Typhoon Holly strikes Okinawa, August 1984
Tropical Storm Lee brushes by Okinawa, August 1985
While conducting my Karate Kid studies it has always been important to me to get a correct timeline. The key to Karate Kid's magic and some of it's mysteries is to know exactly when events took place. Of course the most important date of all when it comes to Karate Kid lore is December 19th, the day of the All Valley Tournament.
But December 19th of what year?
The movie came out in 1984. But is that when its events took place? I suppose when you sit in a theater and watch a movie that is taking place in your time period your mind tells you it is happening in real time. I'm sitting in a theater in the summer of 1984 watching the All Valley Tournament, even though it is taking place in December my mind tells me it is that December that is coming up, it is showing my future events.
Or do I sit there and think of it as events that just recently took place? I'm sitting in a theater in the summer of '84 watching the All Valley Tournament that took place December 19th, it must have been this past December, 1983.
I can see people looking at it both ways. However, we were treated to a decent sequal a couple of years later which ended any doubt of a Karate Kid timeline.
As we all remember Karate Kid 2 took place where Karate Kid 1 left off. Six months after the tournament the movie picks up with Daniel pulling into Mr. Miyagi's house with a beat up car after the senior prom, and a horrible baby blue tuxedo to boot. Mr. Miyagi later gets the letter that tells him of his father's illness in Okinawa. The rest we know, but the key is the typhoon that struck Okinawa sometime in August right around the time they were going to celebrate the Obon festival.
Therefore, if the events of Karate Kid 1 took place in 1983 there should be a typhoon that hits Okinawa in 1984. Or if the events of Karate Kid 1 took place in 1984 there should be a typhoon that hits Okinawa in 1985.
Mystery solved. Typhoon Holly hit Okinawa hard in August of 1984 with winds upwards of 80 miles an hour causing major damage and "stranding an estimated 15,000 vacationers" according to the New York Times article. Of course Mr. Miyagi and Daniel being two of them. In 1985 the only storm to hit Okinawa in August was Tropical Storm Lee which brushed by the island with only "light winds". Certainly not hard enough winds to cause the damage we saw happen in Karate Kid 2.
