English Karate (Eigoban Karate): What Is Kara-te?

Do you need to travel to Japan or Okinawa to authenticate your Japanese or Okinawan karate, respectively? Why? It would be a nice trip, for a holiday, but it is the luxurious way to further study karate. Can everyone afford such travelling? Of course not! Or, at least, not too often. I live so far from the orient. Such a journey is a goal, but an expensive one. On the topic of training, I can undergo the same training and practice in my own garden and house. Karate has been in other places such as England for numerous decades. There is Okinawan karate, Japanese karate, and other countries' karate, for instance English karate (Eigoban karate). 

In a true sense, naming depends on the extent to which karate has changed in a lineage in England, from its original state, as to how much it is actually English over remaining Japanese or Okinawan. Most schools are vastly Japanese, adhering to the way they (the teachers) were taught by their Japanese instructors, thinking that great changes are not possible because there is a curriculum to which they must conform. There is actually no curriculum; truthfully, there are various kata, each of which is karate kenpo. Shotokan karate is not 26/27 kata, plus kumite. It is 15 kata, 26 kata, over 30 kata, or just a handful, as well as the intricate bunkai for each, which is the real kumite (kumiti) element of kenpo karate study. Of course, for traditional martial arts there is also the matter of conditioning methods. Learning in Okinawa, for example, is nice, but is not necessary to seek understanding of karate and life in a true way. It is over-rated because it is a nice idea, comprising an essence; It is a luxury. How do you learn Okinawan karate, or any martial art? You train, practise, and study hard, every day, relentlessly, persevering through any difficulties in training and in life, for years, and for your entire life. That is karate. Forget about whether it is "Japanese", "Okinawan", or, indeed, "English". Karate is effort. It is gongfu - "great effort". And if you put forth real effort in England, learning from English teachers, then you may be studying English karate, but moreover, in the grand scheme of it all, you are simply studying "kara-te" (Chinese-hands). Eigoban karate is just a derivative.