I will take this occasion to mount a defense of my character and 'mission'. For the casual reader, they will perhaps be confused as to why such a defense is necessary. For the veteran traditionalist, even the ones who claim to rise about conventions, they will understand why a defense might be required, though I am prepared for criticisms despite my defense. Every post I make will be geared toward dissemination of some aspect of the art, and this post will be no different. However, at the same time, this is to be a defense of my actions; my Apologia for those that are students of philosophy and familiar with Plato.
History is very important to Traditional Chinese Martial Arts. It was popularly believed that since Traditional Chinese Martial Arts (henceforth abbreviated as TCMA) is so enmeshed with the cultural history of the country and its people, only the Chinese could possibly learn it properly; "the spirit of gung fu", as my uncle said, "lies intrinsically within every Chinese person." Just as how it is very hard for deep seated foreigners to learn and care about the history of distant countries, their goals, values, habits etc... so it is the same with TCMA which, until the present, was very localized in development and practice, and therefore possessing a very strong ethnic flavour. This is quite evident in many of the naming schemes utilized for certain patterns, forms, and various martial theories. Examples would be martial philosophies based on Yin and Yang, forms of combat and exercises focusing on particular animals, and names for certain movements like the posture "One Finger Stabilizing the Heavens."
Because cultural/social history is so ingrained with the practice of TCMA, it is only logical that lineages be a very important concept as well. Lineages stretch back for generations, sometimes a bit tenuously and sometimes quite bold and exact. There is an unspoken, or perhaps occasionally expressed, notion that the further back your line extends, the more prominent/authentic/noteworthy/'powerful' your system must be. This connection, from present day back to a point in time far removed from what we contemporarily experience, is a note of pride and distinction in many martial arts circles and individual practitioners. People can hearken back to an age of heroes, revolutionaries, invincible fighters and vigilantism, pointing to those individuals found within their school, their lineages, all but lost to history and say, "I am directly linked to that man/woman through the art I practice/teach." In this way, it is quite similar to those that adhere to any sort of discipline ranging from distinct forms of achitecture to secret family recipes. And, much like guilds during the Middle-Ages and the Renaissance period, fraternities started forming around these perceived distinctions; people joined together in brotherhoods, and families began keeping secrets to ensure only those accepted through proper trials would be allowed access to their distinct methods. From this a sense of prominence arose just for being a part of a certain group of high esteem and renown. Thus strong lineage adherences are not a concept to simply wave off as irrelevant. They are an integral part to the study of TCMA systems. Though arguably detrimental to an efficient promulgation of an art, such concepts served, and still serves in many areas of the modern day Gong Wu, as a binding agent within families. Such a model promotes a certain retention of distinct elements even between similar schools.
After that somewhat lengthy introduction, I will now bluntly state the issue I must defend. My history is very much in line with the system(s) I practice. I do not adhere and teach what would be considered controversial claims regarding the history of different systems of TCMA I study and/or train. However, my lineage is extremely debatable. My family members knew this (particularly my uncle) when they decided to teach me. I will mention "my uncle" a lot as he was the primary teacher that I chose to identify and learn from after selecting to train under his speciality; that being the Hung Family Fist aka Hung Gar Kuen. I have NO defensible lineage, and it is because of this that some traditionalists have formed negative preconceptions, and have voiced annoyance, at my efforts and status. Thus begins my Apologia.
I mentioned in my first post that my uncle wanted me to rise above the politics and commercialism that runs through the heart of modern day CMA. When he taught me, he made it expressly clear that he would not mention lineages, names or other possibly contemporary individuals whom he may have taught. All he mentioned was that he learned from his father. I never met the man and my uncle never told me his name. Since my uncle has since passed several years ago, I will never know and I must accept this as a fact of life. However, during a particular instance where I pressed him for certain names, he gave me a rather long lecture. The following will be the bulk of his words to me. He spoke mostly Cantonese and some very broken English. This, coupled with the fact that it was about 5 years ago, makes the exact wording questionable. However, the ideas expressed are 100% true to that moment:
[Uncle] "What good is it to know a name? So you can try to gain credit for other people's efforts? The only reason why you should know a name is to let people know you did not CREATE. And even then, just mentioning a title like 'brother' or 'my master from -insert country/city-' would be enough. It is important to give credit where credit is due. However, outside of that, dropping names should be avoided. Listen. Gung Fu is about hard work. There is no short cut. There is no secret. Even the Chinese characters for 'Gung Fu' translates to 'Man with merit gained through effort'. What other people did will be their credit, and make sure you give them that credit. What YOU do will be your credit, and your hard work will guarantee that you will get that credit. If people case so much about names and lineage, making it AS IMPORTANT, or MORE IMPORTANT, than training, then they do not really have the best interest in mind for the art. My father trained me and a few others. I train you and a few others. You may train your children and a few others. As long as YOU PRACTICE and have QUALITY to show for the training, then people have to shut up. There are a lot of people out there who possess quality but cannot teach because they do not have a strong lineage, or they are not cunning enough to work a business system. There is too bad because there are a lot of shit teachers who are cunning and cling to names. They are why Chinese Martial Arts today are laughed at by karate people and white people in general.
[PAUSE...Uncle looks down and then looks at me with fiery eyes]
Why was Lam Sai Wing famous? Because he learned from a famous master? Maybe. But DEFINITELY because he was a righteous man, an excellent fighter, and a producer of many famous fighters. Why was Wong Fei Hung famous? Because he learned from his famous father? Maybe. But DEFINITELY becase he was a righteous man and doctor who paid attention to the common people and defended them from local gangs, corrupt officials and general violence. DEFINITELY because he produced such great fighters like Lam Sai Wing, Tang Fong, and many others. Take away the fact that these two learned from a famous master, and they would still be considered admirable folk heroes for the deeds they did. Let me ask you [insert my name]: Why is Hung Hey Gwun famous?"
[Me] "Because he created the Hung Gar Kuen system, the art that Wong Fei Hung and Lam Sai Wing practiced. He was also a famous revolutionary that fought against the corrupt foreign government and went to spread his fighting system to the common people so they could better fight for themselves."
[Uncle] "Right. He CREATED the art. Yes he was influenced by his training, but he still took what he learned and created something relatively distinct. At some point in time, someone has to create something for it to be passed on. As you can probably see, you can be famous for three reasons. The first is to create something... something worthwhile. The second is to be skilled... good at what you claim to do. The third is to belong to a famous group. Out of the three, only the first two are hallmarks of true Gung Fu. The third is an accident. You might claim that it takes a lot of work to find a famous school. But it would be better to use that effort to train. Do you want to be famous simply because of an accident?"
[Uncle puts his hand on my shoulder and speaks gently]
"Remember this. Train hard and talk less. That way when you show in the future, people cannot talk bad at all about your skills. They may pick on something else, but they have to shut up about your skills."
And that concluded that lecture. Afterward he turned around and just yelled some instructions at me. It was from that conversation, some five years ago, that I have my favourite saying and little signature at the bottom of every post.
So ends my defense of my lack of lineage; my lack of textual qualification to do what I do. Surely I must have a lineage, but if asked for proof, I must confess to have absolutely none. I have been criticized before, but that has yet to stop me from trying my best to teach with credibility and responsibility.
Train Hard. Talk Less
~Thunder Palms
History is very important to Traditional Chinese Martial Arts. It was popularly believed that since Traditional Chinese Martial Arts (henceforth abbreviated as TCMA) is so enmeshed with the cultural history of the country and its people, only the Chinese could possibly learn it properly; "the spirit of gung fu", as my uncle said, "lies intrinsically within every Chinese person." Just as how it is very hard for deep seated foreigners to learn and care about the history of distant countries, their goals, values, habits etc... so it is the same with TCMA which, until the present, was very localized in development and practice, and therefore possessing a very strong ethnic flavour. This is quite evident in many of the naming schemes utilized for certain patterns, forms, and various martial theories. Examples would be martial philosophies based on Yin and Yang, forms of combat and exercises focusing on particular animals, and names for certain movements like the posture "One Finger Stabilizing the Heavens."
Because cultural/social history is so ingrained with the practice of TCMA, it is only logical that lineages be a very important concept as well. Lineages stretch back for generations, sometimes a bit tenuously and sometimes quite bold and exact. There is an unspoken, or perhaps occasionally expressed, notion that the further back your line extends, the more prominent/authentic/noteworthy/'powerful' your system must be. This connection, from present day back to a point in time far removed from what we contemporarily experience, is a note of pride and distinction in many martial arts circles and individual practitioners. People can hearken back to an age of heroes, revolutionaries, invincible fighters and vigilantism, pointing to those individuals found within their school, their lineages, all but lost to history and say, "I am directly linked to that man/woman through the art I practice/teach." In this way, it is quite similar to those that adhere to any sort of discipline ranging from distinct forms of achitecture to secret family recipes. And, much like guilds during the Middle-Ages and the Renaissance period, fraternities started forming around these perceived distinctions; people joined together in brotherhoods, and families began keeping secrets to ensure only those accepted through proper trials would be allowed access to their distinct methods. From this a sense of prominence arose just for being a part of a certain group of high esteem and renown. Thus strong lineage adherences are not a concept to simply wave off as irrelevant. They are an integral part to the study of TCMA systems. Though arguably detrimental to an efficient promulgation of an art, such concepts served, and still serves in many areas of the modern day Gong Wu, as a binding agent within families. Such a model promotes a certain retention of distinct elements even between similar schools.
After that somewhat lengthy introduction, I will now bluntly state the issue I must defend. My history is very much in line with the system(s) I practice. I do not adhere and teach what would be considered controversial claims regarding the history of different systems of TCMA I study and/or train. However, my lineage is extremely debatable. My family members knew this (particularly my uncle) when they decided to teach me. I will mention "my uncle" a lot as he was the primary teacher that I chose to identify and learn from after selecting to train under his speciality; that being the Hung Family Fist aka Hung Gar Kuen. I have NO defensible lineage, and it is because of this that some traditionalists have formed negative preconceptions, and have voiced annoyance, at my efforts and status. Thus begins my Apologia.
I mentioned in my first post that my uncle wanted me to rise above the politics and commercialism that runs through the heart of modern day CMA. When he taught me, he made it expressly clear that he would not mention lineages, names or other possibly contemporary individuals whom he may have taught. All he mentioned was that he learned from his father. I never met the man and my uncle never told me his name. Since my uncle has since passed several years ago, I will never know and I must accept this as a fact of life. However, during a particular instance where I pressed him for certain names, he gave me a rather long lecture. The following will be the bulk of his words to me. He spoke mostly Cantonese and some very broken English. This, coupled with the fact that it was about 5 years ago, makes the exact wording questionable. However, the ideas expressed are 100% true to that moment:
[Uncle] "What good is it to know a name? So you can try to gain credit for other people's efforts? The only reason why you should know a name is to let people know you did not CREATE. And even then, just mentioning a title like 'brother' or 'my master from -insert country/city-' would be enough. It is important to give credit where credit is due. However, outside of that, dropping names should be avoided. Listen. Gung Fu is about hard work. There is no short cut. There is no secret. Even the Chinese characters for 'Gung Fu' translates to 'Man with merit gained through effort'. What other people did will be their credit, and make sure you give them that credit. What YOU do will be your credit, and your hard work will guarantee that you will get that credit. If people case so much about names and lineage, making it AS IMPORTANT, or MORE IMPORTANT, than training, then they do not really have the best interest in mind for the art. My father trained me and a few others. I train you and a few others. You may train your children and a few others. As long as YOU PRACTICE and have QUALITY to show for the training, then people have to shut up. There are a lot of people out there who possess quality but cannot teach because they do not have a strong lineage, or they are not cunning enough to work a business system. There is too bad because there are a lot of shit teachers who are cunning and cling to names. They are why Chinese Martial Arts today are laughed at by karate people and white people in general.
[PAUSE...Uncle looks down and then looks at me with fiery eyes]
Why was Lam Sai Wing famous? Because he learned from a famous master? Maybe. But DEFINITELY because he was a righteous man, an excellent fighter, and a producer of many famous fighters. Why was Wong Fei Hung famous? Because he learned from his famous father? Maybe. But DEFINITELY becase he was a righteous man and doctor who paid attention to the common people and defended them from local gangs, corrupt officials and general violence. DEFINITELY because he produced such great fighters like Lam Sai Wing, Tang Fong, and many others. Take away the fact that these two learned from a famous master, and they would still be considered admirable folk heroes for the deeds they did. Let me ask you [insert my name]: Why is Hung Hey Gwun famous?"
[Me] "Because he created the Hung Gar Kuen system, the art that Wong Fei Hung and Lam Sai Wing practiced. He was also a famous revolutionary that fought against the corrupt foreign government and went to spread his fighting system to the common people so they could better fight for themselves."
[Uncle] "Right. He CREATED the art. Yes he was influenced by his training, but he still took what he learned and created something relatively distinct. At some point in time, someone has to create something for it to be passed on. As you can probably see, you can be famous for three reasons. The first is to create something... something worthwhile. The second is to be skilled... good at what you claim to do. The third is to belong to a famous group. Out of the three, only the first two are hallmarks of true Gung Fu. The third is an accident. You might claim that it takes a lot of work to find a famous school. But it would be better to use that effort to train. Do you want to be famous simply because of an accident?"
[Uncle puts his hand on my shoulder and speaks gently]
"Remember this. Train hard and talk less. That way when you show in the future, people cannot talk bad at all about your skills. They may pick on something else, but they have to shut up about your skills."
And that concluded that lecture. Afterward he turned around and just yelled some instructions at me. It was from that conversation, some five years ago, that I have my favourite saying and little signature at the bottom of every post.
So ends my defense of my lack of lineage; my lack of textual qualification to do what I do. Surely I must have a lineage, but if asked for proof, I must confess to have absolutely none. I have been criticized before, but that has yet to stop me from trying my best to teach with credibility and responsibility.
Train Hard. Talk Less
~Thunder Palms
I both agree and disagree. lineage is a difficult thing. On one hand, it establishes some extent of credibility. That Lam Sai-wing was an accomplished master and taught many others who would become accomplished masters establishes credibility to the lam sai-wing line. If one can trace their lineage to him, you know that to some extent, what you are being taught has had successful precedent and that the rest is up to you.
ReplyDeleteThe good thing about true (not falsified) lineage is that it prevents some bs teacher from making up a crappy bs style from books he's read, and teaching it. It doesn't matter if he makes money off it or not. If what he teaches is crap, then it shouldn't be taught. The bad thing about lineage, as you have stated, is that one can 1) make up a bogus lineage or 2) ride the coattails of the lineage with no personal accomplishments.
My sifu never told me about our lineage, except explaining his training experience with his sifu. I took it upon myself to find that it was immediately traced to Chen Honchung. While I could tell immediately that my sifu was no joke and could feel his power and technique, knowing my lineage gave me further confidence that it was up to ME to make progress in it. I could not say "oh well it was a phony teacher's fault".