Imagine walking home late at night when suddenly a group of people come out of nowhere and begin to surround you. The individual can cry out for help in the hopes that the locals will offer assistance or just give the money and hope that the hoodlums will leave after that.

Knowing some self defense should be considered mandatory for all citizens and for thos who really don't like violence Aikido can be a good alternative.

What is aikido? This is a Japanese martial art just like Judo or Karate that uses primarily the arms to block offensive moves and then redirect it back with the same force to the opponent. It is like catching a ball with one hand and then returning it back to another player.

Tomiki Style Aikido

Like in many other budo diciplines the art of Aikido is usally practiced wearing certain kind of clothes.

Aikido it’s the aikidogi, for Judo it’s judogi, for Jiujitsu it’s the jujutsugi, karategi for Karate, kendogi for kendo and the shinobi-iri and shinobi shozoku for Ninjutsu arts. The training uniforms used in martial arts are often times referred to as mere gi or dogi.

For your first beginners course it is usually okay to wear more common forms of training clothes.

Aside from the trousers and wraparound jackets, Aikido schools also add hakama, which looks like a dress or skirt, to the uniform. The original concept behind wearing a hakama is said to be able to hide the movements of the feet. The hakamas are usually reserved for aikidokas that have received the dan rank.

Aikido clothing

Aikido is one of the oldest form of martial arts. Founded by Morihei Ueshiba, aikido came about through the studies of many different kinds of traditional martial arts.

Aikido is even confused with Daito Ryu Aikijutsu, it is different in its essence.

Its philosophy is basically derived from the belief that deceptions and trickery or brute force will not make us defeat our opponents.

The word "universe" in aikido is not some obscure concept that one cannot achieve.

One method taught in aikido is to breathe with what is called the seika tanden point. This is the part of the body that can be found two inches below the navel.

In Aikido, most of the styles or schools use the kyy/dan ranking system which is the norm in the martial arts world. However, each style has different qualifications for meeting each rank and each style might use colored belts for kyu levels while others do not.

This portal has more information on Aikido basics