so called modern martial arts such as points karate, taekwan do, judo, and MMA have so tainted the real martial spirit with all of the rules and entertainment quotient that they can hardly be called martial arts anymore, but rather martial sports, martial entertainment, or in the OP's case, martial dancing...now grasshopper , please try and snatch the pebble from my hand..........

Jellymeister ... I'm not sure where you've got your informations from but I've the feeling that there's a slight misunderstanding between Aikido and Aikijutsu.

Aikido was never devised as a killing tool, neither before or after the world war 2. Different from Aikijutsu where the main purpose of each technique was designed for full destruction or death of the opponent.

Yes, practicing of any kind of martial arts was banned after WW2 for a periode. Some fine Japanese martial arts died and some survived the difficult time.

There's no new style or old style teaching in Aikido. The way Aikido is practiced these days is not much different from the "old" days.

Well, maybe with the different that we've Air conditioning.

Again, Aikijutsu has different ways to teach, the old way and the modern way.

And as you mentioned finding a master teaching the "old way" is very difficult to find these days and it would be very unlikely that they would teach any "whitemen" at all, why ? .... I don't know !!! This must have somthing to do with the "Japanes way"

Anyhow, I will go out dancing now and if you don't move I will snatch the pepple from ur hand faster than u can blink with ur eyes

By the way, are you planning to buy the car in cash or through a finance ?

In anycase they usually should have given you kind of receipt/contract agreement that should consist of the following:

- Downpayment amount

- Car type, model

- Delivery date (usually it states not later than XXX)

- Freebies

- Additional payment upon receipt of car

I can't 100% recall what that receipt said but I think that there was something mentioned about delivery time or delayed delivery.

You may check that part up again.

If you find that the dealer did "brake" the contract bey delayed delivery, I would suggest you to claim back your down payment and buy from another dealer.

I also believe that they were "bullshitting" you and didn't gave you any freebies.

If they did, then you can consider yourself as lucky

On another note, now the dealer is telling me that I will not be able to get the car until mid April. This is in Songkhla.

Is this normal? What about Bangkok? If you walk into a showroom there, can you drive out with the car the same day?

Let's take it that way, in most cases it will take the dealer around 4 weeks to come up with the car.

If the salesman/women is well connected, then it can take just a few days.

My salesgirl (who was very cute) had good connections and pulled the car I wanted from another dealer who happen to have the car there but their customer did either cancelled the order or the installement was rejected by the finances.

The other way around if the salesman/women is a "newcomer" without good connections it can take up to 3 month.

To answer to your other question, the percentage to drive out with new car on the same day is 1:10000 even if you walkin with millions of THB in cash.

The dealers usually don't stock cars, specially those upcountry.

I'd spend lot's of time checking out different Honda dealers in Rayong, Chonburi and Bangkok before deciding where to buy my car.

Besides of all the freebies. I'd put timing on the top of my list.

In addition the salesgirl was able to sale off my old Cefiro at the same day and at a very high price.

ooh, I forgot to mention, I waited only 05 days

According to a UTUBE video that I found, there is another DVD access door below the DVD slot. This is where the map DVD is located. It appears that when a new version is available you open this door and change the DVD out.

I was wondering if with this system, could a person get a DVD from say Singapore or Malaysia that has Thailand maps in English, or order an English version from Honda here in Thailand.

There's no such door in the device that Honda Thailand is giving you. I've checked every single gap at the DVD player for any hidden input slots but nothing.

I assume that you can get an update from the Honda dealer only.

I've also checked the Sing and Malay models, in hope that you could update the software there, and found that they don't have the same GPS system (but their specs. are much better than Thailands).

Surely if its Garmin based you can change the map to an English language one?

I have a Garmin Nuvi 750. It is NOT an in dash unit but they should work the same way. The map CD from ESRI offers the map in Thai or English on the same CD. You can install whichever one you want.

I'm not sure whether this will work on Hondas Navigator.

Overall I'm not really keen to try it either as it would have an effect on Hondas warranty.

Are you sure, I think one of the offical accesories is a SD card thing for it? Mebbe worth checkin it out if u can get it changed..

Just checked, no SD card input on the device Honda installed into the car.

I assume that they want you to visit them for every update and also charge you for that.

Surely if its Garmin based you can change the map to an English language one?

I have a Garmin Nuvi 750. It is NOT an in dash unit but they should work the same way. The map CD from ESRI offers the map in Thai or English on the same CD. You can install whichever one you want.

I'm not sure whether this will work on Hondas Navigator.

Overall I'm not really keen to try it either as it would have an effect on Hondas warranty.

Funny fitness. Very polular among sys admins. Totally useless for self defence. Take many years to train some usefull skills.

I assume that you are one of those loosers who tried Aikido once or twice in hope to become a Steven Seagul type ...

Yes, Aikido is difficult to learn but this is how life is ... skills are earned by training not by watching and making stupid comments on things they don't understand

I'm no expert, but I think that Aikido practitioners do a little more than "just let nature take its course". I believe that they purposely cause pain to an attacker to discourage them from continuing the attack.

Not that anything is wrong with that.

Yes, Aikido practitioners are able to apply lots of pain on an attacker if they want to but most of the time the pain will be just for a slice of a second to weaken the attacker before turning in such a way that force of nature can take place

The main purpose is not to harm the attacker at all.

My sensei was always saying "You can do this, but we don't do it here" Whenever thinking about his words, it makes me smile all the time.

Well as I say, the test drive was short, but without me asking, the sales girl who was in the front passenger seat changed it and I noticed that the menu was in English. I then asked her if it had voice directions and she inputed a destination and it started giving turn by turn in English. I was driving so am not sure if the map actually showed place/street names in Thai or English.

Yup, the functions can be all set into English incl. the lovely voice but ........ you still need to able to write Thai to fully use the Navi.

If you want to got to Sukumvit Soi 31 you must input your destination in Thai

The names, streets are mostly shown in Thai as well.

However, the Civic it self is a good powerfull car. I've been driving it around 2 month and can't really complain.

The only pain are the Goodyear tyres they gave me (very noisy) ... I personally would prefer Bridgestone Turanza tyres.

I'm not trolling here; I am genuinely interested in the answer to this question:

If a martial art doesn't teach you how to fight, then what does it teach you?

It teaches you peace and harmony and self defense. It is one step from actual fighting.

I guess I put self defense in the same category as fighting when it involves engaging an attacker (i.e. not just running away or attempting to verbally deescalate a confrontation -- both very reasonable but non-martial approaches). The pictures in the OP show people wearing a gi and getting thrown, which are at least the trappings of a fighting system, to my eyes.

Engagin an attacker would be directly confronted to an attack, means blocking etc.

An Aikidoka would never try to do that, he would just get out of the way and let the force of nature do the rest.

That what you see in the picture is exactly what happened.

The guy in the gi was attacking the little girl at full speed, the only thing she did was getting out of the way and gave an additional whip to ensure that the guys gets away from her.

I am no expert. In the past I trained with Sensei Kushida in Yoshokia style Aikido. A Stylistic difference between Aikido and for instance Taekwondo, is that in Aikido their are no punches. With the exception of what you may call an attention punch. Also. no kicks in Aikido. In my very inadequate opinion, Aikido is a much more effective, and useful martial art. I also have a small amount of training in Hun Moo Kwan and Chun Do KwanTaekwondo with Grand Master Kil, and under the auspices of Grand Master Rose. I am the least of all their students.

I would like to get back into Aikido. Unfortunately I have one year and two months before I will retire in Thailand.

Why not make use of those 1 year plus and start training Aikido again

Hope to see you at our dojo

I'm not trolling here; I am genuinely interested in the answer to this question:

If a martial art doesn't teach you how to fight, then what does it teach you?

It teaches you peace and harmony and self defense. It is one step from actual fighting.

Thanks, you've got the point

What style of Aikido do you train in. Akikia, Yoshokai, Yoshinkai.................

We are teaching Aikikai Aikido.

I'm not trolling here; I am genuinely interested in the answer to this question:

If a martial art doesn't teach you how to fight, then what does it teach you?

If you do a little self study in different martial art styles/disciplines you will realize that 90% of them are designed to seriousley injure or even directly kill your attacker.

In Aikido however, the idea is not to harm an attacker at all.

A fight, from my point of view, is when 2 or more people wrestle each others with targeting to hurt/damage the opposite as much as they can.

Like in a verbal argument with your partner ... you will use hart words in trying to "hurt" her/his feelings.

I hope this answers your question

For all who are interested to learn and/or train Aikido in Pattaya please continue reading ....

Since you continue reading this, I assume that you have an interest in Aikido are corious or have nothing better to do than reading this topic and give your comments ......

First but not last, we are NOT teaching how to fight !!!

If you are looking to learn how to fight then I would recommend you to close this page and search for some other articles about martial arts and/or fighting system ....

We are a small group of Aikidokas (Aikido practitioners) who are training Aikido at Mikes Shopping mall.

Our class is usually led by our head instructor T.Hattori Shihan from Japan who is holding a 6 Dan degree in Aikikai Aikido and 7th Dan in Toho Iai.

However, whenever our Sensei is not in town, another senior student will lead the class so that the training can continue.

I've to highlight that our dojo is Not a business .... Of course there are some fees but those fees are kept to pay the "high" rental at Mikes shopping mall.

Any access, is spend on inviting other great teachers from Bangkok and/or overseas to give seminars in Pattaya.

For more details on Aikido and our training schedule please check out our website www.aikido-pattaya.com

Hope to see you guys around ....

Ps.:

Just in case you are wondering how this is Not a business ... I do have a job that is paying my bills.

Aikido happen to become a part of my life after my regular working hrs

hi guys i've been looking for a while to find a club where can i learn any asian martial art like ju jutsu or aikido but i couldn't find any,so guys if u mind to give me a clue where can i find one here in bangkok i'll be very grateful..

thanks for your time reading this

Since you mentioned Aikido, try our this link http://www.thaiaikikai.com/eng/home.html

Good luck