no white gi, but serious training and realistic outcome. you learn the effective use of elbows which is up close and within range of punches and knees.

try your local yellow pages, look under martial arts, and then find the Muay Thai. not kickboxing, unless it has Muay Thai in front of it.

that being said a lot of martial arts have the student wear a gi and have a grading(belt) system, but not all.

there are pretty much 3 different aspects of fighting: standing/striking(boxing, kickboxing,tkd, karate), clinching/throwing(judo, aikido), and ground fighting(brazilian jujitsu, sambo). to be able to defend yourself in any scenario you need to get descent at all of these

unless you are planning on bein a professional fighter i dont see it practical to take 3 different martial arts at once so i suggest a hybrid martial arts: jeet kune do, krav maga, or san soo

you should enjoy these martial arts because at least for jeet kune do and krav maga(im not sure about san soo) you wear regular clothes just like if you would on the streets. theses systems are not bound by rules since its for self-defense purposes. no tournaments and no katas.

these styles are focused on real fights having no rules and utlizing blows such as eye gouges, biting, lowblows; along with traditional punching kicking etc striking vulnerable spots so you can get away… anything that is necessary to survive.

being in krav maga i know that at my place we focused on alot of gun and knife defense along grabs choke holds etc…just like on the streets. i would say in comparison to most other martial arts krav maga would probably be one of the ones that practice disarming weaponds the most. its fairly easy to learn because krav maga also focuses on the body’s natrual reflexes.

the only proplem i have with these hybrid arts are if the instructors are good. for jeet kune do due to bruce lees premature death their few people truly trained in real jeet kune do, krav maga i’ve seen 1 of the gyms in my area was ran by someone who wasnt skilled and makes me question how the Krav Maga Association of America regulates who can teach, and i don’t really know too much about san soo.

but generally anything can be effective if you train realistically and against a resisting opponent. if you do go with any art talk to the instructor about your goals tell him/her you want to defend yourself and not be sport or tournament oriented. make sure the instructor is qualified cuz there are mcdojos popping up rapidly. and most importantly use common sense you should be able to tell whether something is being taught is practical or not

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeet_Kune_Do
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krav_maga
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_soo

learn to box. I believe it develops instincts, speed and power.

and probably not Brazilian jujistu becuase most of the attacks in school will be from multiple attackers.

However, you will find that most self-defense is taught in martial arts schools, and for good reason. You can easily end up severely injuring people or even killing them if you misapply even rudimentary aspects of self-defense. A good teacher of the martial arts can teach you to effectively defend yourself and to learn control over your own body, the better to control your opponent(s). You will also understand how to respond to different types of attacks with appropriate force (for instance, using a kick as a defense against a knife may not be realistic), understand the legal implications of using those amounts of force, and get an in-depth understanding the physics behind self-defense. For a long-term grounding in self-defense, a martial arts environment might be more beneficial to you.

You did say that you don’t want to wear a uniform and are not interested in all the frippery that MA sometimes has–belt tests, tournaments, etc. However, certain martial arts are definitely more effective in teaching self-defense than others, and these types don’t emphasize uniforms and such. Your instincts about those “karate locations” are no doubt correct; I suspect these schools probably teach sport Taekwondo, which is useless when it comes to street fighting. I recommend you look up Krav Maga (the Israeli Defense Force’s highly effective self-defense art) or Jeet Kune Do (Bruce Lee’s adaptive combat system). Also try traditional jujitsu; yes, you will have to deal with the uniforms and bowing, but their techniques are topnotch and very helpful if you get thrown to the ground…or want to throw someone else.