My friend and practice partner David san posted recently about our Sunday coffee ritual. Same as for him I enjoy this quiet time with discussions and good hot brew. I already talked about the positive impacts of turmeric and curcumin, which I use regularly to improve my heart and joint health. However, there are a […]

The numbers for “Making Strides Against Breast Cancer – Sacramento” are in. The whole event raised $413,640 with a goal of $277,000. This is truly amazing to end the fund drive with a plus of over $130k! The vision of this event is to a future where our children no longer live with the threat […]

Last Sunday my fund raiser project came to an end. As the final step, the Zen Martial Arts Striders walked around the Capitol with 20,000 other participants to raise awareness to breast cancer. Our Zen Martial Arts community raised a total of $3,880.09 to save lives and fund the future of breast cancer research, patient […]

Today I am sitting at the dojo as a parent. I am watching my son practicing the same art as me. That is the great thing of our Zen Martial Arts dojo. It is a place for the whole family. In this safe environment my son is learning self-defense and martial arts. In addition, he […]

Last week we did not do our usual Sunday sparring. My son and me went to the Capitol Airshow instead. A whole day of watching airplanes, which is our annual thing here in Sacramento’s fall. In Germany airshows like this are not possible as the safety regulations are too strict. So, naturally, I especially enjoy […]

Update on my Black Belt Project. As you know I am organizing a fundraiser and walk during the “Making Strides of Sacramento” breast cancer event on October, 16th. Currently, as I am writing this blog entry, the Zen Martial Arts Striders are on 6th position of the top donation teams out of 216 participating teams. […]

Sunday sparring time with David-san. Meeting time is 10AM sharp. We go a few rounds, practice some kata and theorize about world politics. The latter is done over some coffee after our morning routine, which is a nice relaxing habit we have established for the end of the week. By the way this is another […]

Meanwhile the One Heart Challenge is down to only David san and me. Geneva san unfortunately got injured during her practice and together with sensei Oliver she decided to continue next year. In addition Geneva san started her college career at Cal Poly Humboldt this fall. I am sad to see her go and wish […]

Throwback Thursday – Part 3 The style of karate I was practicing in Germany was Shorin-ryu Shidokan. It was founded in 1948 by Katsuya Miyahira, who was a student of Chokki Motubo and Choshin Chibana. Chibana was one of the main representatives of the Shorin-ryu (also read as Kobayashi) on Okinawa. In 1956 Miyahira built […]

Throwback Thursday – Part 2 After I finished my study in 2004 I had to move back to my parents. Job market for civil engineers in Germany was super bad at the time. Over the course of a year I wrote 300+ applications all over Europe trying to find a job. During that time my […]