Kajukenbo
Kajukenbo is a hybrid martial art that combines Karate, Judo, Jujutsu, and Kung fu. It was invented in 1947 in Oahu, Hawaii, at the Palamas Settlements, to deal with local crime, as well as to help the people defend themselves from U.S. Navy sailors who would drink and fight with the locals. The inventors were Sijo Adriano Emperado, Peter Y.Y. Choo, Joe Holck, Frank Ordonez, and Clarence Chang, who called themselves the Black Belt Society.
The name works in two ways: "ka" ("long life"), "ju" ("happiness"), "ken" ("fist"), "bo" ("style") or "ka" ("karate"), "ju" ("judo"/"jujutsu"), "ken" ("kenpo"), "bo" (Chinese "boxing" aka Kung Fu).
History of Kajukenbo
In 1948, Sijo Emperado and 4 other skilled martial artists: Joe Holke, Peter YY Choo, Clarence Chang, and Frank Ordonez, made a secret pact to combine their arts into a street fighting combination of their arts, which were:
- Sijo Emperado: Chinese Kenpo and Escrima
- Joe Holke: Kodokan Judo
- Peter Choo - Tang Soo Do
- Clarence Chang - Sil Lum Pai Kung Fu
- Frank Ordonez - Sekeino Jujutsu
They quit their jobs, went on welfare, and trained. They moved their training locations around to keep it secret.
When the Korean War hit, Joe Holke, Peter Choo, Frank Ordonez, and Clarence Chnag were drafted, leaving only Sijo Emperado to carry the system on. Sijo Emperado, along with is brother Joe, introduced Kajukenbo to the public by opening the Palama Settlement School in 1950. The training there was notoriously brutal. Their goal was to be invincible on the street, so the training had to be realistic, and the students sparred with full contact. Broken bones were a common, everyday thing. The number of students soon dwindled to all but a few. Those who remained developed into tough fighters with a reputation for employing their art in street fights with only a little provocation. Several students who came out of the school would become very prominent marital artists themselves, such as Sid Asuncion, Aeju Reyes, Joe Halbuna, and Tony Ramos. The art slowly began to grow in popularity, and soon Emperado had 12 Kajukenbo schools in Hawaii, making it the second largest string of schools at the time. John Leoning, who earned a black belt from Emperado, brought Kajukenbo to the mainland in 1958. Since that time, Kajukenbo has continued to grow.
In 1959, Sijo Emperado began adding Kung Fu into Kajukenbo, shifting the art to a combination of hard and soft techniques. Since them, Kajukenbo has shown to be a very improvement-open style, willing to accept whatever works.
Kajukenbo today
Kajukenbo, as it stands today, has many more grappling moves than regular kenpo, plus it has a lot of joint breaking moves and low blows. While it does include some competitive elements, its primary focus is on realism and practicality. It is generally thought that "unfair" move such as strikes to the eyes or groin are OK, as is whatever else the practitioner feels is necessary to get home that day. The workouts can easily get the heart rate up and last about two hours. While individual schools may show a lot of variation, it would not be unusual to train with sandbags or boxing gloves, and every male student is given, as part of his uniform, a cup to protect his testicles.
It now has 4 distinct branches: Kenpo, the original branch. Chuan-Fa, which includes hard and soft Chinese techniques, Tum Pai, which adds Tai Chi Chuan, and Wun Hop Kuen Do.
There is a core of self defense techniques at the heart of Kajukenbo. Many of the forms taught at most schools focus on practicality; they often will not include impractical, showy moves such as axe kicks and jump kicks. Self defense tricks are often based around real-world scenarios, such as being grabbed, shoved against a wall, choked, punched, kicked, attacked with a knife, etc, rather than things needed to defend oneself against, say, a sword wielding samurai.
While this base of common knowledge will keep schools' styles fundamentally the same, there is a lot of room for variation. Given how different the four foundational styles of Kajukenbo are, it is impossible to fully incorporate them all. Each individual practitioner, when they become a black belt, must decide what parts of what style to take. This tends to encourage schools to incorporate styles outside of Kajukenbo in their study, like Escrima or Aikido.
An important part of some kajukenbo classes is the Kajukenbo Prayer, written by Frank Ordonez.
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