Post by Nataraya on Feb 4, 2005 6:59:39 GMT -5
An Articulate skeptic once cautioned the people of the world to believe nothing of what they heard or read and only half of what they saw. But despite this advice, those same people have gone on believing whatever they want to believe, with frequent disregard for fact. A witty saying may become an absolute truth simply by virtue of its popularity. After all, cats lead nine lives, all men are created equal, people who go to bed at dusk and get up at dawn get rich and smart and strong, frogs cause warts, bees are very busy, little girls are manufactured from things that taste good, and little boys who do what's natural go insane. Right?
Such unsubstantiated aphorisms are not restricted soley to the English language. In Chinese, there's one oft-repeated, melodic ditty that goes: Nan-chu'uan pei tui (fists in the South, leg maneuvers in the North). Many purportedly authoritative books have-presented these words as truisms, and it is now accepted as fact that all kung-fu practitioners living in Southern China use punches to subdue their opponents while all those in the North rely on kicks.
Most writers say geography is the reason for this martial arts. curiosity without even challenging the validity of the concept. Southern China, a prolific producer of rice, is characterized by a wet climate, Northern China by a dry climate. Because their ground is soft, the southern practitioners supposedly have a hard time executing kicks an d thus concentrate on hand technique. Because the ground in the North is hard, and because people of that region are comparatively tall, northern fighters purportedly find it easy to use their feet. These conclusions may have been drawn to part from another popular Chinese saying, Nan -Ch'uan Pei Ma (boats in the South, horses in the north).
But the exponents of the kung-fu aphorism seem to ignore the more specific information offered in the biographical and fictional accounts of many Chinese martial artists. Ts'ai Ch'i. a founder of the tsai school (or. in Cantonese. choy -gar) was a practitioner of southern-style kung-fu. But he became famous for his swift, unexpected kicks, not his punches. In fact, he was ultimately nicknamed Kuei-chiao Ch'i (Ts'ai Ch'i with the ghostly kick ‘Mo Ch'ng-ch'iao, founder of the Mo school. (in Cantonese, mok-gar), one of the five important southern schools, was note for his ting-chiao (spike kick) This kick was always preceded by a turning or swinging around of the body.
LIKE THE SHADOW OF THE MOON
One of the most famous sou thern kung-fu masters was Huang Fei-hung (in Cantonese, done Fei-hung the exponent of the hung school (hung-gar). Wong the many stories and tales about this person, there is one anecdote that tells how Huang won one of the most celebrated matches in Hong Kong history:
It seems that there was a foreigner who brought a wild dog into Hong Kong, immediately posting a notice that offered a huge sum of prize money to anyone who could subdue the animal. Of course, the challengers were required to pay an entrance fee. To attract takers, the foreign hustler noted in his challenge that failure for any Chinese to defeat his hound would prove that the Chinese were no better than dogs. The ploy worked, and many angry Chinese accepted the challenge only to be badly mangled. Rumors of the hound's prowess subsequently became so greatly exaggerated that he was compared to a fierce tiger. Eventually, these rumors reached Huang Fei-hung, who thought they were a disgrace to the
Chinese and decided to challenge the dog himself. There was a great demand for tickets to the event, and on the day that Huang entered the arena he was enthusiastically cheered by a huge audience. But the cheering stopped as the wild dog was brought in, and all that could be heard was the growling of the hound as he tugged on the chains that constrained him. His face was ferociously contorted, his teeth glistening and his eyes fiery with hatred, as he growled and prepared to attack his opponent. Huang stood calmly, looking very determined.
As soon as the wild dog was released from his chains, he sprang toward his human opponent. Huang merely sidestepped and escaped the first attack. The dog turned around and looked more fiercely than ever at the man whom he had just missed. Huang looked at the dog and motioned his right hand upwards. Immediately, .the dog sprang up to bite the hand. Huang quickly side-stepped again and, turning with lightning speed, delivered a kick to the groin. The animal let out a chilling, ear-splitting yelp and fell heavily to the ground like a broken branch, dying immediately.
The maneuver that Huang Fei-hung used was so quick that almost nobody saw it. It came to be called yueh-ying kuei-chiao (the ghostly kick like the shadow of the moon) and was later referred to as wu-ying chiao (the invisible kick). The latter term was used in a recent Shaw Brother kung-fu movie, Master Boxer, which is based on one of the episodes of Huang Fei hung.
One of Huang Fei-hung's top pupils, Ch'eng Hua, also developed a very spectacular kick which helped him defeat many opponents. This technique was called hu-wei chiao (the tiger's tail kick) because it was executed like a back kick. Ch'eng Hua kept this kick a secret until he was forced to use it as an old man in his 70s.
And taking into account the modern scene, there is the late Bruce Lee. Primarily a practitioner of the wing chun style before he founded his own jeet kuen do (way of the intercepting fist), Lee used kicks so much that he was nicknamed by Hong Kong journalists as San-chiao Li (Li with an extra foot, or Li who kicks a lot).
HANDS IN THE NORTH
Meanwhile, in the dry North, not everyone was kicking. Sun Yu-feng, who practiced the Lohan style of kung- fu, was, exceedingly famous for a powerful defensive technique called ( chan-shou (revolving hands). Sun's forte was a complex set of hand movements an locks, executed in twisting patterns and based on principles of leverage.
Ch'en Tzu-cheng, a prominent member of the Ching-wu t'i-yu-hui (the Chinese Physical Culture Association) who taught mainly the fan-tzu-men style of kung-fu, is another Northerner known primarily for and techniques. One of the four basic tactics of his system was tiao-shou, which simply means artful blocking. Ch'en believed that every inch of distance should be calculated in executing punches and blocks and that the technique should be delivered unyieldingly and with full power. To demonstrate, he would often invite students to attack him with numerous brows, which he would thwart with tiao shou technique.
During the 1920s, tai-chi ch'uan exponent Wu Chien,ch'uan, who resided in Shanghai and instructed at the same Chinese Physical Culture Association as Ch'en Tzu-cheng, achieved sudden fame from a single incident. Besides teaching t'ai-chi ch'uan at the CPCA, )-u also gave private instruction to several prominent and wealthy families. At one of these
households, there was a very mischievous youngster who wanted to test Wu's skills and make him look foolish.
One day, when Wu arrived at the residence to give lessons, there were four watch dogs stationed at the front entrance. Wu was wearing a long white Chinese gown, the customary summer garb, and was holding a fan. Upon entering, he was attacked by two dogs. Wu hit the first dog on the head with his fan and, side-stepping, gave his back-hand to the second attacking dog. The third dog was stabbed in the throat with the fan, and a punch to the ribs subdued the remaining animal. Wu's defense consisted entirely of a hand technique called yeh-ma fen tsung (separating the wild horse's mane). Wu had killed all four attacking hounds, and when news of the feat got out, he became instantly famous.
These instances, taken from popular historical literature as well as fiction, clearly question the reliability of the saying, Yan-ch'uan pei-t'ui. For to say that all southern kung-fu practitioners use only their hands, all Northerners their feet, is as presumptuous as insisting that all people who associate with from frogs get warts. Perhaps it would make life easier for historians if discussions of kung-fu would examine each style, each practitioner, on individual merit rather than pre-judging on the basis of geographical location. After all, home is where the art is.
Back in the seventies I was a big fan of the Sinologist Dr Hu. Also from later source I was able to collect several VERY good articles about Chinese culture, and ficts/ facts around Traditional Martial Arts. Till today, huge parts of his reflections are thr truth.
The above scanned text is from Black Belt magazine. Willima Hu did write a lot of articles in the sixties and was the first one to reflect his knowledge of martial arts to the West. The man who tried to dys-mystify the art. I hope the reader will enjoy it. What I like (now) is that there are nice spots hidden in it for discussion between the readers.
Enjoy,
Warm regards,
Evert.
