Hi there, I've been searching for the kanji in my old notes and found this. I was led to believe it meant early dawn... Memei. As for Shimpa', it is a kata that already exists in karate..I just can't find it's meaning.
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Ah, so 未明 (m
imei)
does mean early dawn (literally "not yet" and "bright"). It's transliterated correctly in this image
jisho.org
Unlike English where a vowel can be pronounced in several different ways, Japanese vowels are pretty simple and transliterated consistently as
A: an open, central "
ah", like in "father"
I: a high front vowel like in "
eat"
U: a high back, unrounded "ooh" as in "g
ood,"
E: mid front "
eh", like in "bed"
O: a mid back, rounded "
oh"
So when you wrote "m
emei" you were perhaps thinking like the English "me," but in Japanese spelling it this way would create a different sound and a completely different word (as the possible kanji that could apply changes), hence my confusion.
I looked up Shimpa and found
this page with offers a few different ways to write it
シンパー "Shimpā," in katakana, with a long vowel at the end, which is probably closest to the original pronunciation by the Okinawan masters
It offers 心破, 新破, and 侵破 as possible kanji for the name, but everywhere else I have looked favors 心破. This video is the Shito-ryu version
