I need a commuter and am looking to be able to do maintenance on it myself as well. Of the top three always suggested, Honda, Mazda, Toyota, which is easiest to work on and what models of each should I consider & avoid?
Budget: under $20,000
I’m looking for a 6th gen Honda civic and am having no luck at all. I want a good daily car that will last for forever and not be an absolute gas guzzler. Does anyone know a place I can find them?
In my [last post](https://www.reddit.com/r/karate/s/LNsQMOukQV) I detailed my sensei’s complete disregard and disrespect for any martial art outside of AAKF Karate. A number of you suggested I leave and some said I should stay being so close to my Shodan. In my dojo we only test every 6 months and our belt grading system is an exact copy of the JKA’s kyu to Dan system (according to my sensei). Well, I tested for my 2nd kyu and passed but now I have a bigger problem.
After my 2nd kyu test, my sensei told me that I should not test for my 1st kyu in 6 months but to give it a year. This was a bit of a bummer because that would put me, at minimum, 2 years away from my Shodan. I’ve trained with this sensei for 2 years (*and had done Shotokan karate for 4 before I came to this dojo. In total I have 6 years in Shotokan Karate. So there wasn’t a whole lot that I had to “relearn or anything like that*). I asked what I needed to improve upon and he said “body connection”.
When I did my 1 step and 3 step sparring kumite for my test, I had a significantly higher score than the black belts who tested with me. Prior to this, my sensei had said that the foundation of scoring well in kumite is “body connection”. So I was a bit surprised that my kumite was significantly better (according to his scoring and words) than three black belts he just passed but I am being held back by 2 years now. I bit my tongue and said “In the year that I prepare, what can I do to improve my ‘body connection’?” And his exact words were “oh you’ll get it in time.”
I feel that this is not teaching. If there are no exercises or explanations on how to achieve this goal then how can I just get it? So I asked more clarifying questions about kata, general exercises, etc and was met with “you’ll get it in time.” Seeing the brick wall in front of me, I asked all of the other black belts in the school and they all said the same thing but NOBODY can elaborate or explain how they “got it in time”. So I called all of my old JKA instructors (4 of them with a collective 80 some odd years of experience between them) and asked what he could mean and every single one said “I don’t know what that could possibly mean. I’ve never heard that phrase before.”
Finally, I printed off the JKA Kyu to Dan grading syllabus and found that the techniques and kata I am doing are all the way through Ni Dan. I feel that, with the seemingly incongruent remarks about my kumite & body connection, to the dodging of my “how do I improve” question, and the grading syllabus, that I am being arbitrarily held back with no clear road forward. Not to mention he stated that the average run from white belt to Shodan is anywhere from 4-5 years and I started with him as a purple belt and have only had to learn two new katas and literally no new techniques as my old dojo already taught me those. So from purple belt to Shodan, for me, is 4 years and he can’t quantify what I need to do it improve? It just doesn’t add up.
*Worth noting: I also asked about character issues perhaps that he might see in me and he said “oh my gosh no not at all! You’re a great guy and stellar athlete. You’ll really just get the body connection in time.”* That’s it…
What the heck do I do?