Fook it!

The poststructuralists were right, language is indeed a prison.

As I'm writing a novel right now I feel contained within a seperate universe where only words and words and words exist. I'm strangled by words!
I'm just happy I'm not writing about kung fu. The nonverbal can not always be consolidated by the verbal, as is stated in the film above. I've been pondering how hard it would be to describe the kung fu moves in a true and thrilling way, I mean: how to make it fiction. And it must be thrilling. Why bother to do anything if it did not thrill and fascinate?

But some things can't be described until one experiences it. Like the perfect fook-sau, which I'm hunting as if it were the Holy Grail.

Strange. I haven't been training at all for a week and already I have obsessive thoughts about the fook-sau and I stare at peoples forearms like I have some sort of wierd kink. Forearms, forearms, fook-sau, tan-sau....
CRASH BOOM BANG!

How good for me then that I will train tonight! And how good for me that the perfect fook is just an armlength away (Dai Sifu is in the kitchen, he he...)
CRASH! BOOM! BANG!

I had a slight glitch in my chi-sao, every time I went from bong-sau to tan-sau, a glitch in forward pressure and voila! I create an abyss of unintention were the opponent can get through.

Would it happen if his chi-sao were soft and fluffy and playful? Feel-good fighting? Dancing? Well, it would be decieving, perhaps leading me to forget what it's all about: hitting the opponent. Intention creates forward-pressure. With the right intention we fill in the blank spots between one position and the next. CRASH BOOM BANG!

We cross the abyss.

My fascination with the fook-sau continiues. It seems like every time I train I discover something new about it. A good fook-sau is like the proverbial Flood, it cleans the slate. The Exterminating Angel.

I can't finish Kung Fu like I finish my novel. Cursed be the riddles of the flesh!
Why can't I just be satisfied with what I create, things of substance, that take on a life of their own. Training, though so physical, is at the same time so immaterial. Not at all like black ink on a white paper, that someone might be staring at 100 years from now. Even the darkest of bruises will turn pale after a few days...

I guess the dillemma could be easily solved with a videocamera.

I long for tonight when I will train 18-20.30. FINALLY less writing the god damn novel and more CRASH BOOM BANG!

All Along the Watchtower

One of the songs I constantly listen to is All Along the Watchtower by Bob Dylan, from his 8:th album, John Wesley Harding, which was released in 1967. The album is life-elixir to me, as well as his 30:th album "Time Out of Mind".

To me, Dylan somehow incarnates the beauty of simplicity, and the tinge of incompleteness, the haunting feeling of something left for you to fill in... I can't really explain it, the way Dylan awakens strong emotions in me... The listener is left in an evocative space, where dreams and memories come to life.

It's a great source of inspiration.
All Along the Watchtower fills me with an euphoric, apocalyptic feeling. It's like some great riddle hides within the song.




Then Imagine my thrill when, a couple of weeks ago, I saw Battlestar Galactica, my favourite series, and a cover of All Along the Watchtower is used in the end of the third season as an important key for things to come. It was like the episode was made just for me!

Less is More

WT is simple, direct, effective. But man is an indirect animal - loves to complicate it all, make patterns, make funny movements, make illusions... in Kung Fu as well as everywhere else.

Wing Tsun is like a sharp sword - it should be as a sharp sword, my Sifu tells me. He is not indirect at all. He shows me what it means, krasch, booom, bang! No bullshit.

And it has finally dawned upon me what WT is all about. I have reached some conclusions.

LESS IS MORE

A good fook-sao and slight, deadly alignment of the hip exterminate all.

The simplicity of it all is stunning, breathtaking like a good punch.

I will no longer dwell on fancy, complicated kung-fu moves. In fact, right now, I won't even bother to learn the biu-jee form. I will perfect my basic techniques, they were first for a reason- I will train on my punches, my fook, my tan and bong, with the right no-bullshit mentality I will never need anything else.

Every point clear.

Yes: I train Kung Fu for self-defence. Knock out bad guys. Break a sweat. I want to do it as direct as possible.

But man is an indirect animal.

Some people doesn't want to do Kung Fu in a direct way, and it's ok.
The key is honesty, I guess. Complex intricate, mysterious stuff holds great fascination. Some use Kung Fu as a road to spirituality and mysticism, losing themselves in complicated aestetic moves. Moves without a worldly purpouse (like punching the bad guy). They may pave your way to heaven, but will they save you in a fight?

Don't fool yourself: analyze what you're doing, and to what end.

I keep it simple. Truth often is.

Lund WT revisited

Today I was teaching WT at the kwoon in Lund, which is where it all began for me, almost exactly four years ago. I hope that I managed to give something back to WT Lund today. I enjoyed myself immensly, and hopefully the guys had as good a time as I had. Forgive me if I talked too much nerd, and details. I ranted and raved about the hip-connection, so I hope that you never forget it now.

I also send a thanks to Johan, who helped me out when I black-outed on Chium-Kiu ;-) and helped me take care of the newbeginners.

Hips don't lie.!

I will be back next time Sihing Jacques needs a stand in.

http://www.lundswingtsun.se/