Our Founders
North Harbour Kyokushin Karate was founded in 1982 by Shihan Stephen Takiwa (6th Dan) and Shihan Diane Takiwa (5th Dan) as a branch dojo of Japan’s Kyokushinkaikan. The Shihans moved back to their original home in Hawke’s Bay in 2018, but are still extremely active in Kyokushin Karate, with Shihan Stephen Takiwa serving as our IKO1 New Zealand Branch Chief.
Both Shihans are highly experienced instructors and competitors and we are fortunate to be able to train under Shihans as knowledgeable as the Takiwas.
Our dojo operator
Our current dojo operator and head instructor is Sensei Arpad (Arpi) Vamosi (3rd Dan). The COVID pandemic made operating a dojo incredibly difficult. We were in lockdown and unable to train together and many of our students left New Zealand to return to their home countries. Sensei Arpi worked tirelessly to introduce video conferenced Zoom trainings to our dojo and kept in touch with all the students to ensure that we would be in a position to train together as soon as lockdown ended.
In addition to dealing with COVID, we lost our training facility at Northcote College due to much-needed construction and were forced to move our training, first to Onepoto Domain and, recently, to AUT Sports Centre.
Sensei Arpi brings broad international experience to the club, competing around the world and training regularly via video link with top Shihans from around the globe.
