agree wholeheartedly, especially to the part where you said no possession is worth our lives, sar salamat toh pagdi hazar as they say.
But I wasn't talking about muggers alone. What if the bad guys are just out for blood, you know, the 'peaceful' ones, the ones who keep going stabby stab on the Europeans from time to time?? I read about such incidents and then immerse myself in the thought - what would I do?? I've run so many different scenarios in my mind (Yeah, yeah, I've no life, I know), and never once I found myself coming on top.
You have three advantages over the mugger scenario in this case.
1. The attacking guy would be alone.
2. Would probably be carrying a long knife and aim to kill rather than defend himself. Which means he doesn't have a maneuverable weapon. And will make large telescoping movements, to generate momentum. Which is required for a large knife. I say this because that is what has happened in recent stabbings and the small switchblade can't kill easily with just one stab. If you are a 'misguided teen', you'd want to leave as much of a body count as possible right?
3. Mostly be in a public place, like a church, temple or city Square.
If all these conditions are checked, you can run away, scream, etc. You can't really do either if you're mugged in an alleyway. If the bad guy has a long knife, you can grab the wrist for a very brief moment to punch the guy or shove or something. Which is risky as hell and only works if the opponent has a really large weapon. Like a 15" blade. Also, you need to disengage before you get skewered. And run like you're being chased by a terrorist, because you are.
The way people get killed in these situations is by freezing up in fear.
And this is why those self-defense gurus that infest the yt martial art scene makes me cringe so hard with all those fancy 'knife defense drills'. Like one guy was saying, catch the knife hand, bend his wrist and then the bad guy will have to drop his blade or something on that line and I was thinking, yeah right. The only thing you gonna achieve is making a total ass of yourself, right before your lifeless body hits the dirt.
Absolutely. Grabbing the knife hand is one of the worst ways to deal with it. Not that there is any real way to defend yourself without running, but...
The only 'defense' I can think of would be to get yourself a custom-made hauberk which you will wear underneath your regular clothing and wear a groin protector perhaps. But I don't know how practical that would be in our climate conditions
In these situations running away is the best option according to me. If you can't find a way do put distance between yourself and your opponent, you're dead.