Kajukenbo Okayama: Tell us about yourself.
Eric Coleman: My name is Eric Coleman. I am a self-subscribed photographer. I own a photography/branding/marketing business. Father of one. Living in Austin, Texas. From California.
My company’s initial name was Eric Coleman Photography. I’m expanding the brand this year and changing the name to Creative Massive. We work in marketing, visual branding, anything you need done visually – photography, design, web design, social media marketing stuff, marketing collateral.
KO: What’s your history with Kajukenbo and the martial arts?
Coleman: I actually started in the martial arts when I was in the 2nd grade, at the San Leandro Boy’s Club. This was before (Kajukenbo Instructor) Ron Esteller got there. There was a Taekwondo guy there, and my brothers and I took Taekwondo for probably about a year. Then the guy ran off with everybody’s money. Said he was gonna take us to Disneyland, but he didn’t. (Laughing).
Then a few years after that, there was a Jiu-jutsu guy there at the Boy’s Club. My mom had always sent us to the Boy’s Club because she always wanted us to be in martial arts. Actually, I have 3 brothers, and all 4 of us would go to the Boy’s Club and take lessons.
Eric with his friends and family, way back when: Nate, James, Marc, Keith, Muquet, and Steve.
Eric and his mother, Linda Coleman, 1984. Fun fact: Mrs. Coleman bought the first pads for the Boy's Club classes.
Then, when I was in the 6th or 7th grade, I was about 10 years old and Ron Esteller was there teaching Kajukenbo. I’ll never forget the first day that I went. My mom was like “Go get in class.” So we start taking off our shoes and Ron was like “Nope. Can’t do it. Sit down and watch. And then, when you’re ready, or if you come for a couple times, then you can join the class.”
And at that time, there was probably…I want to say 3 people in the class.
So anyway, I was with Ron for about 3 years. Then I stopped because my mom didn’t want to take us anymore because she was tired of driving [laughs].
I came back when I was able to drive. As soon as I was able to drive one of the first things I did was come back. And I’ve been with him ever since.
It was a passion. Ron only had classes twice a week, and I’d go every Tuesday and Thursday. It was funny because in that first 4 or 5 months, I probably lost about 50 pounds. A friend of mine from high school saw me and he was like “Are you sick? What’s the matter with you? Are you ok?"
I was the same height I am now and I think I got down to like 190 lbs. So I was 6’7”, 6’8”…and 190 lbs. That was very strange.
KO: How'd you start kickboxing in New Mexico?
Coleman: Fast forward to maybe 1991. Ron had started us on stick fighting and he told us about this guy in Albuquerque, New Mexico (Kajukenbo Grandmaster Melchor Chavez) that was training him in Escrima and who was coming up with his students to this tournament we were having in Oakland at Merritt College.
I didn’t get to meet Chavez that time. He probably brought up about 100 students. But the next year, Ron threw a tournament, and a lot of Kajukenbo people from New Mexico came up. We all hit it off, we were all good friends. There was a bunch of us from the Boy’s Club and a bunch of us from the Chavez Dojo.
The following year, we went down to Albuquerque for a weekend and had fun, did a tournament, and got our first taste of kickboxing. We really enjoyed it and had a good time.
The next year was Chavez’ anniversary. A bunch of us wanted to go down and spend two weeks there, training. So, we did that. He saw me and was like “You need to fight”.
I was like “I’m not crazy. I’m not getting in the ring. You’re out of your mind. I saw what they did to the last guy…no.”
But finally, he convinced me to try it out. And it was a game-changer. It was so much better to me than sparring and point fighting.
So I started training with him a little bit more. Luckily I was working for the airline at the time, so I was able to fly down there when I wanted to, train, come back. Chavez would call me for a fight, I’d say yeah. Mind you, I was a black belt at the time, and this was in the 90’s, so I was 10 years into this.
So I’d get myself ready for the fight, fly down there to get the tune ups or whatnot. Get some sparring time in. Come back, go to the fights…and that’s how I worked out until I moved down there in ’99.
KO: And how long were you there?
Coleman: Not long. Maybe about a year. At that time the kickboxing had kind of dried up. MMA was making its way, but at the time people didn’t know a whole lot about it.
Now that’s all they do at the Chavez dojo. But at the time he thought that boxing was the route to go. Boxing for me never really clicked though. I love watching boxing, but I was always ready to kick somebody, so it wasn’t a good fit.
A friend of mine who was a fighter from down there asked me “What’s the difference between kickboxing and boxing?” And this guy was a baseball player, so I told him “Well, it’s kind of similar to somebody asking you to play softball instead of playing baseball.”
And he was like “No, that wouldn’t work”. So it was kind of that difference.
That and the fact that I was homesick. Albuquerque was a little bit different. Especially since I was like one of three black people in the whole state. It made it a little bit difficult.
KO: Did you work in any other fields?
Coleman: Around ’94 or ’95 I ended up getting that job at the airline. Then I kind of floated around. I was still in college.
The only reason it took me so long to get out of college is because I was in the airline industry. I would fly all over the place…I was always fighting or flying – one of the two every weekend. School for me was kinda… “Hm. Am I gonna study or am I gonna go to New York?”
Photo credit: Eric Coleman at Drink and Click ®
So I ended up going to a lot of different places. But then, I was getting older and I was like “I need to finish school before I turn 30.”
At the time I had a bunch of credits in art and a bunch of credits in African-American studies. I thought I could do a minor in art and a major in African-American studies with an emphasis in Law.
I had a friend that was going to Law school and she kind of inspired me, so I set myself on this track to go to Law school. With that, I got a job with a company called Pitney Bowes.
They put me in the mail room of a bunch of law firms and I got to see what the Law profession was like without being a lawyer. And everybody there was trying to talk me out of it [laughs].
They were like “Why would you want to do this? Don’t you see what we have to go through? Why would you want to put yourself through this?”
I ended up taking the LSAT. I ended up doing not great, but not too bad.
I then started looking for a graduate program. Originally I thought either law school or teaching at the college level – specifically, African-American studies. I wasn’t really 100% sure.
Then I met my son’s mom – we had a kid, she was actually in law school at the time. That was further confirmation for me not to go to law school. She had our kid, and I was like “Something’s got to give.”
I was substitute teaching, I wasn’t making a whole lot of money, and I had a kid on the way. I had to figure this out.
So I tried architecture school. I’d always wanted to do architecture but I was always scared of the math. As a substitute though, I started teaching math, and then it made a lot more sense.
Anytime you have to teach something, in martial arts or in anything, the more you teach it the more you learn it, the easier it is to understand it. If you have to show it to somebody, you have to understand it deeply. When I got this better understanding of math, it wasn’t this mysterious, hard thing anymore. I let go of all these mental blocks. I thought “I could do this just like I can do anything I want to do”.
Eric teaching the Muay Thai clinch at Esteller Martial Arts circa 2014.
And like I said, that translates to every form of teaching that you do, especially in the martial arts. When I was teaching at Ron’s school, I had the kickboxing class. It was easy for me as an athlete to do these things, but once I had to teach somebody or show somebody how it’s done, or correct somebody’s form, then I got a much better understanding of what I was actually doing.
I would say there’s no such thing as a bad teacher. They either teach you what you’re supposed to do or what you’re not supposed to do (through their bad teaching). And both of those are pretty valuable.
So, fast forward – I was looking for an architecture program, I had this newborn baby, and I started talking to these people that are actually in the architecture program. And they were like “Why are you doing this?” [laughs].
Everybody’s like “Don’t do it.” They were telling me they were working 20 hours a day, so I wasn’t going to see my kid. And when you finish the program, you’re not going to make any money for the first 10 or 15 years. So I was like. “Okay. Scratch that.”
In the meantime we had decided to move down here to Texas. I was at a loss, I was wondering what I could do. What could I do right now to make money? What skills do I have?
I’d always had an art background, and I was thinking design, graphic design…I ended up taking the money that I’d got from teaching for 5 or 6 years…only about $12,000…lived off it a little bit, bought a bunch of photography equipment and decided to go for it. And that’s where I’m at now.
KO: How did Kajukenbo affect you growing up?
Coleman: It gives you a sense of accomplishment and ability. When I started in the ’80s, everybody was into the karate movies. The Last Dragon, Karate Kid…Ninja Turtles wasn’t out yet but they were big in the comic books. We used to get the Kung Fu magazines with the ninja adds in the back…
My mom and dad used to travel a lot, and they would go to Asia. One time they brought us back those black Kung Fu shoes. My brother, who was much more into Kajukenbo than me at the time…he would wear them to school. But they had absolutely no grip. So you’d run, you’d slide all over the place [laughs].
But seriously, Kajukenbo gave me a sense of confidence. It’s weird because when you realize that you can fight or do something to hurt somebody, it becomes the last thing you want to do. It gave me this appreciation for knowing that I could defend myself but I don’t necessarily have to. One of the things that Ron instilled in us was to not be out there trying to bully people or fight people, but don’t be bullied. Don’t be a victim.
If you see somebody you want to avoid, walk across the street. If they walk across the street, then you have permission to beat ’em up [laughs].
KO: What music always got you ready to train?
Coleman: My favorite song, which I used to walk out to, was a song from Gang Starr called Check the Technique. There were these horns…it’s the hook from that California Soul song. I didn’t know that ’till later, which was kind of funny because I’m die hard California.
I actually met Guru from Gang Starr before he died. He came to perform at a club that I was bouncing at, and I told him “This was the song that used to get me going, that I used to walk out to when I was ready to fight.” That was a great song.
But any song really with an upbeat, mostly hip-hop with upbeat, with high energy, would get me going.
KO: Speaking of that, how long were you bouncing?
Coleman: (Beat) Forgot about that as a job. Uh…10 years.
KO: Did you like it?
Coleman: It was fun. Ninety percent of the time it was easy money. You’re just standing there talking to girls or whatever. Then 5 percent of the time you get to fight somebody. It was like real-world training. That was kind of fun too.
Then there’re the times when you gotta deal with knuckle heads and drunks and things like that. But yeah, it was real fun, actually. There was a lot of camaraderie. People that I worked with to this day are still friends. Lateef (Crowder) is one of the guys I worked with.
(Crowder is a Brazilian-American actor, stuntman, and martial artist who has been in multiple movies starring actors such as Tony Jaa and Scott Adkins. He was also featured in National Geographic’s TV program Fight Science.)
And there were some brawls in that job. I really got to see the nonsense and hypocrisy of a lot of martial arts, and how 90% of that stuff is for show. The reality of it is most people cannot fight. And most people don’t understand violence and how fighting actually works.
If you get somebody that does, then it’s a different story. But for the most part, as far as bouncing goes, I practiced the Bruce Lee art of fighting without fighting a lot of the times.
Well, this was later. When I was younger, I was a little hot-head. If I told you to do something, and you didn’t do it, then we were gonna have a problem. Later on, as I mellowed out in my older age, as we tend to do, it was the art of fighting without fighting.
I’d be like “Hey, let me talk to you outside because I can’t hear what you’re saying. Blah blah blah, this and that.” Once they get outside, I’m like “Okay, you can’t come back in.”
It’s funny because another Kajukenbo black belt, Tiffany Herndon…we went to high school together. I saw her one day working security at Southland Mall. I saw her one time and I was like “Oh, you work security? If somebody tries to do something, are you gonna use your karate on them?”
She was like “No. I’m just gonna spray ’em with the pepper spray and go about my business”.
I thought it was the funniest thing. Years later I thought about it and I thought “Yeah, why go through all that? I got nothing to prove to no body.”
So that became my philosophy.
KO: How did your training in Muay Thai, Capoeria, and Escrima affect your fighting style?
Coleman: It’s really interesting that along the way I realized…especially with Capoeira I realized this…that martial arts is about body mechanics.
Yasmin Jones, at an Eric Coleman photo shoot.
In its purest form that’s all it is. In Capoeira you might have what’s called a martelo – which is really just a roundhouse. It’s just a roundhouse at a different angle. But it’s all the same – all our bodies work the same.
My elbow bends this way just like your elbow bends. I can generate power with my leg if I do this, the same way you can generate power in your leg if you do the same thing.
At first glance you might think Capoeria is so much different from all these other Asian martial arts. But it’s not. It’s just body mechanics and understanding how the body works.
Once you get that fundamental understanding, you can do stuff to another person’s body that it’s not supposed to do. Like “my leg isn’t supposed to bend like that” [laughs]. So if I do that, it’s gonna cause you pain.
It’s interesting that Sensei Chris (Nicholas) was showing us some stuff in the jiu-jutsu class one time and he made a point that he could show us techniques…or he could show us concepts.
(Professor Chris Nicholas is a 7th dan black belt in Danzan Ryu Jiu-jutsu and a police officer in Milpitas, California. Danzan Ryu Jiujutsu is the branch of Jiujutsu that was originally used in the creation of Kajukenbo.)
A technique is never going to work 100% of the time, but a concept is always going to work. And the reality of it is the technique that I use, you yourself might not be able to use because of the difference in our stature.
And the technique that you use, I might not be able to use for the same reason. We’re two different people, two different minds. But the concepts will always work.
So the Capoeira, the Escrima, the Muay Thai – extrapolate the concepts and then say “the Thai kick works because of the whipping action.”
It doesn’t matter if I’m doing Muay Thai or Kajukenbo. That whipping action is always the same. Or I can be balanced, low to the ground, because of the Capoeira, and the idea is creating a stable platform and being able to attack from any position that I’m at. If I take that concept and apply it to all these other techniques, you learn your body mechanics.
It’s not like the movies, where you’re like “Oh, your Muay Thai is very good. Since you know that, I’m going to switch to Escrima…” There’s no real separation.
KO: Where did you learn Capoeira?
Coleman: I started with Mestre (Ed) Becola in Palo Alto, California, and I was with him for a bunch of years. Then I started going to San Jose and studying under Mestre Vaguinho for about a year or two, but Mestre Becola was the one I spent most of my time with.
Eric giving the thumbs up at Ronnie Fonillas' black belt test. In Kajukenbo black belt tests, all black belts are asked to weigh in at a candidate's passing or failure.
KO: What impact would you say Kajukenbo has had on your life today?
Coleman: At this point in my life, it’s more about what I can give back. That was one of the reasons why I asked to join the board for the KAA (Kajukenbo Association of America).
Kajukenbo has fostered so many relationships for me and so many long term friends. It’s more about how I can help younger Kajukenbo practitioners or even people in general. It’s about how I can give people the same self-assurance that I feel like I have. Especially for women, being able to walk down the street or whatever.
Or the idea of understanding that not all these places, these little McDojos, have your best interest in mind, or even have the ability to teach you how to defend yourself.
I went to a Kajukenbo school here in Austin…there’s only like 3 or 4…and it was a mix of Kajukenbo and something else.
I just went to check it out. I wasn’t trying to be pompous or anything, but it was really kind of a shock to me to see how…I don’t want to talk bad about them, but they were not fighters. They would not be able, in my opinion, to be able to defend themselves.
One of the kids was there, and either way he was getting ready for his black belt. And I told him, because he asked me…and I’m not gonna mince words, ‘cause what are they gonna do, beat me up? [laughs]…but he asked me, and I was like “There’s some interesting stuff that you were doing, but the reality of it is I don’t think you’d be that great in a fight. In a real fight. I could see that the lackluster way in which you do things in the school would only be a hindrance for you out in the real world.”
And that’s coming from my experience in the ring and my experience as a bouncer.
So, all that information…I want to give that back. How do I return these gifts, this information, to people that aren’t gonna be a bouncer for 15 years, or aren’t going to get into the ring…how do I prepare them for the problems they’re going to face?
Some of the "Boys Club black belts", today, with their instructor, Ron Esteller (center).
KO: As a Kajukenbo practitioner, what are your thoughts on Floyd Mayweather and the people who say he can’t fight?
Coleman: I say those people don’t know what they’re watching and they’re not real fans of boxing. Once you understand what’s going on, you have to be in awe of this man’s talent. Not him as a person. His talent is amazing.
One of the trainers for Sugar Shane Mosley said Mayweather reduces the best boxers in the world to one or two punches. Meaning, when he fought Mosley, Mosley landed like, one punch on Mayweather and everybody went crazy. And it rocked him for a second, but Mosley still lost that fight overwhelmingly.
And then Marcos Maidana roughed him up. I heard Maidana almost beat Mayweather…he didn’t almost beat nothing.
As a fighter, who wants to get hit? Even with the Mexican style fighting, they come forward and they’re just like “We’re gonna see who gets hit.” But they still do defensive moves.
It’s not his job to let him hit you…it’s your job to hit him. Just the fact that Mayweather can come out in the first two or three rounds, figure out what you’re going to do, and from then on you’re not going to touch him. He’s like “I got that combination.”
He’s like one of those comic book robots that will steal your powers and be like “now I compute that you’re gonna throw this punch at this time…” and once he figures that out you might as well just stop.
I saw that fight he had out there in Japan (vs. Nasukawa Tenshin) and that was a travesty. There was no reason for that little boy to get in the ring with him at all. I know that Japan does those publicity stunts, those kinds of fights all the time, and that’s all that was. That was like Rocky vs. Hulk Hogan [laughs]. That was just a joke.
If you understand what boxing is, if you understand how boxing works, and understand what you’re looking at, it would be impossible for you to not be in awe of that dude’s talent. Impossible.
KO: Are there any particular fighters who you admire/admired?
Coleman: Boxing wise, I really liked Tito (Félix "Tito" Trinidad) when he was fighting.
There are a bunch of boxers that I like.
I don’t actually watch very much MMA, but I did like (Daniel) Cormier. I met him, actually, in San Jose.
But I’m not like, a huge fan of people [laughs]. I like people, but it’s never like “Oh my gosh, they’re the best in the world.” Like, people were all caught up on Anderson Silva for awhile before he got hurt and I’m like “Yeah, he’s good…he’s decent…I’m not all that impressed but…”
I mean, that might even just be the fighter in me where I’m like “Myeh, I feel like I could take him” [laughs].
But that’s always been…I guess my attitude. But I mean, there’re lots of good fighters out there.
KO: Do you have any advice for Kajukenbo practitioners or martial artists in general?
Coleman: There’s a lot to learn. And there’s a lot of people that will tell you that they know stuff…but actually they don’t. And one of the things that helped me along the way is that the people that actually know typically will tell you the same things.
So for example, when I was fighting there was all these people coming out the woodworks who’d be like “Hey, you should do this, this, this, and this.”
But once I found a trusted advisor and listened to him, I would hear his words coming of someone else’s mouth…then I’d be like “Okay. They know. They know something.”
So I would take in everything that I could and kind of translate it for myself, and then use that information going forward. I’d say “This is what I know. Let me see if this works.” And if it worked, I would internalize everything.
Like I told you, there’s no such thing as a bad teacher. There’s only people that tell you what to do and tell you what not to do. The hard part is figuring out which is which. Once you can figure that out, then you’re good to go.
KO: You mentioned a “trusted advisor”. Who was it?
Coleman: I’ve had a couple. Of course Ron. Chavez. Basically all my teachers. I’ve been really, really, really lucky in that…with the exception of the Taekwondo guy…every teacher that I had was really good at what they did. Really good at teaching. They’re literally world-class teachers. It made it easy for me because then the people that they introduced me to were always excellent at what they did.
So that barrier to their information getting to me was a lot lower because of who introduced me to them in the first place.
Like, Ron Esteller. A world-class kind of teacher. His mentality of “go out, learn everything you can, find out what works, and bring it back”. That is very freeing for a student.
That idea of “let’s play with it and deconstruct it and see what works and what doesn’t work…” I think that mentality gives you a lot of room to grow. And that’s what it should be about: growth and knowledge, and figuring out what works. I think that is the gift of Kajukenbo. That’s basically what the founders did. They put all their egos aside and said “Hey…does this work?” That’s the only rubric in which we’re going to judge this. “Does this work?”
And that’s a great, non-biased way to look at martial arts.
Contact Eric and Creative Massive by email at eric@ericcolemanphotography.com or by phone at 510-798-6277, or check out his website at http://www.ericcolemanphotography.com/