Arjuken?

[fiat_lux_777]

Hi All,

I was wondering if anyone else is familiar (or practices) Arjuken karate a la Ernesto Presas?

Thanks,

Todd

[Keeper]

I trained in arnis, mano-mano and daga sa daga with Grandmaster and his blackbelts at Philippine HQ in Manila.
I don't think he calls his stuff arjuken any more. It's Kombatan - under which falls mano mano, solo/doble baston, daga sa daga, bankaw, dulo dulo and dumog.
But you can still find arjuken writen on the walls and windows at Philippine HQ.

From what I hear, the systems have changed slightly from the days when he called it arjuken. I think that was in the late 70s when he was still practicing hardcore deathmatch type arnis. Nowadays I think it's a bit more systematic and traditional like.

Hope that helps

Keeper

PS - have you trained with GM?

[LAKANPOPOT]

ARJUKEN Karate

AR-Modern arnis/Ju-judo-jujitsu/Ken-kendo Karate(Shorin ryu and Shotokan Karate) is the meaning of ARJUKEN Karate. It is as you can see a fusion of styles GM Ernesto Presas studied and researched. The history goes that GM Ernesto and his late brother GM REmy were one of the pioneers of Japanese martial arts in the Philippines(with the Gonzales family, Canete family,etc.) Anyways, The brothers were invited by the Japanese police to demonstrate and share their art of Modern Arnis. So as an exchange the brothers learned the Japanese arts while teaching Arnis in Japan.
GM Ernesto is knowlegdable in Karate, Judo, Jujitsu, Kobudo, Iado and Kendo. Aside from this he dabled and have ranks in Tang soo do, Moo duk Kwan, Greco roman wrestling. That is now what the Evolution of Kombatan Arnis is. GM Ernesto now calls his art Kombatan Arnis-Mano mano. ARJUKEN was practice until the 1994. I was one of the last instructors to teach in the HQ. Now we carry the name Kombatan Arnis. Why? We follow our GM. His art has gone from Modern Arnis (But since he had been associated with his Brother too much) it became Arnis Presas style then Ernesto Presas Sr. Progressive martial arts systems. Now it evolved into Kombatan Arnis( I know what's next?) Jokingly aside, He is always evolving. We always said he was like a Filipino ninja because of the japanese arts. Now we say Kombatan arnis is like a Filipino version of Jeet Kune Do( as a joke) GM still does his research and always teaches us new stuff. A great teacher where language barriers is solved by movement. HOpe this helps.

Lakanduli

[LAKANPOPOT]

By the way, ARJUKEN was big in Australia, and the rest of Europe. In Australia Trish Trais(hope I spelled it right) was the head of the organization. Austrailia has the biggest following in ARJUKEN. They are a great group. In Europe we had Are Larsen of Sweden, New Zealand-Kurt Graham. I forgot the others. We were required to study all the arts GM STudied so we would be all around(well rounded martial artists). Then once we reached the advance rank we were allowed to specialize in the different arts. Now GM promotes the Filipino arts more than the Japanese arts.
We now teach Mano-mano which is a mix slight kickboxing base with lockings, takedowns and control movements as our emptyhand arts.
Kombatan arnis is the fusion of all the styles of arnis GM has reasearched. Modern Arnis, Sungkiti-tutsada, Palis Palis (all Family Arts of the Preas') then Hirada Batanguena(Solo baston system) Doble baston, Bangkaw(staff), Dulo-dulo(palm stick), Espada y daga, and daga sa daga(knife).

Lakanduli

[johnzag]

Guys quickly I have personally traveled to the philippines and trained with Grand Master Presas. Arjuken is an out of date style that GM Presas used to promote as mentioned in the other posts Kombatan is now the name of the style. In Australia the head of the International Philippines Martial Arts Federation (I.P.M.A.F.) which is GM Presas organisation is a person called Hugh Doherty who is based in Ringwood Melbourne. He is a 6th Dan in Kombatan and was graded directly by GM Presas and all the other top filipino Lakans.
If you are interested in Kombatan Ernesto Presas Jnr should be coming out at some stage this year so maybe try and come along to one of the seminars that he is conducting. If you are interested I can give you the names of people currently teaching Kombatan in Australia.

[Keeper]

Johnzag,

Are you one of the big Ausie guys that trained in Negros and Manila?

The guys at HQ were showing me loads of pics of the other westeners they've trained with.

[johnzag]

Well in the last 4 years there have been 2 sets of Aussies that have gone to the 1999 world kombatan training camp and the 2003 world kombatan training camp. So the answer is if it was pictures from the 2003 camp then yes if it was pictures from the 1999 camp then it was Hugh Doherty and 3 of his students one of which is now my instructor. From memory the guys who went to the 1999 camp were Hugh Doherty, Khalid Hamid, Peter Simons and Andrew Elliott (my instructor).

[Keeper]

It was the 1999 pictures I saw. There pic is also in "Arnis - Presas Style and Balisong"

[johnzag]

Yeah I know the pictures that you are talking about we have them up on the wall in our Dojo as well. Not to mention that I got a signed copy of the book you mentioned from GM when I was in the Philippines last year. I have trained with all the people in the picture and they are all great guys. My instructor Andrew Elliott kept going on about how great an experience it was attending the 1999 camp so the only way a couple of us thought we would ever shut him up was to go to the camp in 2003. We are hopefully going to go back next year which should be great. We are a small group in Australia but working very hard to get Kombatan adopted on a wider scale down under. Its a great Martial Art!