Message from Master Thinh
Dear Silkisondan Masters, Instructors, Black Belts, and Students:
I can’t even begin to tell you how much I look forward to seeing every one of you today. I have to take my wife to Vietnam to attend her father’s funeral. We lost him to lung cancer on Wednesday, March 16.
Vietnam is where I originally come from. I grew up and finished high school in 1970 and went to the US on April 27, 1971, as one of the few selected elite students for college education.
I started at San Francisco State University shortly after I arrived in the US and it was my first Karate teaching at that time.
California was fine, but I found Utah State University offering me a better opportunity to attend college, take special English classes for foreign students, and better opportunity to teach Karate at the school campus.
I spent a year in Utah and moved on to locate in Virginia to continue my engineering degree at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia. At this school, I was able to teach for the Navy YMCA, the City of Ocean View, the Jewish Community Center, and at the school campus.
I graduated from ODU in May 1976 and came to Richmond, Virginia to work for Virginia Electric & Power Company, now Virginia Power.
Richmond is where I started to build the root for Silkisondan Karate.
Master Ron Proffitt start with me at the first school located in Beverly Hills Shopping Center and continue to train under me at the second and third schools.
Master Rusty Burke started to train with me in a very similar pattern as Master Proffitt.
Instructor Kha is my son, but more especially to me than any of my students in many respects. He breathed Karate atmosphere at one year old and has not stopped.
I can go on the mention many great students I have, but the list is too long. If you see these 3 individuals, Master Proffitt, Master Burke, and Instructor Kha, you see at all.
It will be a great mistake not to mention those who believe in and support me.
Mille and Cinnamon. These two ladies present so many mothers who devote themselves as mothers as wives. They devote and give as much as my die heart students. They are very tough humans.
Let’s talk about technical stuff. Why is Silkisondan?
Sieu Khi Song Dan is the Vietnamese original term. It means the highest superior breathing in 2 ways. Inhaling to feel our body and build stability, exhaling to study your opponents.
The balance of both will result in knowing yourself and knowing others.
And the balance perhaps gives you travel far into the future.
Having said the above, I have been very fortunate to make sound and good decisions:
Studying karate is one
The method used to train my students
Selected Instructors who grow and solidify the Silkisondan system
One thing that I am so proud of is that I don’t micromanage my students. I let them grow.
This will bring me to touch on our younger students as our next generation. Ask yourself, do you think Kha will need to manage Megan once she is ready to teach Karate. I seriously doubt the question, if any.
In so many words, I find love and excellent physical training coupled with lifetime benefits in karate.
I want every one of you to know that all of my instructors care about their students.
Last but not least, I want you to know that I learn karate from my students more than I learned from my teachers.
Thank you,
Master Thinh