What’s Next for the Chinese Martial Arts in the West?

6 05 2016

So while we are on the subject of conflict…

There is a saying that “bad press is better than no press”. Lot’s of truth to that. People think everything in life must be 100% positive, 100% of the time–and I disagree. There is a balance that must be managed to everything, and those who ignore the part they don’t like will find difficulty  when they are forced to encounter them. Best that you acknowledge and learn the negative, than have it smack you in the face and not know how to handle it. The Chinese martial arts is a good example of this, and I have a theory. You may not agree, and that’s okay. Think about it; if every martial artist never had a feud, never had differences, never fought each other, agreed on EVERYTHING–TCMA (traditional Chinese martial arts) would be so boring. So, Sijo #1 says I found a great way to do Kung Fu. Sijo #2 says no, I have a better way. #1 and #2 can’t agree, so they spar to see who was right, and voila! Regardless of who wins, both have tested their art, both modified their methods based on the results of the match. Perhaps there were several matches over time, several over generations… wouldn’t both systems get stronger from all of that tempering and testing and modifying? Besides, in order to have a “better way”–wouldn’t that require them to disagree with their teachers?

And right there ^^ in one short paragraph, the DC Jow Ga Federation has summed up the entire history of Kung Fu over all these centuries and millenia. A Kung Fu man learns Kung Fu. He thinks he can improve it. He encounters someone who thinks not–they test their theories–and new arts and systems are born and fused and molded and hardened. So here’s another saying:  A little conflict is good. And so it is!

Thanks to Bruce Lee, the Chinese martial arts had its “bad press”. He criticized how our masters and grandmasters were doing Kung Fu. People disagreed, feelings were hurt, there were even a few fights. In the long run, more people became curious about the Chinese arts, and our Sifus were able to give themselves a pretty good living from all that attention. Sure, some pieces of the art had to be adjusted to accomodate the new type of martial arts student:  the western, non-Chinese student. Admit it, they learn different from Asians. So Kung Fu here in the West got a few tweaking here and there so that our Sifus could attract, teach, and retain students. Gave it its own personality too. You could take Hung Gar here in America and put it against Hung Gar in China and see some differences in most cases. Sometimes the art and forms may be the same, but terminology and cultures will differ. In others, simply because there are more non-Chinese styles around American kwun (schools)–American Kung Fu schools may be practiced differently, have different clothing, etc. Like it or not, we must acknowledge and honor American lineages of Chinese martial arts to be just as valid as other non-Chinese lineages, despite how unique and strange they may seem. Sadly, many who come from non-Chinese lineages do not feel secure in being different, and therefore look to leave what their teachers gave them in order to look or resemble Chinese lineages. And this practice only gives credibility to those who discredit American/European/Latin lineages. Either way, Bruce Lee’s demand that Kung Fu update to modern, Western culture had an effect on all of us, as we all benefited from the increased interest and enrollments as well as the new developments that occurred as a result of his influence.

 

yeah, thanks for forcing us to take on kiddie classes, Daniel San!

yeah, thanks for forcing us to take on kiddie classes, Daniel San!

In the 1980s, I would say two things had an effect on Chinese martial arts:  Inflation and Karate Kid, the movie. (Yeah, I said it!) First, with the rising cost of real estate, a Sifu could no longer make a living with a small school of 20 students like he could in the 70s. Tuition was weighed against one’s own bills and many people would drop out if personal finances disallowed practice. And Karate Kid–I could write a book on how it hurt Kung Fu… Chinese martial arts schools which at first were teenaged and adult-oriented schools, now had to compete with Karate schools to be relevant in a new industry being created because of that movie’s popularity. In 1981, I was turned away by my Sifu who thought I was too young for Jow Ga. By 1987, schools were recruiting students as young as 5! If you wanted to stay in business or capitalize on the new children’s market–you had to accept (and learn to teach) children. Well, many Chinese style teachers taught arts that were too difficult for younger students to learn. We also taught techniques that were inappropriate for younger children. Unlike our Tae Kwon Do/Karate counterparts, Chinese martial arts had to be modified for age-appropriateness, and many Sifu could not keep up. Tae Kwon Do’s first form, Chun Ji/Tae Kuk Il Jang/Pal Gye Il Jang, consists mainly of three or four movements done several times–compared to Bak Siu Lum’s Gune Lic or Hung Gar’s Gung Gee Fuk Fu–which helped those schools retain younger students, while CMA schools could only retain the few whose focus allowed them to stay interested in such complicated forms. Tae Kwon Do is simpler and easier to teach to large groups, while Chinese styles require more one-on-one attention–making it difficult to do in a commercially successful school. These two things made running a succesful Chinese style school much more difficult than a Karate or TKD school, so we saw less growth in Chinese styles.

I could go on and possibly write a book about why Kung Fu had not grown like Karate and Tae Kwon Do, but I’d like to get to my point… Let’s skip forward to the 90s and Y2Ks.

I would call the 1990s the hey day for child-oriented martial arts schools, aka the “McDojo”. (This is actually an unfair label, as many child-oriented schools are in fact very good and NOT out to take your money) In the 90s, I saw more millionaires come out of this industry than ever, and many of them were Chinese martial artists who came to TKD just to make a better living. I recall a group of teachers come to me to invest in a franchise and I turned them down, just to watch each become wildly successful. None were TKD teachers, but they became them in order to enter the business. One such teacher is today an MMA gym–which leads me to my second point. Coming out of the 90s, MMA was becoming popular as was another genre of martial arts school you might not have noticed:  the Self Defense academy. Look around you, in whatever city you happen to be in, you will notice many adult oriented schools returning–and non are commercial karate. They may teach Krav Maga, Filipino Martial Arts, Brazilian Jujitsu, Aikido (nod to Steven Segal), Jeet Kune Do (Bruce Lee is still more popular than ever)… and many arts you may not have noticed. Most are doing very well, not all are riding the wave of a fad either. So the question you might ask is, What about the Chinese Martial Arts?

What happened?

I think many of us got stuck into tradition. Unlike our own Sifus and Masters, who were willing to evolve in order to accomodate the change in times and culture–many of us feel like we are doing something wrong if we don’t practice this art exactly as our teachers gave it to us. Some of us who live in America, look to Hong Kong to figure out what to do, yet we have two separate cultures, traditions and industries. Many of us learned and practiced our Kung Fu completely unaware of what the rest of the martial arts community is up to. Even after 20, 30 years in the arts we looked around one day and discovered that the martial arts community evolved several times over yet we are still doing the same things, the same way. No one is saying to add Zumba or MMA to your repertoire. But it would be a good idea to find out what successful martial artists are doing and to find a way to fit what we do in with that! One of the most successful flyers I used–I got my tag line from a grappler:  “Got Stand Up?”  I don’t know much about grappling, but I do know how to fight standing up. We did a monthly fight night for years, and fought all types in our school. As a result, we have had many mixed martial arts fighters come to my school to learn plain old, Jow Ga and FMA. So I marketed to that group offering just to work with them with standup fighting and I didn’t have to change much  to accomodate them. You could do the same. Here are a few other areas:

  • Fitness classes with a Kung Fu theme
  • Weapons workshops
  • Martial Arts for aspiring actors (a GREAT area. I’ve taught several myself)
  • Self Defense/Street Survival–learn the jargon and see what street survival experts do; you’ll find that Kung Fu fits perfectly with this area
  • **Tie-ins with the Ip Man/Tony Jaa/Jet Li movies**–I can’t believe more schools aren’t doing this! Our children don’t know much about Bruce Lee these days, but they sure as heck know who Yip/Ip Man is. Isn’t that crazy? He is crazy popular. You better get on this bandwagon!!!
  • Tie-ins with every Ninja Turtle/Anime movie that hits the big screen–This is a gold mine. Chinese martial arts fits in so well with this genre, it’s crazy
  • Tournaments as an alternative to school/intramural sports–many children are not athletically gifted. Most sports will try your kid out then reject them if they aren’t “naturals”. I really dislike that. However, the martial arts is possibly one of the only sports where no kid rides the bench, they don’t have to try out to do it, and every kid is taught the game from the ground up with zero fear of being left behind. How could a parent turn that down. Not only that, your child is really learning a trade! Even if he goes to college, gets a job, he will always be able to supplement his income by teaching Kung Fu. Come on, Sifu–you know what to say!

The point is, Kung Fu isn’t dying. We are just experiencing a recession. It’s time to realize it isn’t 1985; it’s 2016. The potential Kung Fu student isn’t turned on by Shaw Brothers films anymore. This art has survived longer than many spoken languages–outlived governments. Surely, the generation walking the Earth today can find a way to keep it relevant.

Anyone have ideas to add? Please list them in the comments below! Thank you for visiting the DC Jow Ga Federation.

 

 


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Categories : Kung Fu Philosophy

The Misconception of “Finding Out What Works” In Kung Fu

26 11 2013

I’m about to disagree with many of you and your teachers. Please hear me out first.

Martial artists are guilty of taking what they learned and heard and just regurgitating it without doing any of their own thinking and research–without investigating and qualifying their knowledge and simply passing it on. Worse, they will pass thing on exactly as they learned it. Although times change and fighting evolves, the self-defense needs of the average citizen changes, the combat role of the average martial artist changes, even weapons technology changes with the times… Martial artists (especially Chinese martial artists) often do not. Not only are we guilty of this, we’re actually proud of that fact.

No one else exaggerates the age of a style more than we do. No one fights over “I have the actual/pure/most authentic version” with their own classmates like the Kung Fu man does. For some reason, when one of us talks of updating or improving or modifying a martial art–we are ostracized for betraying our teacher’s art. As if there were a such thing as a Kung Fu style that had no evolution in its history, or these arts never had a beginning.

So one of the things martial artists like to do without thinking is to repeat or adopt philosophies without thinking them through. One that I hear a lot is “Kung Fu needs to be researched so that you can find out what works.”

Well, yes and no.

Kung Fu does need to be researched. It needs to be practiced, absorbed, understood, made second nature, mastered in movement as well as theory, and most of all–understood.

And no, that is no typo. I wrote “understood” twice for emphasis. See, you must first understand the techniques you learn. You must know how to throw them, when to throw them, and then do them until they are as natural as walking. When someone surprises you and throws a balled-up piece of paper at you, the knee-jerk reaction you make–whether it is to catch it, deflect it, or shield against it–should be the same way you utilize the techniques in your system.

Take, for example, this technique. The Jiu Sao is a standard technique in the Jow Ga system, as it is in many Southern systems. It occurs at least 7 -8 times in every form. Yet if you were to watch most Jow Ga practitioners fight–you’d almost never see it executed. Why? Because the Small Tiger Block (as we often refer to it) is not a natural reaction. Most people who practice the forms, will only execute the block a few times in class and when it occurs in a form without actually training the technique, drilling it until it becomes second nature.  And this is something many Kung Fu practitioners do. It is one reason “Kung Fu & MMA” sends the wrong message:  “We practice Chinese Martial Arts, but we utilize Muay Thai and BJJ to fight with.” Honestly, you have added the MMA element because your understanding of your style is not developed to the point you can actually use it.

In other words, you do not understand your system enough to fight with it.

And here, we arrive to my point, and the second “understood”. Your Kung Fu should be drilled until it becomes second nature and natural in fighting, then you must train it and research and test it enough so that you can understand HOW it works. It is not a question of “what” works–it is a question of “how” it works. So when Jow Lung walked the earth, the average fighter thrusted his punches. But today, 100+ years later, the average fighter has watched boxing and now snaps his punches. The Jiu Sao which once worked against the stiff Sei Ping Chune doesn’t quite work against the jab, but it can. You just have to find out HOW.

When Jow Ga fighters say they train their Jow Ga to find out “what” works, they are saying there are pieces of Jow Ga that does, and some that does not. If it does not, why do them? My message to you, Jow family is that your Jow Ga does work. You just have to train, drill, test and train some more until you find out how–so that it all works. And while you’re adding more and more forms, more and more styles, and shaking hands with more and more people until you are too old to fight–that knowledge is sitting on your forms lists, drying up while you spend valuable Jow Ga time investigating other arts. This is not just for Jow Ga people–all Kung Fu people. Test your Kung Fu. Then take the results of that test–whether you win the fights or lose–then find out why, how those results came to be, how to make them more efficient and effective, what can be done to counter your technique, and how you can prevent opponents from countering you. There are so many possibilities and so many levels of understanding, it will take a lifetime. So the fewer systems and forms you know, the further you can take your knowledge and ability.

For this reason, 99% of the information given on this site will deal with our first form, Siu Fook Fu. Harvest as much as you can yield from your Kung Fu. Stay tuned, so you can find out what we have done with ours.

Thank you for visiting the Dean Chin’s Jow Ga Federation.


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Categories : Kung Fu Philosophy

DC Jow Ga Training Clips

25 11 2013

This will be quick and easy.

Our purpose for creating this page is to pay homage to our Sifu and branch founder, Master Dean Chin. However, my personal motivation for doing such a site is to see established the acceptance of Dean Chin’s lineage as a unique and authentic version of the Jow Ga Kung Fu family. Every style has its branches and strains. Some are viewed as credible; some are not. As long as the person teaching a style/variation has an understanding of that style as a combat art and pays his dues–as well as proving its effectiveness–I view any strain of an art to be validated and acceptable.

There are many within our ranks who do not see Dean Chin’s Jow Ga as “pure” or valid as the Asian branches. Sifu modified his forms, he altered the way he taught the art, he added some elements of other arts. In the end, he called it all Jow Ga and sought to promote the style, and he didn’t even brand it as “Dean Chin’s Jow Ga”. I chose this name, because the term “Dean Chin version of Jow Ga” forms was often used to claim that a form was not authentic or incomplete.

Sifu did shorten many forms. He also forgot some forms. But do not allow these two facts fool you into believing that what he taught was not effective and powerful. Simply by viewing those who sprung from the loins of his school, you will see how strong Dean Chin Jow Ga is. However, despite that Sifu’s students were very good at performing forms–from Sifus Hoy Lee to Randy Bennett to Rahim Muhammad to Deric Mims to Troy Williams to Raymond Wong to Deric Johnson–when Sifu wanted to showcase the strength of his Kung Fu, he elected to have his students fight. When Sifu accompanied me to my first National tournament in 1983, he did not enter me into forms division–he entered me as a fighter. When he took a team to Taiwan–he brought fighters. When Sifu crashed a class while on of my Si Hings taught, he taught not Small Tiger form (everybody knew it anyway), he taught techniques within the form. Form, to Sifu Chin, was not a performance art. Forms were a collection of fighting technique, and this is what he used forms for in his classes.

When Sharif Talib and I decided to upload Jow Ga clips to youtube, then, we determined that there were enough forms on youtube under Jow Ga. So we committed ourselves to showing Dean Chin fighting techniques, as he taught them to us. We hope you will find them as valuable and useful as we did. Occasionally, we will produce (street quality, not studio quality… hey, it’s the information that matters!) Jow Ga videos that will highlight fighting rather than form, and these will be offered for less than the price of one month of lessons. When we teach workshops and clinics, they will be addressing the combat applications of this unique version of Jow Ga. Please check with us regularly, and subscribe to both my channel as well Sharif’s.

As a preview, I will present two examples below. Thank you for visiting the DC Jow Ga Federation.

DC Jow Ga Footwork Development

DC Jow Ga Small Tiger Technique


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Categories : Technique and Strategy, Video Clips

Dean Chin’s Jow Ga Technique – Tiger Claw to Uppercut

14 04 2013

Short and sweet. No description necessary. If you know Jow Ga, you are familiar with this pillar technique of the system.

Thank you for visiting the DC Jow Ga Federation.


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Categories : Video Clips

While On the Subject of Tigers (Running Into Walls)

4 03 2013

While we’re on the subject of Tigers…

Perhaps we should take this time to inform the readers that Tiger style Kung Fu has little to do with Tiger clawing and making “hwa” sounds. Sort of.

Tiger claw Kung Fu is a style of fighting in which one takes on the characteristics of a Tiger:

  • No animal in its right mind attacks a Tiger. Not even the Lion. Seriously, when was the last time you saw a Tiger fight a Lion?
  • The Tiger is indomitable
  • He is powerful
  • He is ruthless
  • He is not known for speed, except at close quarters
  • His footwork is a pouncing-style attack
  • He does not retreat
  • And, oh yeah, he has those claws

When Jow Ga refers to itself (and Jow Lung) as “Fu Pow”–Tiger and Leopard–we are referring to the combination of a fighting style that is powerful and cruel, like a Tiger, as well as quick and agile, like the Leopard. Without wanting to teach by blog, we’ll leave it at that.

In the Dean Chin school, considerable time is spend building the horse upon which the fighter stands. In other words, we build the strong and powerful legs that enable us to attack an opponent from what seems like a safe distance to the opponent. More than a kicking/leg’s distance away, but not so far that the opponent cannot be reached. The training starts by teaching the stances, and building the fighter’s ability to hold them for a long periods of time. Immediately after the fighter begins developing strength, we introduce movement–first short, basic movements, then later to more complex movements. Next, the movement with the feet will incorporate hand attacks, so that power is generated from the legs through the attacking motion of the body through the arms and hands and expelled through the destructive power of the attack.

Think of the difference between a 2 ton elephant swatting you, and a 1/2 ton Tiger rushing full speed and crashing into you. Both have power, but one is more devastating and sudden. When the elephant attacks, it has power but it is a power that one feels confident that you can escape it. However, when the Tiger attacks it is both intimidating and frightening because what is hurled at you is coming so fast even if you see it, you can’t escape it. If the Tiger has generated enough momentum, his power can feel like an elephant hit you when he lands.

And, like we stated earlier, his posture, his build, his presence is such that everyone in the room knows he’s there. It is a forceful, yet latent, presence. Can go from 0 – 60 in the blink of an eye. This kind of velocity has nothing to do with Tiger Claws. It all comes from the Horse. We must build the fighter’s physique into the personified image of a Tiger:  Strong, explosive legs, powerful upper body, and a killer instinct. There are three important tools used to accomplish this:

  • lifetime of stance training
  • weighted handwork (dumbells, brass rings, bricks, etc.)
  • plenty of impact training

Not exactly hi-tech stuff, but it’s very effective. And if you don’t want join problems, don’t look for shortcuts.

With this kind of training, we have no need to run from the opponent. In none of our Tiger forms, do we retreat. In one form–the Fu Pow Chune (Tiger and Cougar) form–there is one part that shuffles back to draw the opponent into attacking, and once the opponent does so, we capture him and tear his arm off. Just like a Tiger.

When the body rushes forward in a forward-moving attack, not only are we “shuffling” forward with the feet–we are actually attacking with our torso as well as the limbs. This way, if the opponent counters while we attack or is foolish enough to lunge forward, he will run smack into a wall. Although you may only weigh 190 lbs (like I do), the forward motion multiplies the force attacking him, and increases the damage we intended to inflict.

Wish I could tell you more, but you’ll have to hunt down a Jow Ga Sifu to learn more.

Thanks for visiting the DC Jow Ga Federation.


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Categories : Jow Ga in America

Build the Tiger

4 03 2013

In Dean Chin’s Jow Ga, we believe in Building the Tiger.

Jow Ga training is more than simply learning forms, a bunch of weapons, and performing Lion Dance. For most in the Kung Fu world this may be true, but training in the Dean Chin branch of Jow Ga is much more rigorous and (for many) quite boring. Our list of forms and techniques is as long as any other Southern style one would find, but considerable time is spent building strength in various parts of the body which enable our techniques to be effective.

This is one of those things misunderstood about Kung Fu. While many systems simply impart techniques that simulate tearing, strangling, dislocating and breaking–the Kung Fu student must develop his body to be able to actually use those techniques for what they were intended for. When the body has been forged properly, the fighter has, in effect become a Tiger:

  • Powerful shoulders
  • The Tiger’s Claw:  the fingers, the hand, the wrist and forearms
  • A strong and destructive fist
  • Strong neck and abdomen
  • Strong, explosive legs
  • A courageous and fearless, and where necessary–ferocious–heart

Take your system’s clawing techniques. If you were to use those techniques on a real attacker, what damage would you be capable of inflicting? The Jow Ga man, if properly trained, can answer that question. Rather than learn forms on top of forms on top of forms–one’s time would be better spent if a full year were devoted to developing the body much in the way a Tiger’s body is developed:

  • powerful upper body to overpower an attacker
  • powerful grip for grappling, seizing, strangling and for forming the fist
  • a desensitized fist that can be used as a blunt-force weapon against the opponent
  • a durable body that can withstand the opponents’ attack
  • strong neck that can resist a neck-snapping knockout punch
  • legs that allows the fighter to explosively pounce on or chase down an escaping opponent
  • the confidence that your opponent cannot hurt you
  • the ability to turn on the malicious intent when the appropriate time calls for it

That last item is what is often referred to as “Fighting Spirit” in the old school. It is one aspect that is too often omitted from Kung Fu training. In other words, the psychological capacity to injure, maim, or kill the opponent where necessary. A Tiger is never dangerous when he is not hungry or under attack. This is because although he has the ability to destroy anything in its path, it is unnecessary. The law of nature does not allow the Tiger to just go through the jungle killing everything it encounters. Yet when provoked, or hungry, or defending its young–nothing will stop it from a merciless, cruel attack.

The Kung Fu fighter must have all of the above:  Technique, physiology, courage, and the mental switch to turn him from law-abiding citizen into unstoppable killer. This is not a technique one can learn from a book or video. It is a principle; one that must be cultivated and developed through years of training to turn a man–regardless of what he comes through the school doorway with–into a Tiger through proper Kung Fu training. The body must be transformed into something extra-human, and the kind of training that this requires is a slow, patient, arduous process. You cannot develop this kind of Kung Fu ability if you are concerned with partying and celebrating all the time. Dean Chin was not a Kung Fu historian. He was not a collector of forms. He was not a Kung Fu politician, nor was he a Kung Fu party animal.

Thank you for visiting the DC Jow Ga Federation.


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Categories : Technique and Strategy