If I try to sum-up the situation, and maybe I will forget some people, I can give the name of several people I deeply respect. Therefore I will not list hundreds of people I don’t respect at all. Those I respect are some people from the Shaolin school that no one knows, and Shigeru Egami Sensei, Harada Sensei, Christian Tissier Sensei, Adam Prince Sensei, Enzo Cellini Sensei, Bernard Monnerret Sensei and, even if I knew him a bit less, Dominique Valera. They are basically the only people from martial arts that I can say I respect.

So, that gives you a little idea. But don’t dream. What do you think? If we were talking about Boxing, Football or Ice-Skating, it would be the same. It shouldn’t be like this, because with the Budo and with the Shaolin practice, there is sometimes Buddhism or at least philosophy, respect and harmony. But it happens that above all of this, manipulation, power, sex and money remain stronger.

A little philosophical idea to finish, to leave you in the spirit of the pure Budo that I still practice today. Because of my commitment I even became blind. But despite the blindness I go on practicing because when you have the spirit you die the day of you death, not twenty or forty years before this day.

Because I always had this spirit to ask the truth to my masters and to see the truth with my colleagues I am hated by a lot of people. As it is impossible for my students to fight everybody, once I leave a school, they prefer to say that I am the devil than to stand and fight and keep their respect for their master. I taught for instance to two students (Philippe Protas and Damien Bert) to put on the kimono and to make the node of the white belt. I taught them until the black belt and I created around Charvieu different schools that I gave to them when I left. They received from me the knowledge and a real kingdom of schools, and now they pretend that they created everything. Like this they can delete my name. It’s simple. It’s too hard in the world of martial arts to stay close and respectful to somebody who reveals the truth.

Another example that will be much shorter. For some political reasons I was myself a founder and leader of the IKDS (International Karate Do Shotokai). At the beginning of this association, there were some exams, organised by our organisation. For some technical pedagogical reasons, a lot of people had a very high level but didn’t have the correct degrees (dan) and we had to organise, in an unfair way, that some people fail the exam in spite of having a high level. All this was due to statistics in an exam. As I was very much into the protection of this association, I had decided to volunteer to fail. But it happened that at the exam I got the best level and the referees came to me and said “we cannot refuse you, there is no way”. After a long argumentation and a little treat from me they accepted to refuse my qualification because it was needed for the protection of this association. It is the only time of my life where, officially, I failed an exam. But when you are in the Shaolin spirit, or Shotokai spirit, you don’t care about the papers and the diplomas. You care about the spirit, the commitment and your personal pride in your actions.

In the past I practiced also a lot of Capoeira where existed the same spirit. For years there was a town of Capoeira hidden in the jungle, a little bit like the town of Robin Wood. They were fighting against slavery and the white American masters; the slavers. Then, most of them were killed in spite of possessing an extremely efficient Capoeira. The practice of today is coming mainly from people who wanted to dance and to laugh. So every time that you’ll find a technique which is not that efficient, you’ll find the reason in the history that will give you a clear comprehension.

When the master Gichin Funakoshi died, everybody was so unhappy with him because of his refusal of competition that no one wanted to invest one euro in his funerals. Some disciples who also refused the completion gathered. They created the Shotokai in order to, as a first action, pay the funerals of the master Gichin Funakoshi. Afterwards the school of Shotokai developed in different styles and techniques, as their only common point was “no competition”. Therefore Shotokai is not a style but an idea.

It is quite weird indeed to see in every dojo of Karate-do today, the picture of Gichin Funakoshi Sensei on every Kamiza, while in fact everything was rejected by the master of Karate and also by his students. And at the same time, the Shotokan schools all over the world are trying to do everything to deny the existence of the Shotokai schools. From this story you will understand that from Karate were born afterwards some other schools with better and more efficient techniques, as the karate sold to the non-Japanese people was a fake karate.

With the death of his son in whom he saw the future of Karate, the founder Gichin Funakoshi lost his spirit. More and more, the young Japanese people wanted to practice competition. One day was created the JKA (Japan Karate Association). It was signed by the master Gichin Funakoshi but he was absolutely against it. He was old and diabetic, and he went with a young student to visit many bakeries to buy a lot of sweets. He arrived in the meeting three hours late, he signed and left. It happens that the young student who accompanied him in the bakeries is one of my masters. His name is Harada Sensei. As I said, I am part of the history. From this day, Gichin Funakoshi taught only to beginners. When the students were getting the level of the shodan (black belt), they wanted to practice competition and he was sending them to the other teachers.