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Escrima now and Then


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It is interesting to meet practitioners from different styles of eskrima and learn their naming and numbering structure.Our concepts to stick fighting are related to each other, but perhaps our perspectives influenced by the background of our instructor.No matter what you call your martial art, Arnis, Kali, Escrima or perhaps something more specific like Pekiti Tirsia, we are finding out that we have much that is the same.We are simply branches of the same tree.

Through the years, I have seen individuals create arguments over such trivial things as martial arts vocabulary because in our minds, there are no dialects, no variance in terms that describe our arts.We could really get off track years ago by talking about the differences in arnis and say, escrima.Years ago I asked Guro Nathan Defensor about the similarities and differences between escrima and arnis. my instructor always said that there was not much difference in the names men gave to FMA, some of the words came from cultures that colonized the Philippines.When I first started in the Filipino Martial Arts, there were people that I would meet that were adamant as to how to describe their martial arts.

With social media like MySpace, Twitter, and Facebook, we now can reach out and network with other martial artists to get their philosophy on techniques or martial arts weapons.  Online resources such as Ray Terry’s Eskrima Digest and numerous web sites have been, in my opinion, a huge help in getting us all to see that we are very much alike.  YouTube video clips show us that, yep, we do that too.Now there is a great deal of people learning more than one martial art, as we now see the benefits of a multiple system approach that just would not have happened back in the 80’s in many schools.

We are also seeing greater access to international trade, which means that escrima practitioners have greater access to exotic escrima sticks such as kamagong sticks and bahi sticks. Twenty years ago, you may have known someone in your group that had fighting sticks made of Filipino hardwood, but finding a source was somewhat difficult. With technology at our fingertips and the success of online shopping, everyone now has access to buy great escrima sticks.

While allowing martial artists to meet and compare notes all over the web, the Internet may have done more to spread martial arts all over the world in a short period than any other source!

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