# A Newbie's Intro



## Dronak (Oct 25, 2001)

Hi all.  I recently found out about this message board and it looked like a pretty good place for all sorts of areas, so I decided to give it a try.  I'm a little disappointed to see that the area I've just started studying has so few posts (compared to some others), but oh well.  Maybe things will pick up.  I don't have too much to say, but felt like getting my first post out of the way, so I figured I'd go for a general introduction.

I'm a graduate student and just this semester learned about a Chinese martial arts club on campus.  Actually the club has been non-existent for about five years which is why I didn't know about it before.  I've been interested in martial arts for a while, just in general, nothing real specific, and so I thought I'd give this a try.  I've only been doing this for about a month, so I'm still super-new, but I am enjoying it.  

The club found an instructor to teach us the northern long fist style of shaolin kung fu.  He apparently has a long term, four year, plan for us because we got a general syllabus (so to speak) for that long.  I'm planning to graduate after two more years though, so I'll see how far I get through his plan.  We also have one with the schedule for this semester.  As you'd imagine, we're doing a lot of basic stuff now, stances, kicks, gestures, stretching, etc.  The first form we're learning got translated as "six closing fist/boxing" (don't know the Chinese name), we're scheduled to do a few of the ten tan-tuie routines for the style, and we're also learning some self defense applications called grabbing hands (things like if an attacker grabs your wrist).  The future appears to hold more forms and such as well as some weapon training (I think he said staff would likely be first).  I think he said there are grabbing knives and grabbing guns applications that we may get to later on.  I don't really understand most of the stuff on the long term syllabus to explain what is included.  But the instructor also said that he may teach us other things according to our individual potentials as well.  The list of things there included Yang tai chi (and sword) and Mantis fist among others.

We're hoping to have some training sessions during the winter break and the summer instead of just the fall and spring school semesters.  I think the instructor wants to make these a bit more intensive, too; e.g., more days a week and/or more time each day.  He also said that if we all practice regularly and hard, trying to get everything just right every time, we just might be able to start with weapons come summer.  

So there you have it, a basic intro to me and the class I just started taking.  And that takes care of my first post.  I hope intros like this are OK.  I'm hoping it will get some conversation going because I love to talk about my favorite activities.


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## Bob Hubbard (Oct 25, 2001)

Welcome.  

The more the merrier here.  We're about 3 months old, and still spreading the word.  If a forum is a little quiet now, just give it some time...and tell everyone you know who's got an interest in MA.  

I've looked at some of the Tai Chi sword styles, and someday, hope to have the balance and flexibility to try them.  I've done some Wing Chung, and am currently skimming a book on Northern Shaolin KF. Names similar to what your studying, but different too.  ??? Another name listed on the book is Pek Sil Lum.  Wonder if its the same thing.


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## Icepick (Oct 26, 2001)

Dronak -

I've done a tiny bit of Wing Chun as well, so I'm not very fluent  in Kung Fu discussion.  Great that you found a college program though!  I wish I had  started before I graduated!


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## Dronak (Oct 26, 2001)

I'm glad to be here.    I didn't realize the board was so new.  In that case I'm sure things will pick up all over as more people find out about it.  I put a link to here on my web personal web site so that might get a couple more people here.  

I'm too new to be able to tell you if the book you have, Kaith, covers the same stuff I'm being taught.  I think I've heard of that book and from the little I saw, it appeared to be the same style.  Maybe I'll get it later.  For now though I bought a book that specifically said it was long fist style because I figured I couldn't really go wrong with that.  I think it has what we're learning, but since the form we're currently doing isn't in the book it's a little hard to tell.  The long term syllabus lists other forms that look like they are in the book (names translated a bit differently though) so I think this was a good first choice.  I like having books for reference and to put notes in, so I'll probably get some others, like that Pek Sil Lum one, later.

Icepick, I'm glad I found the program here, too.  Perhaps more appropriately, I'm glad some people started up the club again.  And I'm new to this, so I'm not fluent in any sort of martial arts discussion yet, but that won't stop me from sharing the little I do know.    One of the initial information sheets we were given said that this style was chosen for us because traditionally it was the first style students in ancient China learned.  It's suppposed to be a good preparation for anything else because it requires a lot of flexibility, power, and speed.  I guess the idea is that if you can do this style correctly, other styles that aren't quite as demanding will be easier to handle.  Of course, the trick is learning how to do everything in this style correctly and it's not simple.


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## GouRonin (Oct 26, 2001)

Just curious as to where you are studying (school) if you don't mind telling us.


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## Dronak (Oct 26, 2001)

I didn't think anyone would care which particular school I was at which is why I didn't mention it in the first place.  But since you asked, I'm at the University of Maryland.


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## GouRonin (Oct 26, 2001)

Just curious. It always helps to be in the know in case someone else asks something and you can connect the two up. Let us know how your training goes. That and give us good training tips from your art.
:asian:


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## Dronak (Oct 29, 2001)

That's true, GouRonin.  It can help to know where people are so that you can direct people who want location specific information to others who have it or can get it fairly easily.

The training is going pretty well, but it does seems to move rather quickly.  I take notes on what we've learned and make notes in that book I bought so that I won't forget everything.  Exactly what we're taught in each class varies a bit, but there's usually a fair amount of new stuff.  We always get a couple more moves (about four) of the six closing fist form, usually there's a new stance or kick or two or a new tan tuie routine or something, and sometimes we get a new grabbing hands self defense application.  And naturally we practice stuff we've already learned; it's not *only* new stuff.  With that much new stuff each week though, there's a lot to remember.  That's why I take notes.

Oh, and sometimes he talks to us for a bit about the culture and traditions and such.  As he told us, a martial art is more than just the moves, so we need to be made aware of all the other stuff that goes with it, too.  That can be a nice little break from practicing when you're getting sore/tired.    They're generally good things to know as far as I can tell.  Sometimes it just indicates the sort of expectations he has for us -- e.g., he said that next year for his birthday he wants a demonstration from us.  So he's already got us scheduled for performances even though we're only a bit over a month into our training.    He seems to really like teaching us though.  He has a few other classes, but he said they're almost all young children and senior citizens.  That kind of limits what he can do with them.  With a bunch of undergrad/grad students in their 20s (that's the majority of the class anyway), there's more he can do with us and I think he's glad to have a class like us with people he can really train the way he wants to.

Anyway, I'm not so sure I'd recognize good training tips if I got them.  Being new, I'm just building the foundation now, I have nothing to compare to, so I'm likely to think that what we're learning is semi-standard stuff.  But if something sticks out as particularly interesting to me, I'll try to remember to pass it along.


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## GouRonin (Oct 29, 2001)

When I started I think I wrote everything down in a book. I still write stuff down but not nearly as much as I used to. Now I write down interesting stuff. Sometimes it's better for me to just do rather than think.

Looking back on my old books I laugh sometimes, other times I think hard about what I wrote. In any case, notebooks are fun. Keep them.


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## Karl_Skewes (Nov 1, 2001)

I've been studying Winc Chun for about 3months now. 

Being a small guy, 70kg - 5'8", I find it really suits my build. 
As its very efficient, compared to the little bits of TKD and Karate anyways. The instructor (Sifu Tony) is always happy and his attitude is infectious. 
He walks around the room helping everyone individually as well as of course giving general ideas. Tony sometimes talks at the end of training, on different ideas, mostly morals. This is a nice reminder.

Anyhow, I'm rambling.... but I'm rapt, hope others are enjoying whatever they're doing and more ppl start posting ;D


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## Dronak (Jan 11, 2002)

I figured I might as well append this to the original thread I started.  For anyone who's curious, we've finished off our first semester of long fist training and have now moved into a winter training session.  This one is more intense than the fall, partly because I think our master wants to get in as much as possible and partly because I think he just wants to push us and hopefully get us to improve more quickly.  We're now up to 3 hours a day, 3 days a week, nearly double what we did in the fall.  From the first few classes it looks like the new stuff will be some applications of the Six Closing Fist form we learned last semester and the teaching of a new form called Power Fist.  As I recall, our master said that normally Power Fist would be learned after Linking Step Fist, but Power Fist uses more of the harder basic stances that he felt we needed more practice with, so he's doing that with us first.  Naturally there's practice of old stuff, stances, kicks, etc.  Part of this seems to include increasing the number of repetitions of some of the basic stance training exercises, I'd guess in order to build stamina.  I think the general plan is to complete Power Fist before the spring semester and probably get those repetitions up to some high number.  I'm not sure what the exact plan for the spring is, but I think it's supposed to involve the teaching of two forms in some manner.  I think he still plans to split us into groups for form teaching later, but I'm not sure.  I'm more worried about getting back into shape for the winter; I didn't practice as much as I should have over the winter.    Well, it is kind of nice to be back to regular training, even if it is harder this time around.  I just thought I'd post a little update for anyone who was wondering how things were going over here.


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## Cthulhu (Jan 11, 2002)

Sounds like you're having a good time and getting some good training in as well.  I'm not familiar with those forms, so I can't offer anything in that respect.

I think the fact that the instructor is willing to spend that increased amount of time on your group shows that you all are worthy of his extra attention.

Keep at it!

Cthulhu


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## arnisador (Jan 11, 2002)

> _Originally posted by Cthulhu _
> *I think the fact that the instructor is willing to spend that increased amount of time on your group shows that you all are worthy of his extra attention.*



Yes. It sounds like a great situation--being given three hours per day of training in a legitimate and interesting martial art.


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## Dronak (Jan 13, 2002)

Yes, we certainly have a very good opportunity being the first group he's teaching.  As I wrote earlier, we're the first group of students he can really train the way he wants to; the other classes he teachers are mainly filled with senior citizens or young children.  He's also said that when next school year starts and we have a completely new batch of students, that those of us who have been here for a year already will be expected to help them with their basic training.  I think that's partly why he's pushing us now, too.  He wants to make sure we know our basics well enough to be able to help new students with them next year.  Being the very first group, we're lucky enough to get all the time with the instructor; future groups won't get his undivided attention all the time like we are so we are fortunate to have come in when we did.  It is a pain sometimes, but if I really didn't like it, I wouldn't stay with it.  Oh, at class yesterday we got our belts, too.  Black ones.  Since there's no belt ranking system in Chinese martial arts and color doesn't matter, our instructor decided that we should all have black belts because they don't get as obviously dirty as quickly as light colored belts.


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## Dronak (Jan 20, 2002)

You know, it just doesn't seem worth starting a new thread for the small bits I have to mention.    At practice yesterday, our master told me that he wanted me to be part of the tai chi group in the spring.  I think he plans to have three groups, one for tai chi and the other two to learn two different Shaolin forms.  I also think the whole class will be learning Linking Step Fist, another basic Shaolin form.  Anyway, if I heard and recall correctly, he told us that his grandmaster learned Yang style tai chi from Yang Cheng-Fu.  If that's right, then when he teaches us we'll be learning from a line that goes back to one of the main names in the Yang family style of tai chi.  Pretty cool, huh?    I just thought I'd pass that along because I thought it was interesting.


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## arnisador (Jan 20, 2002)

> _Originally posted by Dronak _
> *If that's right, then when he teaches us we'll be learning from a line that goes back to one of the main names in the Yang family style of tai chi.  Pretty cool, huh?*



Yes it is!

What do you think of the effectiveness of what you've learned so far in kung fu--be it for self-defense, exercise, character development or what-have-you. And by forms do you mean that he is teaching various parts of Shaolin kung fu, or are these truly different styles (as Wing Chun and Praying Mantis are)?


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## Dronak (Jan 21, 2002)

Let's see.  I think what I've learned can be summed up as basic stances, basic kicks, exercises for practicing those, two forms (well, the second form will be completed this week), and a few grabbing hands self defense moves.  As far as self defense goes, it's a bit hard to tell how effective this would be because we haven't practiced specificially for that very much.  Our master does show us applications of moves so we have a picture in our head of why we do certain things the way we do.  We haven't practiced much use of them though; we're mainly working on learning the forms and getting basics down better.  I'd imagine that if you had practiced things often enough to make them basically second nature they would work for self defense.  I think the grabbing hands stuff will work as we've been taught if you're quick enough to apply them.  They're kind of like joint locking techniques and it seems like you have to be fast and accurate to get them to work properly.

It is certainly good exercise; my muscles frequently hurt after practice.    The stances are pretty low which makes them tough.  We're supposed to be getting into a position where our bones help support our weight, but it's hard to get that just right position and even if you do it doesn't 100% eliminate muscle use.  Until we build up our stamina more it will probably continune to hurt.  Character development, I'm not sure.  Our master is really pushing to give us as much as he can, so he's moving faster than you would traditionally.  He has told us about other aspects of the art, not just the moves, so we've had some exposure to that sort of thing.  I think his current emphasis is more on teaching us forms and such than the more mental aspects of the art.

I thought "forms" was used the same way in general, but perhaps not.  As a beginner I don't have much exposure to the whole area.  The way I use "form" at least is to refer to a particular routine, an ordering of moves.  So far we've done two forms, Six Closing Fist and Power Fist.  I think the spring semester will include another one called Linking Step Fist.  All of these are part of the shaolin kung fu style we're learning.  They're just different routines containing different moves with often different purposes in mind (I think).  I think our master has learned other styles besides the one he's teaching us, but we're just learning one style right now.  Excluding the tai chi, that is, which he plans to start teaching some people in the spring; clearly tai chi isn't shaolin kung fu.


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## Dronak (Jan 30, 2002)

Yes, replying to myself in my thread again.    I just got an e-mail from our instructor.  There were two notes in it.  One is that he wants about 8 or so of us to help him out at a performance in a few weeks; we'd do our basic form as a group and he'd do a couple advanced forms himself.  The other is that he's scheduled a little "exam" for us in about a month.  He said that those of us who have learned both Six Closing Fist and Power Fist, the first two forms he taught us, can take part.  If we pass, we can start learning a more advanced form, one of the Ambush Fist forms, a bit later in the semester.  He's even bringing in two guest judges to assist him -- a two time world Taekwondo champion and another one of his master's students.  Wow, public performances and in class exams and we've only been practicing for maybe 5 months, tops.  Well, it's good experience I suppose.

Since I have learned both forms, I'm pretty sure I'll be expected to take part in this little exam.  However, the teacher has told me that he wanted me to be in a tai chi group this semester and start learning that.  I believe that means I'd do tai chi instead of an advanced Shaolin form, so I'm not sure he'd have me learning Ambush Fist even if I do pass the exam.  I guess I'll just have to wait and see, huh?  Well, I have about a month to get ready and try to get those forms down as accurately as possible.  Wish me luck for my upcoming exam.    Even if the teacher won't put me in an Ambush Fist group, I'd still like to pass the exam.  I'll let you know more about it once it's over.


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## Cthulhu (Jan 30, 2002)

Good luck!  Just try to relax during the exam.  Don't think of doing the forms as a performance for the judges.  Just do them like you would when trying to perfect them on your own.

Most of all, have fun!

Cthulhu


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## Dronak (Jan 31, 2002)

Thanks for the tip, Cthulhu.  I'll try not to worry too much about the judges.  One good thing is that our teacher will be one of the judges and he's seen us plenty of times before.  I think that will lend a little moral support and make us feel a little more relaxed.  Our teacher told us that "the exam criteria are base of martial art spirit, skills, attitude to your master and classmates" and that practice attendance would be factored in, too.  He also said if we couldn't do the exam on the scheduled Saturday, we could do it at the following practice Tuesday, but then he would be the only judge and no mistakes would be allowed.  I guess with the three judges they'll be a little more lenient considering that we've been pushing fast and probably haven't trained as long as necessary to really get down the forms.  Well, I'll just keep practicing and do the best I can when the time comes.

[My Orange Belt post.  Yeah!   ]


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## Cthulhu (Jan 31, 2002)

No prob, Dronak.  What you may want to try doing starting, well...now, is to practice your forms on your own, full speed, full power, as if you were testing, visualizing every movement and technique is done to perfection.  Do this several times a day (great workout, too!).  Basically, you need to be able to 'zone out', to the point where you're essentially in a meditative state while doing the form.  When you take the exam, you basically want to be in that state when doing the form.  This way, you really won't worry about the judge because, for all intents and purposes, they don't exist to you; the only thing that will matter are the 'attackers' in front of you as you do the form.

Good luck!

Cthulhu


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## Dronak (Feb 1, 2002)

That's another good suggestion.  I think I know what you mean.  Back in high school when our gymnastics team went to the state competition, it was a big thing with lots of events going on all at once.  But when it was my turn on one of the events, I was so concentrated on what I was doing that I blocked out everything else.  It was as if the whole room was silent; I just didn't hear anything for the time of my routine.  That is kind of a good way to forget about any judges or spectators.  Some time before the exam I should find out how our teacher plans on running it.  When we do forms in practice we pause between moves.  I wonder if he'll do that, counting for us, or if we just do it on our own as smoothly as possible.  Will we be doing this in small groups or one at a time?  I'm sure we'll find out more details as we get closer to the exam.  Our first official spring semester practice/class is tomorrow.  I'm sure he'll tell us more about what he has planned for the semester then.


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## Dronak (Feb 3, 2002)

Yup, another little update.    I don't know how many people really care, but as a beginner I have to offer what I can.  Plus it helps my post total.    Our teacher said a little more about the exam and related topics.  First, he split us into two groups right now.  The group I'm in is starting to learn the traditional long form of Yang style tai chi.  The other is doing another basic Shaolin long fist form, Linking Step Fist.  As noted, the exam will be for people who have learned the first two basic forms, Six Closing Fist and Power Fist.  If we pass, we can learn an Ambush Fist form shortly afterwards.  If not, we stick with what we're currently doing.  The general idea seems to be that we have to pass the exam (1) to move to the intermediate level forms and (2) to learn more than one form at once.  He said he'd repeat the tests later for anyone who didn't pass it this time or didn't learn two basic forms yet.  We can then pick two of the three basic forms to do for the test.  So if I do pass the test, I'll be learning both Yang tai chi and the intermediate Ambush Fist form during this semester.  Assuming enough people pass the exam and he does start teaching Ambush Fist this semseter, we'll end up with three groups with some people in two groups.  I hope to do Linking Step Fist at some point in the future though; I'd really prefer to know all the basic forms before moving up, but I have to do what the instructor wants me to do.  So that's the update.  Oh, our instructor's classmate that will help with the judging is the same one who was here for a little while in the fall, so most of us have met her before.  Not that that means anything to anyone else, but it means we've at least met one of the two other judges.  Just tossing that in while I'm at it.


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## arnisador (Feb 3, 2002)

Can you tell us a little bit about the forms you've learned? Do they seem to match their names? I'm curious what an "Ambush Fist" is!


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## Dronak (Feb 4, 2002)

Well, I can try to, arnisador, but I don't really know a whole lot about them.  The first one we learned was Six Closing Fist.  The name unfortunately doesn't offer much help in figuring out what the form emphasizes.  We were told that this form should always be taught first, so I'm guessing it may just be a sort of well rounded form containing a bit of a lot of aspects so that you can get the flavor of the style.  The one we did this winter was Power Fist which, as I understand, is mainly for the purposes of developing power.  Our teacher said that we should be putting all of our energy into every punch in the form and there are a lot of them.  The overwhelming majority of our counts (where we pause when doing it) have a strike of one type or another.  This form also uses some of the harder basic stances (like Crouching Tiger) more frequently.  I guess that's another way to help increase power in some sense.  The third basic form, which I'm not learning now because I'm doing tai chi instead, is Linking Step Fist.  As I understand it, the point of this form is to help learn smooth, flowing movements and now to maintain your balance while doing them.  We only just started that form (people not in the tai chi group, that is).  At least for Power Fist and Linking Step Fist, I think the main purposes do match the names.

As far as Ambush Fist goes, I can't say much about it.  I know there are two, First Ambush Fist and Second Ambush Fist, because the syllabus thing we got in the fall had both listed.  They're higher level forms (intermediate, I suppose) and we haven't started learning them yet.  If enough of us pass the exam at the end of the month, we will start one of them shortly afterwards though.  If I pass, I may be able to say more about it in a month or so.  I can guess a bit more, but keep in mind they are only guesses and I could be totally wrong.

Since they're called First and Second Ambush Fist I'd think they're related somehow, most likely in the general purpose of the form, I'd guess.  Perhaps one builds more off Linking Step Fist and the other builds more off Power Fist, but both have the same general goal in mind.  *shrug*  Given the "Ambush" part, I would be inclined to guess that these two forms may be built more obviously like a combat sequence.  I'm sure there are martial applications in all the forms, but some forms are just more obviously like a fighting form than others, you know?  That's about all I could guess for the moment though.  If you want to know more, let me know what you're looking for and I'll see if I can provide it.


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## arnisador (Feb 4, 2002)

Thanks Dronak, I am finding this interesting. I don't know much about kung fu so I am learning things. Even the names of the forms are new to me.


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## Dronak (Feb 7, 2002)

If the names are new, I can give you some more just so you will have heard them.  We were given a four year planned syllabus back in the fall which listed everything we were hoping to do.  It's changed already since we had a winter training session, but that doesn't affect the names on the paper.    Since I'm not familiar with everything I can't guarantee that all of this is northern long fist Shaolin kung fu.  The instructor did say other things would probably be taught later depending on individuals' ability and interests.  But, here's the outline we received:

First Year, beginner:  first semester -- stretching, warm ups, fundamental gestures and kicks, tan tuie with ten routines, Six Closing Fist, grabbing hands self defense skills; second semester -- Linking Step Fist, Power Fist

Second Year, middle level:  first semester -- Second Ambush Fist, Monk Staff; second semester -- First Ambush Fist, Seven Stars Knife

Third Year, advanced-middle level:  first semester -- Fourth Running Fight Fist, Three Elements Sword; second semester -- Cross Fist, Three Elements Sword Fighting Applications, Knife vs. Spear Fighting Applications

Fourth Year, advanced:  Tai-Chu Long Fist, Third Cannon Fist, Fourth Cha Fist, Nine-Dragons Staff, Ba-Gua Broad Sword, Shaolin Spear

Other skills that may be taught based on personal potentials included:  Yang style tai chi, Yang style tai chi sword, Tiger Fist, Snake Fist, Drunken Fist, Mantis Style Fist, Hon Style Fist, Chinese War Sword, Iron Fan.  I think there were more listed on an earlier copy of this four year syllabus, but I only have the more recent copy now.

So that's our big plan.    The first semester was right on because we were all starting from scratch, but we only did the first 5 of 10 tan tuie routines and didn't get to all of the grabbing hands applications listed on a separate sheet.  The winter training took Power Fist out of the second semester.  The spring will still have Linking Step Fist (for people not learning Yang tai chi) and an Ambush Fist, maybe the Second Ambush Fist since that was listed first on the sheet, for the people who pass the exam at the end of the month assuming there are like half a dozen people who pass to make it worth his time to teach the form.  The teacher claims that we may be able to start some weapon training in the summer if we work hard enough and have a good enough foundation and background for it.  Weapons in under one year?  He's obviously pushing us quickly and he admitted as much.  Since he's unsure of how long he'll be able to teach us, he wants to give us as much as he possibly can.

Anyway, since you mentioned that the names of the forms were new to you, I thought you might be interested in seeing our big four year plan with all the stuff the teacher originally intended to cover over the years.  The names may not mean anything to you, a lot of them don't mean anything to me yet either, but it may still be interesting information.


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## arnisador (Feb 7, 2002)

Thanks Dronak, I _do_ find this interesting as I have even less real kung fu experience than you! I studied an American-created style of kung fu for less than a year. It wasn't like what you're describing.


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## Dronak (Feb 11, 2002)

Well, we had our first performance yesterday and it went OK.  The organizers apparently didn't have everything straight because there were three people in charge, not just one, and we think there were some communication problems.  Anyway, we all met at school at around 9:40am (meaning I had to be up somewhat before 8am to eat and get ready) and drove out to Virginia to the college hosting the event.  We got there near 11am, did some stretching on our own, a real short warm up set of basic stance exercises, and praticed the Six Closing Fist form we'd be performing a few times.  We then got to check out the stage and figure out our positions so we'd know how to line ourselves up right.  We originally thought the event was from 12-1:30pm and we'd be the last to go, but it turns out their lunch thing was starting at noon and the actual event wasn't starting until 2pm.  But they changed us from the last group to the first one, so we were going on at about 2.  We had some time to get a small lunch before coming back for the performance.  BTW, our part was our instructor doing a solo sword form first (he was going to do a combat sword form with a classmate of his, but for some reason they couldn't do that, rats), then us students doing our basic form as a group, then the instructor going again with a barehand form.  The three things together were our part of the show.  Well, things got a little confused because while we were waiting, we somehow got the impression that this children's group was supposed to go on before us and they were waiting in the opposite wings of the stage.  But they weren't and the background music for our teacher's performance started, so he had to go out before he was really fully ready.  When he was done, we took our turn.  I haven't seen the tape yet, so I don't know what the group as a whole looked like, but I think it turned out OK.  We all knew our timing and communication was a little off, so it wasn't as clean as it could have been, but we're all still beginners.  I was in the front row and nearly ran out of room, almost hitting a couple big firecracker decorations they put on the side of the stage.  And if I was that close to the edge, the guy behind me on my left (4 in front, 5 in back, staggered) was off the visible stage for part of the performance.  (Off the stage meaning in the wings, not fallen off the edge.  )  I suspect we all had some minor bobbles, I'm pretty sure I lost my balance in a one leg stance once and had to touch my other foot down to avoid falling over, but on the whole it was probably OK.  We went off, our teacher did his other form, and we were finished.  We stuck around for a little while afterwards to get some group photos and eat and chat, then we headed home.  All in all, it wasn't bad.  It was just way too early to get up on a Sunday morning.    I just had to oversleep today to make up for the sleep I missed this weekend.  Next big thing in our schedule -- the little exam to see if we can start learning a more advanced Shaolin form.


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## disciple (Feb 11, 2002)

Sounds like a lot of fun 
Were you anywhere near nervous? I remember when I did some perfomances, I couldn't concentrate with the loud music from the next tent, children playing around, and other stuff  
Do you know your forms in chinese (mandarin pin yin, if possible)? Because I never heard of those english terms before  

Salute to you
:asian:


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## Dronak (Feb 11, 2002)

Maybe a little, but I wasn't as nervous as I kind of expected to be.  Over the years I've done enough public performances, primarily music concerts, that I'm semi used to it in general.  But often when the performance is of something new to me, like this was, I'd be more nervous.  I guess being in a group took off some of the pressure so I didn't worry so much about it.  Our teacher had music during his performances, but we didn't.  We had to have one guy in the group count for us so that we'd all stay basically together, so we didn't have any background sound.  The performances were apparently all done one at a time on this school building's stage, so there weren't disctractions from other things going on simultaneously.

As for our forms' names, the instructor didn't write them out in Chinese for us.  The sheet I have only has the English translations.  I have a book which appears to contain a couple of the forms we're learning and it does have Chinese names.  If I'm not mistaken, the Power Fist form is Gung Li Chuan and Linking Step Fist is Lien Bu Chuan.  There are two Ambush Fist forms, First and Second, and I think their names are Yi Lu Mei Fu and Er Lu Mei Fu.  I don't have a name for Six Closing Fist.  He might have said the name in Chinese at some point, but I never wrote it down if he did.  The book has two other forms, Shaw Fu Ien and Shih Tzu Tan, but I don't know what they translate as and whether or not those are even in our plan.  There are a fair number of non Chinese speakers in the club, so the instructor generally sticks to English words.  Once in a while he uses Chinese terms, but it's kind of rare at the moment.  We might get more later though.


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## Dronak (Feb 23, 2002)

Hi all.  A little update for anyone who's interested.  We had our first exam in class today.  The whole procedure was simple enough.  We drew numbers to see what order we'd go in.  I got number 1.    I was hoping for something in the middle, but oh well.  The three judges (our instructor, one of his seniors, and a friend of his who is a two time world taekwondo champion) were seated at a table on one side of the room.  Actually, it was a large hallway in the building, but you know.  We each had to perform the two basic Shaolin forms we learned, but we did them one at a time.  That is, we went through the list with everyone doing Six Closing Fist, then took a short break and cycled through the list again with everyone doing Power Fist.  Once that was over, we got a few general comments from the judges.  Our teacher's senior was here in the fall for a short time and she said she was impressed with the progress we had made over the few months she was gone.  Our teacher said everything was generally OK, too.  After the comments, we were finished and went home.

We won't get the results until our next practice on Tuesday.  I guess out teacher needs to do some calculations before he can give us results.  He said that we weren't being tested only on the forms and the accuracy of them, but martial spirit, attitude towards the teacher and classmates, I think attendance was getting factored in, too, a couple other things.  So I suppose he has to weight those in and put together the three judges' results for everyone before getting final results.  So it will be a few more days before I can tell you whether or not I passed.  It seemed to go well enough, I don't think I had any major screw-ups  so hopefully I passed.  I'll see on Tuesday and I'll let you know the results around then.


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## arnisador (Feb 23, 2002)

Sounds like a long test! Good luck and please do let us know what happens!


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## disciple (Feb 24, 2002)

Sounds to me like a piece of cake for you :ninja: so, of course you will pass the test, unless your attitude got in the way :lol: j/k

salute
:asian:


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## Dronak (Feb 26, 2002)

I just got back from class a little while ago.  Two people were doing a make-up exam since they couldn't do it on Saturday, but we had a normal class apart from that.  After they were done, we later found out our results.  I did pass the exam.  As far as I can tell, everyone who took it passed.  I'll admit I was a little surprised considering what I saw in a couple people's forms, but there were other factors, too, and I'm sure our instructor is doing what he thinks is best for everyone.  It doesn't exactly lessen my surprise, but whatever, it's not my decision to make.  Our teacher did mention that two people "just passed" as he grouped us up so they'd have to work hard to keep up.  I guess that means there was some noticeable difference between at least some of us.  We didn't get any real specific comments or scores though.  He just said we passed, grouped us up, and started teaching.

It appears that we've now been broken up into three more groups for a grand total of five now.  The ones who passed the exam are in two groups and learning two forms at once while the ones who didn't or didn't take it are in one group learning only one form.  We started with two groups:  one for Linking Step Fist and one for Yang style tai chi; I'm in the tai chi group.  I knew we'd have at least one more group after the exam, but I wasn't expecting three more.  The teacher selected three students to learn Fourth Running Fight Fist, I think he called it.  Don't ask me what that is, I haven't a clue.  The rest of us got split into two groups:  one learning First Ambush Fist and the other learning Second Ambush Fist.  I knew there were two Ambush Fist forms so that's not as surprising as him adding that other form to this semester's teaching.  All the people in Second Ambush Fist are from the Linking Step Fist group and all the people in First Ambush Fist are from the tai chi group.  I think that's just because he didn't pull us all together before splitting us up again, so it was a sort of unintentional artificial division.  He had the first group pick First or Second and they chose Second.  That left me learning the First Ambush Fist form which our teacher said is actually a bit harder than the Second Ambush Fist.  Lucky me.  

So, that's the latest update on my training over here.  I've learned two of the three basic Shaolin forms already, started learning some Yang style tai chi, and now get to start First Ambush Fist, an intermediate level Shaolin form.  I'd really like to learn that third basic Shaolin form, but perhaps I'll get a chance to later.  I'll see I guess.  But that's all for now.  I said I'd let you know the results and that's it -- I passed and get to learn another form now.  I hope I can handle it.  

P.S. -- I almost forgot.  Our teacher also had us do the two basic forms we learned as a group and videotaped it.  I think he said he plans to send it back to his master (our grandmaster) so he could see how the class was coming along.  I'm not completely what to think of that one.


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## Bob Hubbard (Feb 26, 2002)

Hey, congrats! :cheers: 

Did you get to watch the videotape?  I've heard its a great way to see how you move.


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## Cthulhu (Feb 26, 2002)

Congratulations, Dronak!   

I agree with Kaith, a video of yourself doing a form is a great learning tool.  If you didn't get to see the tape he made, simply record yourself doing your forms one day.

Cthulhu

Congrats again! :cheers:


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## arnisador (Feb 26, 2002)

Yes, Congratulations! I'll be curious to hear why Ambush Fist is so named.


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## Dronak (Feb 27, 2002)

Thanks.    I'm glad I passed, but I'm a little concerned about actually being able to follow everything.  Our teacher's method of instruction doesn't really match my best learning method so it's a little hard for me to follow him sometimes.  He previously said that if we had trouble following some move picked out for this example, we may not be ready to go to more advanced forms.  Well, I did have some trouble getting that move by his copy what I do teaching method.  You can probably see why I'm a bit concerned then.  Anyway, I didn't get to see the tape he made last night.  He might make a copy for the club though so I may get to see it at some point.  I'm curious as to what our grandmaster will think -- how well we've learned things for such a short period of time or how horrible we are because we're going way too fast.    You could really look at it either way.  I did see the video of our performance from a few weeks back though.  It looked better as a whole than I thought it would from how it seemed people thought their individual performances went.

As for why Ambush Fist is called that, I can't be sure at this point.  I've only been taught like 5 movements in one of the two forms.    There's also the possibility of the translation not really capturing the exact meaning of the original.  Flipping through the book I have which includes "solutions" for the techniques (i.e., how you could apply them in combat), I see a couple interesting things.  The very first move says it can be used to grab the arms of two attackers, one on each side, and then pull them down.  If there's a third attacker in front, a kick can be used on him/her.  Oddly enough, it appears to be the only one that specifically mentions multiple attackers.  There are a couple of techniques the book says can be used to defend against rod (staff) attacks.  A crouching move is listed as used "to pick up sand or a stone" to throw in the face of the attacker.  That's followed by a series of walks away from the opponent which our teacher showed us before and said can be used to kick up sand in the face of the opponent following you (it would be most likely followed by an attack on the opponent).  It also looks like there are a fair number of double attacks, e.g. a simultaneous punch and kick or a punch/kick immediately followed by another punch/kick.  I don't know if that really helps explain the form's name, but I thought they were interesting points.


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## Cthulhu (Feb 27, 2002)

It'd be good if you could get us the romanization of the Chinese names.  Depending on whether you're using Cantonese of Mandarin Chinese, Ambush Fist could translate as '<something> Kune' or '<something> chuan/quan'.  If you could give us what that <something> is, one of us may be able to link that form up with something we've seen before.

Keep on training!

Cthulhu


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## arnisador (Feb 27, 2002)

> _Originally posted by Dronak _
> *I don't know if that really helps explain the form's name, but I thought they were interesting points. *



Thanks, that was very interesting! I have seen some moves in kata before that are of the general form you describe. I appreciate your sharing this with me--I have so little kung fu experience that it really is educational for me.

Is this book publicly available or is it something only given to people in your school?


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## Dronak (Feb 27, 2002)

arnisador, the book is publicly available.  I bought it from Amazon.com.  The title is _Shaolin Long Fist Kung Fu_ and it's by Yang Jwing-Ming and Jeffery A. Bolt.  I bought it without knowing exactly what was in it and was lucky to find that it did have a few of the forms we're learning.  I don't think it's *exactly* the same as what we're doing, for one the photos show stances that are rather high compared to what we've been taught, but it's pretty close.  I can annotate the differences and still use it as a reference since I've been given instruction in the details the book might miss.

Cthulhu, I agree that it can be useful to have the original Chinese names of the forms.  Our teacher generally doesn't use them though because many of us in the class don't know Chinese.  What I've gathered mainly from the book I have is that Linking Step Fist is Lien Bu Chuan and Power Fist is Gung Li Chuan.  The third basic form, Six Closing Fist, isn't in my book and I don't recall the teacher ever saying its Chinese name.  He may have, but I never wrote it down if he did.  The Ambush Fist forms are, I think, Yi Lu Mei Fu and Er Lu Mei Fu for the First and Second ones respectively.  The book I have also has two other forms, Shaw Fu Ien and Shih Tzu Tan, but I don't know what they translate to or if we're even going to learn them.  Does that help you out?


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## Cthulhu (Feb 27, 2002)

Okay, did a quick search on Google on the forms.  Here's what I found from the second link:

Lien Bu Chuan - Connecting Steps 
Gung Li Chuan - Developing strength
Yi Lu Mei Fu - First Ambush Form
Er Lu Mei Fu - Second Ambush Form

And the two you didn't know translations for:

Shaw Fu Ien - Roaring Tiger Form 
Shih Tzu Tan - Cross step

I've seen that book at B&N, so it should be fairly easy to find for anyone interested.

Cthulhu


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## disciple (Feb 27, 2002)

Oh I get it...you're learning shaolin chang quan. Me too.  But it's been a couple of months and the teacher still teach us only basic moves. He said to keep practicing the basic until perfect. After 6 mo, we will have a test to see if we have it correct. I have no problem with that, cuz I know that usually in shaolin temple they require a couple of YEARS to learn the basic, at least that's how it was in ancient times.
I think the hardest thing is the deep horse stance  especially after some time and you still have to practice the hand movement and some jumping kicks



salute
:asian:


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## Dronak (Feb 27, 2002)

I don't think our teacher ever actually gave us the Chinese name of the style he's teaching.  I think about the best we got was in translation, something like northern shaolin long fist style kung fu.  I've read that Chang Quan translates into Long Fist, but I wasn't sure if it was the same style.  A few things I've seen on the web give a basic form of Chang Quan that doesn't look like any of the three basic forms I'm familiar with.

I am trying to find a book or two that has more forms from the style we're learning and I know of a couple that say they're Long-Style Boxing, the brief description of which say they're Chang Quan.  I was thinking of getting them, but I'm not sure exactly what forms they have.  If one or more people here believe what I'm doing is Chang Quan, I'll probably go ahead and get those books because they will likely have more forms from the style I'm learning.  Actually, if anyone has some specific book suggestions that would be helpful, too.

P.S. -- Yeah, we are moving very fast.  Our teacher has pretty much said so a few times already.  I think it's because our teacher doesn't know exactly how long he'll be able to teach us and therefore wants to give us as much as possible as quickly as possible.  Your timeline isn't terribly far off from ours, I think.  This first exam we had was about 5 or 6 months after we started.  We had two basic forms as part of the test, maybe you'll have one instead, I don't know.  But yeah, real traditional training takes way longer than we're doing now.  Our class might still be going a bit too fast, but we're doing our best to keep up.


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## disciple (Feb 27, 2002)

I dont think we will have any "forms" by the end of 6 mo. You said that you had a book of shaolin long fist by yang jwing ming, and the cover shows one of the basic moves we had in the class. I aslo was thinking about buying them, but I thought I dont need it just yet.
The chinese names Cthulhu and you provided sounded familiar though.

salute
:asian:


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## disciple (Feb 27, 2002)

Did you start learning to use some weapons yet? It seems you know some weapons well (from another thread).

salute
:asian:


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## Dronak (Feb 27, 2002)

The book has more than just some forms in it.  There are sections on basic stances, hand forms (fist, palm, etc.), leg forms (same idea), basic punches, basic kicks, stretching, stuff like that.  Most of the book is the five forms it contains, but there is useful stuff before that, too.  When or if you buy the book is of course up to you.  I'm just pointing out that it does have some stuff besides just forms.

As for weapons, no, I haven't done any training with any of them.  We're still working on learning barehand forms.  I don't know weapons well at all.  I just remember a few of the things our teacher pointed out to us in a couple of his weapon demonstrations, maybe a few things I've read, too.  Our teacher does plan to get to weapons though.  I think the latest revised estimate is towards the end of the summer and he said we might get to start with either staff or sword.  He said that traditionally you wouldn't even touch a weapon for 2 years minimum.  And we're hoping to get to them with only about 1 year of training?  Just another indicator of how fast we're moving.


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## arnisador (Mar 2, 2002)

> _Originally posted by Dronak _
> *The title is _Shaolin Long Fist Kung Fu_ and it's by Yang Jwing-Ming and Jeffery A. Bolt.  I bought it without knowing exactly what was in it *



Surprisingly, so did I, many years ago--it's on my shelf (as are books about many other arts I've never practiced but have wondered or been curious about). Now I have a better idea what you're doing!


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## Dronak (Mar 3, 2002)

Yes, that book will give you an idea of what I'm learning.  There does seem to be some differences between the forms in the book and what our teacher is teaching us, but they don't seem to be huge.  Things like there's an extra punch the book doesn't have or the book has a kick where we don't.  The basics of the forms appear to be the same from what I can tell.  The stances shown in the book are too high compared to what we do though.  E.g., for Mountain Climbing Stance we were told that the goal is to have the front leg's shin perpendicular to the ground and the thigh about parallel to the ground.  The author's pictures don't have his thigh anywhere close to parallel to the ground.  Still, since I'm not using the book for instruction, it's OK.  I use it more as a reminder of what I've learned and a place to put some notes.

I've been trying to find other books that have more forms from the style we're learning.  I forget if I mentioned that in here before or not.  If so, sorry for the repetition.  The problem is it's very difficult to get details of what's in books (e.g., names of forms) so I either don't get any or buy them blind (like I did for this one) and hope they have what I want.  If so, great, if not, then I have to decide whether to keep them or return them.  Two books by Cheng Huikun on "Long-Style Boxing" look like they may be what I want, but nowhere on the web can I find a list of forms in them to make sure.  The descriptions mention being Chang Quan which I believe can be translated as Long Fist, but I also think that's a rather general term.  I don't know if that Chang Quan would be the same thing as the Long Fist we're doing.  *shrug*  I'll decide on something sooner or later.  There's no big rush on it.


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## Dronak (Mar 5, 2002)

BTW, if a moderator thinks I should be splitting this thread into new one(s) at some point, feel free to let me know or split it yourself if you can and want.  It just seems to me that it fits fine here in the thread I originally started talking about my learning.

We got a little better idea of why our teacher is pushing us rather hard and fast.  For one, his intention is to teach us as if we were all going to become coaches/teachers.  Of course we still can't teach until he decides we're ready and some of us may never become coaches.  He wants us to have that mindset for learning though, to think like we're going to be teachers.  He has said that he will eventually expect us to help teach the new students in the class, so I guess we'll all probably be doing that later on.  He seemed to indicate that in the future, he may just teach mainly the older students (as in the ones who've been there the longest) and have them teach the newer ones.  I think this would help keep things moving since he doesn't have to personally teach everyone everything.  I think he said that since some of us are learning different forms than others, the plan is to have us specialize in teaching the forms we learned directly from him.  There are certainly some advantages to being in the first group here and getting almost everything straight from him.  

He said that he does plan to give us as much as he can as quickly as he can.  We kind of gathered that already, but he specifically said so this time.  This almost necessitates using a non-traditional teaching method which might not go over so well with everyone so he kind of impied that we should sort of keep quiet about that.  In that case, let's just say that he's hoping to give us all of his knowledge, etc. in a much shorter time than it took him to gain it.  Not that we'd be as good as he is having progressed so quickly of course, but we would have the same general knowledge of things he has.  And that appears to be his main goal, passing on the knowledge he has.

It also sounded like he has an even bigger goal of starting some sort of long fist organization.  I think he was saying that there is one or one is starting in Taiwan, but there's nothing like that here in the US and I think he's hoping to be part of creating one.  I really didn't get too much out of that section of today's little chat, so I'll just have to let you know more when/if I hear more about it.  I thought this might be of some interest to those of you who are sort of tracking my progress.    I know I liked hearing a bit more about why we're going so fast and I thought you might, too.


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## arnisador (Mar 5, 2002)

> _Originally posted by Dronak _
> 
> *It also sounded like he has an even bigger goal of starting some sort of long fist organization.*



Interesting about the training you to be trainers! It sounds like you're getting a unique experience. Hopefully the group of you will fan out after college and spread the art.


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## Dronak (Mar 6, 2002)

Yeah, knowing that he's training us as if we were all going to be coaches does help put things in a better perspective.  I think it's fairly common for people to change locations after college, so this would help spread the art.  If he gets us to the point where he feels we could do some teaching, we would be able to help spread the art when we moved on.  I kind of thought the long fist organization thing was meant to be more like a governing body, a sort of headquarters for the style, rather than a branching-out group of teachers, but we'll see I guess.


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## Dronak (Mar 11, 2002)

> _Originally posted by arnisador _
> 
> *I'll be curious to hear why Ambush Fist is so named. *



I gave about as much of an answer as I could when you posted this, but I now have something else that might interest you.  In the third batch of moves our instructor taught us Saturday, two of them involve grabbing knives that would be on your body and throwing them at your opponent.  The first is taking one from your left leg, like a boot knife maybe?, by running your left hand along the leg while it kicks.  In the form that's follow by a vertical palm strike rather than something more like a knife throwing action.  The second one involves making 1/2 turn away from the opponent while getting a knife from your side, sort of under the left arm on the ribs, then turning back around to face him and throwing the knife from overhead.  I'm thinking this one might be more for throwing stars or something similar rather than what we usually think of as a knife (handle and blade).  It would seem a lot easier to hide throwing stars on your body than a knife, but I don't actually know for sure.  The teacher just said the moves were for grabbing knives.  The first move is a little easier to get than the second.  The second involves a lot of arm circling and balancing on the 1/2 turn to face the opponent because it's kind of like your spinning around as you throw the knife.  It's a bit harder to coordinate.  I thought you might find that interesting.  It seems to be shaping up to be a rather interesting form, but it does already appear noticeably harder than the previous ones we've done.


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## arnisador (Mar 12, 2002)

That's neat! I have heard of such applications of forms before but not often.

But then, who's ambushing whom?


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## Dronak (Mar 13, 2002)

I don't know.    Maybe when I remember I should ask our teacher whether the Ambush Form is so named because you're the one doing the ambushing or because it trains you to respond to being ambushed.  I get the impression that it's meant as a response to an ambush because I don't think martial arts training was meant to make you the aggresor.  Plus the book I have listed an application of the first move as pulling two attackers off balance and if necessary kicking a third.  That would seem to imply you're the one getting attacked.

As for the knife applications, I agree they're interesting.  I don't know how many moves in barehand forms could be used to get/use weapons.  My experience and knowledge is too limited right now.  Our teacher will usually show us an application of a move if he thinks it will help us understand it better and thus learn it faster.  That's probably why he added in these knife applications.  Without knowing that it wouldn't necessarily be obvious (not to us beginners anyway) why we're doing the moves that way.


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## Dronak (Mar 17, 2002)

Our instructor recently received some sort of certification recognizing his teaching level (or something or other) from some organization I can't remember.  Great, huh?    I think it was something like the International Martial Arts Training Center, but I'm not sure.  I think he said this is the first one done for a Chinese martial artist, so that's pretty cool.  He mentioned again about how he has this big plan for spreading the art and training us to become teachers so we can help if we want to.  Of course he's not going to force us to do something we don't really want to.  But this summer he said he was going to have some special class for training people to teach the first level, so to speak.  He said that would basically be Six Closing Fist, Power Fist, Linking Step Fist, and tan tuie routines 1-5.  I think the plan for this class is for him to make sure that we've got everything exactly the way it should be so that we wouldn't teach anything wrong and also to show us some applications of everything so that we'll know those, too.  I think he wants to start some sort of teaching certification levels and this would be the first one.  He said older students may need to help teach newer students whether or not they've taken a coaching class, but the ones who do take the class and learn things well enough would be able to teach outside of our classes.  I'm kind of interested in the coaching class just to make sure I get all the details right, but I haven't learned the Linking Step Fist form yet, so I'm not sure if I could do it.  He might only want people who have learned all three forms in there, I don't know.  Anyway, I think that's the main news from class recently.  Just passing things along for those who are interested in how things are going here.


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## arnisador (Mar 17, 2002)

This is interesting as a cultural phenomenon! I take it your sifu really loves the martial arts. How old is he? How long has he been here in the States? Has he taught other groups here?


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## Cthulhu (Mar 17, 2002)

Dronak,

Go for the coaching class!  I've always believed that you don't know something unless you can teach that something.  

Getting the opportunity to teach really helps your own training.

Cthulhu


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## Dronak (Mar 18, 2002)

arnisador, I don't think I can exactly answer all your questions.  As for his age, I'm not a great guesser, but I'd say maybe in his 30s.  Papers we have say he's had 18 years of training and he's talked about doing MA while in high school.  If he started in high school when he was say 18, another 18 years of training puts his age around 36.  Chances are he started somewhat earlier than that and is somewhat younger.  I think he's also mentioned having a masters degree.  I guess a range then would be say mid 20s to mid 30s.  I'm not sure how long he's been here in the US.  All I can say from the background papers I have is that it probably wasn't any earlier than 1985 -- a note says he won the National Chin-Nien Cup Chinese Martial Arts Competition in that year in Taiwan.  As I recall, he got that masters from a school here, so he must have been here for at least a few years already.  I know that he does teach some tai chi classes out in Virginia, but I don't know if he's taught long fist to other groups.

Cthulhu, I generally agree.  You know that you've really learned something well if you're able to teach it to someone else.  That's why our department likes everyone to be a teaching assistant at some point, I think.  Besides the obvious experience of teaching a class, that is.  I'm interested in that coaching class from what he said more so that I know I'm doing everything correctly than to know I can teach it to others, but being able to teach would be a plus, too.  Still, as noted, I haven't learned one of the forms that's planned to be included, so I'm not sure if I can take the class.  He might want me to learn the form first before doing the coaching class, but then again he might feel that I can learn it from that coaching class and let me do it.  I don't know, I'll have to see.  That's still a few months away though and I'm sure we'll get more details as the summer gets nearer.

Oh, as a little aside, we've finished off the first section of the Yang style tai chi form we're learning.  The sheet we got lists 100 moves and there are 21 in part one (the shortest section of the three).  It's nice to have reached a marker like that.  I wonder how far we'll get before the summer.  Almost certainly not all the way through, but I wonder if we'll finish part two, up to move 58.  I'll see in a few months, I guess.


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## Dronak (Apr 8, 2002)

Another update for those keeping track.  It looks like we've decided on doing weapons for summer training.  We'll be able to practice outside where there's tons of room and I think everyone will be doing a weapon regardless of how long they've been with the club.  I'm not sure any of us are *really* ready to do weapons, but some have been training longer than others.  We'll have two weapons -- broad sword and staff.  The teacher told us that if we plan to be here for the summer session, we should go buy one of each for ourselves.  I think he said we'd all learn the basics of both weapons, but we'd only do a form for one of them.  I'm hoping to do the staff form, but I think it's our teacher's choice as to which weapon form we learn.  Anyway.  I don't think our barehand form training will be left behind.  The tai chi group I'm in will be continuing because there's no way we're going to complete the entire form this semester.  Some "how to teach" class was planned, too, but I haven't heard any more about it lately.  I think the teacher wanted to up the class sessions to 4 hours in the summer, too.  I don't know if that would be three days a week or only two as a recent e-mail we got seemed to imply, but we'll find out later.  There's still plenty of time before the school year ends to prepare for a summer session.  Oh yeah, I think it will only be about two months, not the three months or so that we have off between school years.  I guess that about covers the recent developments here.  I just thought I'd keep you informed.


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## disciple (Apr 8, 2002)

Hi, Dronak! I just recently tranferred MA school, and finally I can recognized some of the forms you're talking about 
not sure about the english term though, we use english name only for first fist and second fist, the rest are chinese...but i recognized tan toi too
how far is you training? what have u learned?

salute

:asian:


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## Dronak (Apr 8, 2002)

Over the past few months I've been giving little updates about what I've been doing here in this thread.  Considering how many posts there are now though, I can't blame you for not wanting to read the entire thing.    At some point I should split things off into a new thread, but most of my updates don't seem worth their own thread, so I keep posting here.

The shorter summary of things so far is that I started in the fall when the Chinese Martial Arts Club on campus started.  We're learning northern Shaolin long fist style kung fu.  Back then we learned a bunch of basic stances, punches, kicks, stretches, etc.  We also did five of ten tan tuie routines and learned a basic form the teacher called Six Closing Fist.  Since a good portion of the class doesn't speak Chinese, he sticks to English translations most of the time.  We had a short winter training session in January where we learned another basic form called Power Fist.  When the spring started, we got split up into two groups.  A smaller group (the one I'm in) is learning some Yang style tai chi while the other group is doing the third basic form called Linking Step Fist.  About a month into that, we had a little exam for people who learned the first two forms.  If you passed, you could learn a second form during the spring.  These would be more advanced, intermediate level I suppose.  I think everyone who took the exam did pass which frankly surprised me, but it was the teacher's choice and I'm sure he knows what he's doing.  The people doing a second form were also split up, this time in to three groups.  A couple people the teacher selected to learn Fourth Running Fight Fist, the rest were split into First Ambush Fist (tai chi group people) and Second Ambush Fist (Linking Step Fist people).  That group division is only there because the teacher didn't group us all back up again before splitting us into the First and Second Ambush Fist groups.  Oh, there should be Chinese names for a few forms earlier in the thread should you want to look them up.  They didn't come directly from our teacher, but I think they're right from what I can tell.

That's where we're at now.  I was about to repeat the summer plan as I understand it, but realized there's no need to since that's only like two posts up.  As for next school year, the teacher mentioned possibly doing some sparring/combat training with selected people then, but that's too far away to really worry about right now.  It's a lot of interesting stuff, but it's also pretty hard especially when we're moving so quickly.  But that's the way our teacher wants to do it.  If we've learned things sufficiently well, we can move on.  It's sort of like how you don't need straight As in school to go to the next grade level -- do good enough and you pass.  Same idea, we don't have to be perfect to learn a new form, just have learned the previous one decently well.  I still think it's a bit fast at least for some people, but we're all trying to keep up.


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## Cthulhu (Apr 8, 2002)

Dronak,

I've really enjoyed reading about your progress in your chosen art!  Many of my favorite martial arts books aren't about history or technique, but the experiences of people in the martial arts.

And just think, when you eventually have your own students, they'll have this to look back on.  And so will you!

Cthulhu
keep 'em comin'


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## arnisador (Apr 8, 2002)

I've been enjoying it too, and was just flipping through the Shaolin Long Fist book by Yang and Bolt again today because of it!


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## disciple (Apr 9, 2002)

> _Originally posted by arnisador _
> 
> *I've been enjoying it too, and was just flipping through the Shaolin Long Fist book by Yang and Bolt again today because of it! *


 

I am too reading the book 

*Dronak,*
do you do sparring, chin-na, push hands in the class?

salute


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## Dronak (Apr 9, 2002)

I'm glad to hear that at least a few people enjoy reading the updates about my training.    I guess it's not the kind of thing everyone likes, but since I found this board shortly after I started training, I thought some people would be interested in reading about how things go.  I don't know how often you get to follow things near real time right from the start, so it seemed to me that it might interest some people.

Cthulhu, you've got a point there.  This thread can make up a pretty good history of my experience in starting martial arts training.  I should save the whole thread to my hard drive periodically so I have it all on record.

arnisador and disciple, the Yang and Bolt book is pretty good, but it's not exactly what we're learning in our classes.  For one, the stances shown in the book are generally higher than we practice them.  E.g., our Mountain Climbing / Bow and Arrow Stance has our front shin perpendicular to the ground and our front thigh nearly parallel to the ground; the thigh isn't near parallel in the book.  The forms I'm doing that are in the book have some differences that I've had to notate, too.  Power Fist was basically right, mainly minor differences as I recall, but First Ambush Fist appears (by my reading) to have more significant differences.  Well, the book is an extra reference to help remind me how things go.  With my added notes, I shouldn't have too much trouble reproducing what we learned.

disciple, so far we've basically stuck to barehand form training.  We did learn some "grabbing hands" self defense techniques in the fall (I forgot about those) and I think those could be classified as chin-na techniques -- they were mainly some sort of wrist locking moves.  Push hands might be part of the tai chi stuff later on, but right now we're still just learning the form.  We should get to sparring in the Shaolin section eventually, but I'm not certain how soon.  I had heard it could happen as early as this coming fall for selected students, but I'm not sure anything's really set for that far in advance.


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## arnisador (Apr 9, 2002)

This is an interesting insight into an art unlike any I've ever studied, so I'm enjoying following the thread.


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## KumaSan (Apr 9, 2002)

Count me amongst those reading your story with interest. It was a pretty good idea to write this down as it happens, and provides a very interesting (to me anyway) story. Thanks!


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## Dronak (Apr 10, 2002)

It's nice to have some positive feedback on my story here.  It started off as a basic introduction and since some people seemed interested in it, I kept posting updates.  I didn't start it with the intention of making it a story of my learning experience, but it's sort of going that way now.  It can be hard for me to gauge interest in it though.  Sometimes there's really no need to people to reply to my posts but without the feedback, I'm not sure people are reading and interested.  It's good to know that some of you are enjoying it, so I'll keep posting new information when I have something that might be worth passing along.

Maybe after the summer when I've gone through a year of training, I'll start a new thread for year two.    I can start it with a recap of the first year and then go from there in the same way I did here.  That seems to be a fairly logical breaking point anyway since we'll be into another school year then.


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## Cthulhu (Apr 10, 2002)

Yeah, I apologize...I should have given you some more feedback earlier.  

Well, even if I don't reply, you now know that I'm reading the thread!  

Cthulhu


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## Dronak (Apr 11, 2002)

Don't worry about it Cthulhu.  I realize that not all of the posts I made here encourage replies.  I mean, with a simple "here's what we're going to do next" post, what do you say back?  "Cool, keep us updated"?  There's really not a lot to say in response to some posts.  But yeah, at least I know now that some people are reading and enjoying the thread, so I'll keep sending along updates when I have something new that might be interesting.


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## Dronak (May 8, 2002)

Not too much new, but I've got a little more news.  We're basically finished for the semester now.  The teacher won't be able to come for the last few sessions until finals, so no more new moves.  The Linking Step Fist group was the only one to complete their form.  Everyone else will continue and hopefully finish their forms in the summer.  The tai chi form is long and we're not going to finish it in the summer.  Our aim there is to complete the second section then stop and resume in the fall.  We will be doing weapons in the summer -- staff or broadsword.  The teacher wants us to buy both now so that we can practice some basic moves for both weapons, but we'll only do an actual form for one weapon.  We're getting wooden broadswords for practice both for our own safety and so the school doesn't complain or something about us carrying around metal swords (even if they are dull with no real blade).  Our practice sessions for the summer will be four hours long, three times a week, but the teacher will only be there for two of them.  He wants us to spend some more time stretching to help improve our flexibility and doing basic training stuff to help improve our stamina.  I think that's partly the reason for the extra hour.  I think the summer session will be short, only 6 weeks or so, because the teacher is going away towards the end of the summer.  We might continue practicing on our own after the summer classes end, but I guess we'll see later.  Like I said, not a whole lot, but it's been a while since I had something new, so I thought I'd pass along the current summer plan.


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## Nightingale (Sep 10, 2003)

how are things going now?


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## 7starmantis (Jan 9, 2004)

Yes, I would be interested in knowing how it is going now as well.

7sm


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## arnisador (Jan 12, 2004)

Yes, it's been a while!


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## Dronak (Jan 31, 2004)

Wow.  I haven't been here in quite a while because I've had to stop going to practice in order to focus on getting my research done so that I can graduate this school year.  So imagine my surprise to see my intro thread on the first page here.  

Well, once my research work started moving along last January, I had to cut back on fun activities in order to keep work moving along.  It's time for me to graduate, so I need to make a push to finish and get out of here.  I haven't been to practices since last school year.  I'm pretty sure I have a second and maybe a third thread similar to this that would bring you more up to date, at least to the last time I posted to it; you might want to dig it/them up for some more info.  AFAIK, things have been going along pretty much as usual, the teacher gives group lessons at normal class sessions and holds weekend sessions where he teaches advanced forms to the senior students.  Me, I've been trying to do a little practicing at home when I have some time.  Every now and then I review the basic forms so I don't completely forget them, but I don't do much with the higher level forms.  I also really need to practice tai chi more since that's what I really wanted to learn.  It's kind of relaxing but also a nice workout, I'm usually sweating by the end, so I ought to try to make it a regular part of my schedule.  Some exercise like that should help relieve a bit of the stress I'm going to be under while trying to finish my PhD.

The latest news I have is that our teacher will be moving back to Taiwan around the end of February.  This is unfortunate, but he wants to do a special one day seminar session to teach us Cha Fist (that's what it sounded like), answer questions, and give us an idea of how the club can continue on without him there to teach.  I think he said Cha Fist is one of the four most famous Shaolin forms; it's also supposed to be pretty advanced.  But he's going to let anyone come, new students, too, because this may be the only time they'd be able to learn directly from him.  Since this will be a one-shot deal, I'm planning to adjust my schedule so that I can attend it.  I'm hoping he'll also teach us the last three tan tui routines he hasn't yet so that we know the complete set of ten.  Exactly what happens after this semester, I don't know.  I'm pretty sure everyone will keep having practices for the spring, possibly the summer, but come fall and next school year, I'm not sure if they're going to keep the club going when they don't have a teacher.  I think this is something for the club officers to discuss at some point.

So I guess that's the basic update.  Sorry about being away so much, but even reading the boards here has slipped my mind since I haven't had time to practice and keep up with our MA classes.  I'll try to pop in a little more regularly even if I'm not learning or practicing much, just to keep in touch.


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## arnisador (Jan 31, 2004)

Sounds like your priorities are where they have to be, but it must be tough having to not do it after you put so much effort into learning it!


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## Dronak (May 28, 2004)

Hi, I'm stopping by again.  Yes, graduating comes first.  Just don't get me started on how much torture I'm going through to try to finish my PhD; this is probably the worst period of my life so far.  But, on MA I do kind of miss the practices.  They were always good exercise.  I just don't have the time for it anymore right now though.  Maybe when I finally graduate I can get back to them.  For the time being though, I do try to do a little practicing at home so that I can at least remember the basic stuff.  I ran through Linking Step Fist a number of times just a few days ago in order to refresh my memory on it.  That was the last of the three basic level forms we learned so I didn't drill it as much over as long a time as the other two.  I also review the tan tui routines once in a while.  And I'm trying to get back into the habit of doing tai chi regularly before bed.  It gives me some exercise and helps me relax so it's pretty good for helping control the stress I'm under.  Just this week I bought a few more tai chi and chi gong type music CDs to play when practicing at home.

We had that last class session a while ago now.  We learned the Fourth Cha Fist form specifically and we were allowed to video tape the session.  Our club officers are still attempting to put the various tapes and views together to form a nice DVD for those of us who went to the session.  That reminds me, one of the officers also made a CD with the video of our teacher performing the the tai chi form he taught us; I need to pick that up from him one of these days.  As always, I took notes in class, but I think they're incomplete in some places because I made them fast.  I'm waiting to check them against the video once the other guys get that made.  We also learned tan tui routines 8 and 9 at that session so we go almost all of them before our teacher left.  I think he said he couldn't remember routine 10 so he couldn't teach it to us.  We did have a video of our teacher's teacher doing all 10 tan tui routines.  Maybe if I study that carefully, I can pick up the last routine.  Oh well.  I am glad he gave us at least 2 of the 3 we had been missing.  Better to have 90% than 70%.    I haven't really heard anything about continuing practice over the summer or what they want to do about next year; most of the members and officers are graduating and without our teacher . . .  We'll have to wait and see, I guess.

But that's the basic update now.  We had our final session, learned another, more advanced form and 2 more tan tui routines.  I think people are/were still practicing, but I'm not sure what's planned for the future.  Me, I've got to focus on finishing my work so I can graduate and find a job.  I'm trying to resume regular tai chi practice, but that's generally all I do besides short refreshers on the basic kung fu stuff once in a while.


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## arnisador (May 28, 2004)

Thanks for stopping by! Good luck with school.


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## Dronak (Nov 23, 2004)

What the heck, it's an old thread, but it's my thread, so I'll dig it up if I want.  

Just a little update to let you all know, whoever remembers me and/or is interested, that I finally finished my PhD.  I passed the defense back in August, but had to do some revisions.  My advisor approved them today, so I submitted it and all the other paperwork (and money) and that's it.  It looks like the electronic submission process is causing some minor problems, but hopefully it'll all be fine.  Now I just need to find a job.  *sigh*

On the MA side of things, a small group of us who are still here in the area are practicing together once or twice a week.  It's only about 5 or 6 people, but without our teacher here and many students having graduated and moved on, I guess it's no surprise that the group is small.  Basically we just practice forms we all know together, but we may start teaching each other some of the forms that not all of us learned.  Our teacher did e-mail us about a month ago to tell us about his placings in a tournament (he did well and using a form or few that he taught us, too) and to say that he might be able to send us some video later on.  We haven't gotten any yet, but it will certainly be interesting to see what he sends us, if he does.  So I guess we'll keep on practicing and doing what we can while we're here.  I've got plenty of stuff I can practice on my own if I need/want to and most importantly to me, I learned tai chi which is what I really joined the club for.  I need to make more of an effort to keep up with that, but that's usually what I practice, more so than the kung fu.


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## 7starmantis (Nov 24, 2004)

Gongradulations!! Wow, you must feel good about getting that finished. 

Thats good that your still training, many people have leraned that way, my sifu did for quite a while when he was young. His sifu would send them video, or have on eof them visit and learn it and take it back and train on it for a while.

Good to hear from you again.

7sm


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## Dronak (Feb 15, 2005)

Yeah, I'm digging up my old thread again to provide a bit of an update for anyone who's still interested.  We've still got about 5 or 6 people from our club around here who want to practice.  There's even a new person interested who happened to see a few of us practicing last semester and wanted to know more.  We're not actively recruiting people or anything though because our teacher isn't here anymore; we just want to keep practicing what we learned.  We've scheduled three practices a week, people come to whatever ones they can, and it's mainly the same as before.  We try to do all the forms we all know together as a group and then we'll help out some of the newer people with their forms and such.  We've also decided to teach each other a form (or more?) for two main reasons.  One, so that we all have some more forms in common to practice as an entire group.  Two, so that at least one other person will know every form you know so you'll always have at least one partner to practice each form with.  The other guys are teaching me the Seven Star Knife (broadsword) form since I'm the only one who doesn't know it yet.  Maybe later I can learn Second Ambush Fist and I think I'd be pretty satisfied with that for the kung fu side of things.  Oh, a while back some of the people in our club videotaped themselves performing all of the forms we had learned and got that onto a DVD.  I think they said it's missing the advanced forms taught in special sessions and maybe one or two others, but essentially this is the video record of what we've been taught over the years.  One of guys in the club is making copies for us so that we can all have it for reference.  I'm looking forward to getting it.  It should be a useful addition to my own written notes.  I asked if I could get a copy on CD instead of DVD because I can't read the DVD right now.  If there was too much info and it would take too many CDs, I said it would be OK to leave it on a DVD.  I don't know exactly what was on there though, so we'll see how it turned out soon enough.  No word from our teacher about the videos he said he could send back in like Novemeber.  Oh well.

So I guess that's about it.  We're still trying to practice what we know and it's been going OK so far.  But it is kind of tough without a teacher and without the same large group we had before.


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## Darksoul (Feb 16, 2005)

Dronak,

-Its nice to see that after all this time, you and others are still practicing. As new as I am to kung-fu, I cannot imagine practicing without a teacher. Hopefully, your Sifu will get back to you again. If not, might I suggest maybe trying out other styles? I know you like what you're working with now, and thats cool, though it seems at some point, you'll be ready to move on. Without your original teacher, what are your options? Just curious if you've given any though to your future training. Glad you update this thread every now and then. Its nice to read about a person's evolution through martial arts. Thanks.


A---)


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## Dronak (Feb 16, 2005)

Yes, it would be nice if our teacher could come back to the US to teach us again, but I don't really know if he wants to or is able to right now.  Actually, if he was able to send us some videos done in a kind of instructional format, we could continue learning that way.  It's not the same as having him here in person, but it could work.  Still, we do have plenty of material to practice and get better at doing because he moved so quickly while he was here.  I've got six barehand forms, the tan tui routines (nine of the ten), one weapon form, and the Yang style tai chi long form.  IIRC, all but two tan tui routines and one high level barehand form were taught in two years.  And most of the long-time club members have more than that because they went to some special classes I chose not to attend.  So there is plenty for us to work on, especially if we start teaching each other forms and adding to our totals.

I haven't really thought much about what to do later on.  As long as I'm still in this area and there are people from the club around who want to practice with, I'll probably keep doing what I'm doing now.  If that breaks up or I move or something, I can still practice on my own, but honestly, I'll probably slip back to only really working on tai chi and doing just enough with the basic kung fu forms to avoid completely forgetting them.  I have written notes on everything I learned, so going back and reproducing the forms using them and my memory usually isn't too difficult.

I don't know if I'd be able to find someone else who teaches this same style of kung fu to continue doing exactly this.  I could try some other similar style or even switch to something completely different.  For example, since this seems to be primarily striking, doing something that's more based on grappling and ground fighting would be a useful way to help round out my knowledge of different fighting styles and ranges.  (I'm sure some would argue that I should find those things in the style I'm already in, but let's not do that discussion.)  Another possibility is that I search around to find a good tai chi teacher and work primarily on that.  I could stay with the Yang style that I've started or start going into other styles.  Given that my main interest in starting this was tai chi anyway, this may be the most likely option.

I've been posting new updates here because this is where others were asking about how things were going.  But I did have two other threads that have more details about the training I was doing at the time I wrote them.  I searched them out and in case anyone here hasn't seen them or wants a refresher, you can check them out here:  Newbie Part 2 -- Weapons and My Story and Training, Part 3.  Part 2 only covers the few months of the first summer when we did weapons.  Part 3 covers most of the second school year of training.  This thread originally covered the first school year, but is now continuing with more recent stuff, after my break to complete my PhD and getting back into it now, this school year.


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## Darksoul (Feb 16, 2005)

-Very cool, very cool. As long as you keep up with something, it really doesn't matter does it? You still have a lot of material to cover, and, more importanly, people to practice with. I look at the mountain of material that is praying mantis and think, the top is not my goal, just as far as I can learn. We have many weapons form, though I know there is only a few weapons I'm actually interested in learning. Knowing myself as I do, haha, I'm content with learing basics and enough of the style to be comfortable with. Like knowing 10 techniques really well, as opposed to 30 techs so-so. I thinking about looking into some Tai Chi as well.


A---)


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## Dronak (Apr 25, 2005)

Since it's been a while, I thought I'd give a little update for anyone who may be interested.  Things are still going about the same as earlier this year -- about 4 people from the group show up for practices pretty regularly.  We actually have a new member, too, a woman who saw a few of us practicing back in December and was interested in learning more.  We're not actively recruiting for people since we have no teacher, but since she was interested, we've started teaching her some of the basic forms and such.

As for me, one of my classmates and I switched forms -- we taught each other one we knew that the other didn't.  I learned Second Ambush Fist from him and he learned First Ambush Fist from me.  This helped us both get a new form, it gets someone else in the group who knows First Ambush (I was the only one), and it helps me fill out the lower end of the form list, too.  Another classmate was showing me the Seven Star Knife broadsword form, but we only got part of the way through it.  The guy showing me had some bad luck with injuries and wasn't able to practice for a month or so.  He's back now though, so perhaps we'll resume doing this form.  I have a copy of a VHS tape that has this on it and the Fourth Cha Fist form, so I have another reference for it that I could use if necessary.

This weekend, I just got a copy of the DVD our class made that contains video of members performing the forms we were taught.  This will be a great reference and reminder.  Unfortunately, I can't view it -- my computer doesn't have a DVD drive and my DVD player won't read these computer-type DVDs.  I could copy the stuff to CDs from my parents' computer the next time I went there, but asked a housemate if he could do it for me.  He was kind enough to agree.  It'll be a while before he gets them all done which is fine; I asked him if he could do it one of these days when he had some spare time.  It should be interesting to see what they've got on there because I don't know the exact contents.  I'll try to let you know if you're interested.


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## arnisador (Apr 25, 2005)

Do you only practice forms solo in the group, or also do partner exercises?


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## Dronak (Apr 26, 2005)

Just solo forms.  I don't think there are enough people who know partner exercises.  I think those were mostly taught in the special classes the teacher had on weekends and not everyone went to those.


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## Dronak (May 2, 2005)

My housemate finished making CDs from the DVD for me.  For the most part, the DVD contains what I expected it to, though not quite as well organized/formatted as I had hoped.  There are videos of club members performing most of the forms we learned.  It would be kind of hard to learn from the demos since the guys went through all the forms without really pausing like we do in practice, but that's OK.  It'll be a nice reminder of what I have learned should I forget a little bit here or there.  Our one day special class for learning Fourth Cha Fist is on there, too.  That takes up a lot of space.  The contents of our club web site is there and so are some extra videos that I found on http://www.jiayo.com/ after web searching for info on style names I'd never heard of before.

I've got a technical question, if anyone can help me out.  For some reason I don't know, when the guys videotaped themselves, sometimes they got separate audio and video files.  So there are mpg and mp3 pairs of files that should be joined to make one file.  I have no idea of how to do that though.  I web searched, but couldn't really find anything.  I do remember that the guys said they were having trouble merging the separate audio and video files together and I guess in the end they gave up.  Does anyone know how I could get them combined?  I can live without it, but it would be nice to have them merged, particularly for the Fourth Cha Fist seminar which was instruction rather than just demonstration.  Thanks.


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## 7starmantis (May 3, 2005)

Dronak said:
			
		

> I've got a technical question, if anyone can help me out. For some reason I don't know, when the guys videotaped themselves, sometimes they got separate audio and video files. So there are mpg and mp3 pairs of files that should be joined to make one file. I have no idea of how to do that though. I web searched, but couldn't really find anything. I do remember that the guys said they were having trouble merging the separate audio and video files together and I guess in the end they gave up. Does anyone know how I could get them combined? I can live without it, but it would be nice to have them merged, particularly for the Fourth Cha Fist seminar which was instruction rather than just demonstration. Thanks.


 Thats a good question for the Computer Room Forum

 7sm


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## Dronak (May 3, 2005)

Yeah, I thought about posting it there, but that forum looked rather empty.  That's why I mentioned it here.  I guess it can't hurt to try though, thanks.


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## arnisador (May 3, 2005)

I bet you'll see some computerphiles pop up if you post there.


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## Dronak (May 4, 2005)

Yes, I got some replies pretty quickly.  I guess people do keep an eye on the forum, but if there's no questions being asked, they don't have anything to post about.  I haven't been able to do what I wanted to yet, but maybe I will.  Someone also said this split is normal for writing to DVDs, so maybe when I can actually play the DVD it'll work fine without needing to combine things myself.  I'll see eventually.

Side note about training -- it looks like we're going to make this week the last one for the semester.  Finals will be coming up in a few weeks and people will need to study for them.  I think we're going to try to pick up again in June with whoever is still around and interested in practicing.


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## arnisador (May 4, 2005)

We've got two more weeks after this one before finals! I'm dying here.


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## Dronak (May 29, 2005)

I don't actually have much to say on the MA side of things right now.  Our group decided to stop practicing once the school semester finished and take a few weeks off.  I think we're going to try to pick up again for the summer within a few weeks.

The bigger news is on the personal side -- I finally got a job.  I should have noted in here that I completed my PhD.  I did the defense in August, but missed summer deadlines and had revisions to do, so I ended up with a December graduation.  I've been looking for a job since fall 2003, about a year before I planned to finish.  It's taken until just now for me to get a job.  Part of that could be because I didn't want to continue doing heavy research, but I wasn't getting offers on research post-docs and fellowships when I applied for them anyway.  I think I was very lucky to get this job and at just the right time, before I was practically out of money in my checking account.

The company e-mailed me after finding my resume/CV on line.  It was for a software engineer position working mainly in the earth sciences and they thought I'd be a good match.  I replied and explained that I did have the sort of experience they wanted, but often in different areas since I did astronomy work.  They phoned and we talked for a little while, then set up and in-person interview for the following week.  I went to that and everything seemed to go well.  It sounded like they were still interested which was good.  When I sent an e-mail thank you follow-up, I got a reply that said they'd be checking references and as long as it went well, which they expected it to, I'd have an official offer by early the next week.  I e-mailed my references to let them know the check was coming and tell them that this was a good opportunity for me, doing computer work in the science field.  I then waited and a few days later, I had the offer letter.  I quickly accepted, of course.  The whole thing took about 2 weeks, it was very fast.

I'm going to be working on the Science Software Reuse project, something designed to find and make available all sorts of programs and components that people can reuse in making and designing their own software rather than having to write everything from scratch.  I think that initially we have to search out what's already available, see if anyone has a similar, suitable repository, stuff like that.  Assuming we don't find something in existence that meets the needs, we'll have to go about designing something that will.  The job is based at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, just a few miles down the road from me, which is very convenient.  I'm not employed directly by Goddard, but by another company (Innovim) who's been contracted by Goddard to do work for them.  Filling in time sheets every day with notes about what I did is kind of a pain and things in general seem a lot more structured than school was, but what can you do?

It's an entry level position, so they'll help train me where I need it, and full-time.  The benefits are pretty comprehensive, it seems, and those can start after 2 months.  The salary is pretty good, too, at least for me now.  I'm getting somewhat more than double my grad student salary which was paying for 20 hours a week.  So it's not like I'm making a fortune, but considering I was living off that grad student salary for many years, doubling it is a significant increase.  I'll be able to use all that extra money for saving, fun spending, and paying off undergrad student loans.  I've had to cut back so much the past 9 months that I've been unemployed (my advisor couldn't fund me for the fall semester) that I'm really looking forward to having money again.  The one little drawback is that I won't see my first pay check for a month because they process the pay before the last; effectively, they always owe me one pay this way.  I'll probably have to take some money out of savings to make sure I'll have enough to survive until I start getting paid (I'm getting almost dangerously low now), but that's OK because I know I'll be able to replace it in the near future.  Once I start getting paid, I'll be able to go to more ballroom dances again, renew subscriptions I let lapse (or was about to), buy some stuff I've been wanting to get, etc.  A new computer is definitely on my list because mine is becoming more of a pain as time goes by, but will have to wait for a few months until I make sure my checking account has enough money that I can pay off the charge within a couple months.  I did already buy myself a new PDA though.

I guess that's about it for now.  Last week was my first week and things seem to be going well enough.  I've got a bunch of background reading to do in order to understand the project, what's been done, and what they want to do.  I'll also need to read up a bit on the computer specific side of things so that by the time we expect to do a lot of computer work, I'll be more caught up on it.  Oh, the last point that shows how lucky I was with this -- in some general conversation at lunch on Monday, my boss noted that they actually found my resume by accident.  They were looking for someone to do instrument calibrations or something like that and I guess my data calibration was enough to get me into their search results.  I suppose they looked over my background and experience and decided that I'd be good for this other job, passed it along, then all the stuff I already noted took place.  I guess this is how things were meant to turn out then.


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## arnisador (May 29, 2005)

Hmm, probably not what you were expecting to do after grad. school, then? But after 9 months of unemployment it must sound good. I'm glad to hear that you've found something acceptable.

I'm a numerical analyst and I enjoy this kind of work! I'm going to spend the coming year on computational biology during a sabbatical at Sandia National Labs. I hope your new job works out well for you.

Any hope of continuing the martial arts--possibly at a new school?


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## Dronak (May 29, 2005)

Well, I had gotten tired of doing research, so I didn't really want to do that again immediately.  I was looking for teaching and tutoring jobs or anything else that wouldn't involve heavy research like I was doing.  Computing work was always an option, but it can be hard to get a straight computer job without a straight computer background.  This job is good because while it will be heavier on the computer stuff than I'm used to, the work is in earth and space science, so my science background will still be useful.  Actually, that seemed to be a good draw for them -- with NASA's relatively recent merger of earth and space sciences, they're going to have to expand from the former that they know into the latter where they don't have much experience.  With my astronomy background, I should be able to help them as they start shifting into the space science area.  No, I guess it's not exactly what I planned on, but it does seem like a good opportunity to use my academic training, learning more about computing work while still staying connected with the sciences.  It sounds good and I love learning, so this should be good work.  Plus my boss said that there should be opportunities to get funding for research, if something good turns up that seems worth doing.  So I may be able to get back into research work later on if I feel like it.  Right now though I have to focus on learning what I need to in order to do this job.

Continuing with MA in another school is certainly possible, yes, if I decide I have the time for it later on.  I'd have to look around and see what schools are in the area and what they teach.  Tai chi has been my main interest, so I might try to find some good schools teaching that, any family, and consider them.  But right now I think I'll stick with what I have been doing, at least until I get settled into this new job.


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