elegant & aesthetic <--- Respectfully, this will get you killed in the streets.

Sorry. My remarks were well intended but came off really poorly and rude. I apologise.

As mentioned earlier, "Our goal is to instill discipline, live a healthy lifestyle, self confidence and learn self defence." I would like to emphasise the self defence element.

Hence, pressure testing (sparring) is important. Hence why I believed that "elegance & aesthetics" can, in all seriousness, get one killed.

That is not to say that high level Aikido practitioners can't fight and break arms. I'm sure Sonny Loke has had some regular spars before.

However, the likelihood of a train one-hour-a-week school kid will be able to use Aikido skills (I stress, most Aikido schools in Malaysia don't spar) against another kid who includes regular spars as part of their training.

I mentioned in my original post that we are considering Judo, Taekwondo and Muay Thai for our child.