Drunken Monkey

personally, when i do chi sau, i don't go for the hits. i much prefere to tie him/her up completely and keep one hand free. i know it makes bad habits (not hitting when i have them trapped) but it does get them to work harder. the look on their face as their hands are tied and they see i have a free hand to scratch my nose is kinda funny...

hmmm, isn't this the same austin goh whose store off carnaby street has closed??? anyone know where he's gone? anyway, i don't really recommend learning forms from a book or video, especially if you're thinking of taking proper classes. no matter how closely you can imitate what you see, you will never learn about the invisible things like how a proper stance feels like, or the spring touch of a properly executed bong sau... worse still is if you get into bad habits cos then your instructor will have a hard time time trying to teach you their methods.

hmmm, i spy a slightly dubious statement there... most people i know who practise other martial arts do not just stand there waiting to be hit... anyway, back to the original post. what it looks like is a misunderstanding of the terms hard/soft martial arts. conceptually, wing chun is soft but in execution, it is hard (but only when you need it to be).

been away for a while, my pc got struck down by a really annoying virus.... anyway, gonna spread the topic a little wider and talk about forms in general. whether it is from a chinese style, or a japanese style, modern or old, you have to remember that forms training in always going to be important. the forms training is supposed to show you the ideal/perfect execution of the moves within your martial art. someone has said that kickboxing doesn't involves kata/forms but i say they do. when they train, they practice, body position, accuracy, consistency, power. these are the things that our forms training are for. the only difference is that our traditional forms consist of a lot of moves strung together and their forms consist of small, often singular moves. i have said this many times before, the way we move in forms is not the way we move in a fight.

i thikn, in a film, the style becomes irrelevant and it becomes more about how it looks and what you want to show. some will apreciate the precise moves of wing chun for close up but then for wider angles, more flash will be better. check out the first police story for some kick ass fight scenes.

i always thought tkd was just a korean re-interpretation of karate that general choi hung hei organised and taught to the korean army.

then it does depend on what you call flashy. i personally love watching my sifu just shifting slightly on the spot and changing arm/hand position to neutralise a threat then just walk forward. the simple, clean, unfussed, presise movements are just so impressive. all this with a smile too. then again i also appreciate the cool moves they use in films and i do harbour a secret desire to be able to do them...

you call that a plot? haha, my plot is better than yours. it is not, my superior plot will win. arghhh, i have been defeated, i must rewrite my plot but watch out, i WILL be back for my revenge...

we spar with what ever force we want to. we kind of don't use some moves that are considered last resort moves. these include the famous biu gee to eys, throat, kidney, elbows to head etc but we do train for them ayou probably do on the bag and we learn where we can use them on the dummy+free form training. most of the time, when we get through the defences, which will require the use of quite a bit of force sometimes, it is enough to just put you hand up against his face. enough to let him know that you have "hit" him. the actual training of the strikes occurs on the wall bag, hanging bag and finger jab pad. one thing that beginners in wing chun do is use too much force to overcome faults in their technique. in this case we usually pair him up with a more experienced guy/gal and just have them defend all day. that way eventually the newbie will learn that too much force will just tire you out. eventually he will learn that you only use as much force as you need to. as for practise, we also train in loose techniques a lot. for example, tan sau+strike is the most basic one but there are so many variations of situations that everytime you do one it will never be the same as the last. what this means is that sometimes we just spend the day going backwards and forwards doing this changing the variables (strength, speed, step-in, step-in speed, from side etc etc)

well, it was also partly to prove that i coud do it. i wanted to remove all the fantasy and find out the truth. to learn was my reason. you could say it was for fun but i think it was more because i kind of needed to learn. it was the only way i felt i could get closer to my own culture. it encompassed everything that is chinese: history, myth, philosphy, rituals, family. another part of it if you look at it was because i wanted to be able to do what they were able to do. to be so precise in their movement, to have so much control over themselves and the situation. i always tell people, the true test of how tough you are is not how you fight but rather how you DON'T fight. i guess i was lucky in that the art which found me was wing chun...

the main reason for training is to simply be better than you already are. for ever person you beat, there will always be ten more better, waiting to fight. i don't think that aiming for belts of awards is important. what is important is the art that you are learning. it's a shame you don't train in a class of some sort. one of the best things of going to train with a group of people is the atmosphere. we are more or less a family, we don't have any belt system and simply refere to each other as si-hing/si-dai/si-miu etc... we go to each other for help in all sorts of matters because we know we can rely on each other both inside and outside of the training hall.

ok, then i have to say i started because i just wanted to learn. as a chinese kid growing up in london, my only contact with the chinese culture was through the many programs that we got on tape (all of dubious production merits). invariably, many of these were of the martial arts variety. these were of the fantasy type with lots of gliding about in treetops and magic arts. while these were fun to watch i knew that somewhere there existed REAL martial arts. there was one particular program that serialised the life of chan chen (the student of fok yuen gap) after he disappeared. what struck me about this one was that there was no fancy flying about and no over the top fancy moves. just pure simple technique. that's what really attracted me. the purity of it all. so simple yet so effective. i just wanted to learn more about all of the various styles that i saw on these programs. the more i searched the more i found out. in the end i just ended up totally in love with the whole topic; styles, histories, myths, philosphy... somehow and purely by accident, i was exposed to wing chun when i was young. this stopped after about a year and i kind of forgot about it (girls and all that) but then during my later years in university i happened across it again and haven't stopped since. so really, there is no real reason. i did not go out to find any particular style. it kinda found me.

i've got myself a "copy" of an old book. it's of lam sai wing performing the tiger crane form. it consists of plate prints of him in positions and each plate is accompanied by a page of text explaining the movement and theory.

well i think the "teching to foreigners" would've annoyed the chinese more than stealing their money... it's a cultural thing.

i don't really care whether he won or lost. that's not really the point i'm trying to make. i just don't like the idea of people saying things without proof/evidence.

hehe, who needs a plot... i mean, most martial arts films don't bother with one!

wckf - just out of interest, have you done that test of your tan sau, where you just hold it in position and let people swing at it... try it. for a start it gets you used to your tan saus optimum position for sparring and secondly, it'll show you that a swing/hook, which can be strong, can be neutralised with a simple tan sau. now go practise some more.

so, since when were there black belts who train every day for tournaments walking the streets looking for a fight? the average joe on the street isn't going to fight like how a ufc fighter is going to. a ufc fighter has to learn and train in what works in the ring. as nearly everyone who participates trains more or less the same thing, they also have to train in the things that specifically work against these primay techniques. in a way, this is actually sort of limits the things he does. while this does not mean he is not a capable fighter but it does mean he may not be prepared for ALL eventualities. what i mean is that the ring is in no way close to what i fight on the streets is going to be like. the best you can do is to constantly train and spar with as many people as possible. after all, the more you do something, the more prepared you are.

i know what you mean, a LOT of people confuse tournaments and how you spar in a class with how effective the art is. after all, how many of us have gone at it hammer and nails with our kung fu brothers outside of the class to test what we have learnt? all those who have will know that it looks like nothing we do in the training hall.

how about those who train purely for the love and appreciation of the art? surely if you train seriously, then you will having fun, getting fit, learning about the art, learning how to defend yourself, learning how to fight, learning how not to fight...

ok, a literal traslation of san soo/sau is "loose techniques" what that means is that you learn a lot of small separate moves, much like how you do in kickboxing as you go on practising these moves and combinations instead of the more traditional forms. so if you really want to work "flashy" kicks into your repertoire, you can. just keep practising!

china is quite big. southern china (half of the country) is still quite big... there are as many styles and variations of kung fun in southern china as there are types of coffee in starbucks. invariably, all will claim to be good for something but then again it all depends whether you prefere espresso or a skinny latte and how much you drink.

and there's the fact that there are no rules on the street and so the number of things that might happen increase a thousand fold. no amount of training can fully prepare you for what might happen.

totally the wrong kind of answer but i think most martial arts, if not all martial arts will be effective if you train to be proficient in the techniques/theories that it teaches. after all, if you don't practise, how will you get good? you need to practise forms to inprove your precision of execution and you need to spar to improve reations/speed/accuracy etc...

but it's sometimes a pain for me cos my sifu sometimes asks me to translate/explain chinese sayings to the others but it doesn't always work...