Black Belt Testing

Barrett and Joshua are testing for their black belts tomorrow. I'm looking forward to going, now that the pressure isn't on me. My gi is washed and pressed, my camera batteries are fully charged, video tapes are bought, and an extra memory card for my digital camera is also bought. I just have to get it all packed up, and I'll be ready to go. It's going to be kind of weird having more black belts in the class. For so long, it was sensei, James, and me. Even before James and I got our black belts, it was still sort of just us. I mean, we were brown belts, and the next highest rank in the class was blue. Other students joined, but dropped out before they got too far. Barrett has been in the dojo the longest--other than James and me, of course. I got my brown belt the day he got his blue. Joshua started about the same time I got my brown. Now they are testing for black. Theirs will be a tough test, but I'm confident they will do well.

There is a wide variety in black belt testing throughout the martial arts. It varies from style to style. It also varies within each style--from association to association, and even from dojo to dojo.

Some students are tested in their own dojo, during regular class hours, and by their own sensei. Others (like us) are tested by a board of 5th dan and higher, who must be certified by the association. Some tests last only an hour. Some are 24 hours. Still other students must go through a testing cycle that lasts several months, and in some ways resembles military basic training more so than martial arts.

Some associations hold black belt testing in the greatest of secrecy. Others are open to anyone who wants to attend and watch. When my friend Carole was here for my black belt test, she was wanting to talk about her own test. She would start a sentence, then stop herself saying, "I'll tell you after your test." In her association, kyu ranks are not allowed to know what happens during a black belt test until it's their time to test. She was actually shocked when I told her I'd already watched three black belt tests--so shocked that she called her husband just to tell him!

The requirements for rank vary just as widely. Shortly after I got my black belt, one of my coworkers asked how I could be a black belt if I couldn't do the splits. Splits aren't required in my association. Some styles/associations do have physical fitness requirements, though. Some candidates are required to run x amount of miles in x amount of time, and do x amount of push ups, etc. I can kind of understand physical fitness requirements, but some students go through things that don't resemble karate in the slightest. One friend was describing her test to me, and (it was a 24 hour test) throughout the whole test, she and the other two who were testing didn't actually do any karate. They had to do things that demonstrated teamwork, and taught them cooperation, and unity, and things that were designed to draw them closer to the others in their testing circle. Now, teamwork and cooperation are all well and good, but last I checked, karate was still an individual thing. Even if you are part of a karate team, when you are sparring, or doing kata, you are still out there by yourself.

My friend, and the others testing with her, didn't do a single kata during the entire test--at least not from what my friend told me. I have another friend who had to put together a musical demo for her black belt test. Ok, in a roundabout way, that could be strangely appropriate. When the Japanese took over Okinawa and outlawed all weapons and training, many families disguised kata as dances so the Japanese wouldn't catch on that they were actually training to defend themselves. But still...would I fail my black belt test because I'm not a choreographer?

At the other extreme, I've heard horror stories of people coming out of tests with broken bones from being beaten so severely by those testing them. Of people having those testing them in their faces screaming insults at them (to see if they would break down, so I'm told). Humiliating the candidates. I know one woman who started her menstrual period at the beginning of her 24 hour black belt test. Her sensei wouldn't let her leave to get any feminine hygiene products. He told her that she would fail if she left. She finished her test with her menstrual discharge running down her legs, staining her white gi for all to see. (Frankly, if it were me, I'd have told the sensei that he could fail me if he wanted to, but he would not humiliate me this way, and I would have left anyway.)

It all makes me rather proud of our black belt tests. They are very simple and straightforward. You demonstrate your karate. That's it. Basics, kata, bunkai, weapons, self defense, and sparring.

No musical demos. No three mile runs. No push ups. No boot camp style humiliations.

Just karate. Plain and simple.

But not easy. Never easy.

It is still karate after all.
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