Tae Soo Do and Hwa Rang Do

[The Noid]

I've seen through a bit of research on Tae Soo Do that it is required you earn a TSD black belt before you can train at Hwa Rang Do. I started my martial arts "career" at Hwa Rang Do and I've seen many others do the same. Does anyone know, are the rules more slack then they once were or is it just the area I'm in that is allowing this?

[complete]

Tae Soo Do is the "light" and "sport" version of Hwa Rang Do. It was only created like 10 years ago to attract more students to the art who are scared off by the vigorous training of Hwa Rang Do. "Tae" means great in Chinese character, and is also the first name of Chief Master Taejoon Lee.

You can start at Hwa Rang Do right away, if you want. Or some people prefer to start easy by starting in TSD and once you get a blackbelt in TSD, you are automatically a certain belt in Hwa Rang Do. (I forgot if it was orange or yellow)

As it was explained to me by Master Taejoon Lee, Hwa Rang Do is very intense almost like military training with lot of yelling and screaming, whereas Tae Soo Do is like making people feel good for small accomplishments and encouragements. Not sure if I explained it exactly but you get the point.

[The Noid]

Alright, thank you. That pretty much cleared it up for me.