MORE, MUCH MORE.

…if you can intercept someone’s wrist as they throw a punch, they were never trying to hit you in the head.

My recent surgery is surprising me in the difficulty of the recovery.

It shouldn’t, after all, I was effectively stabbed in the abdomen four times and then the knives were wiggled about.

It was just done by a doctor and I paid for it.

Moving around is out of the question, I have played all of my ps5 games to death so now all I have left is reading and thinking.

And as I have mentioned the OxyContin is adding colour and texture to that..I feel like Captain Kurtz trying to get it all down before it comes true.

I am reading a lot and going through my quite large 1990s Kung Fu instructional D.V.D. library.

And since my last re-evaluation this may not be a good idea.

Everything is up for grabs.

Do these guys really believe what they are saying or is it just another carriage on the Gravy Train?

I am sorry to repeat myself but this is everywhere… I feel like a Conrad character, perhaps Kurtz, frantically trying to get it all down before it turns out to be true.

To be expected this leads me to thinking about what I am teaching.

And quite importantly WHO I am teaching it to.

And WHO I am talking to with this blog.

When I am talking to students under 35 years of age I forget that they have no idea how much the world has changed in their life time.

Australia became part of the global community on June 23, 1989.

That was when the internet launched.

And everything changed.

Forever.

Before 1989 finding any information on Kung Fu in particular and Martial Arts in general, was limeted to meeting someone that had been there and done that.

And hopefully told something like the truth.

The internet opened a gate that would never be closed.

The “Information Super Highway”.That is how we referred to the internet back then, now it is just the net or the web if it is even mentioned.

Poorly scanned copies of things like the Tai Chi Classics were traded on what can only be looked at as a black market.

Napster. Limewire and Pirate Bay, these monsters were not just music.

Some silly prices for some silly books.

Think about it, if they were genuine historical manuscripts, for free was a silly price.

And of course this was the beggining of the made-up histories of the rapidly becoming popular styles.

Buddhist Shaolin Temple Kung Fu such as ‘Iron fist’ and ‘White Crane’

Taoist Wudang Mountain Temple Tai Chi Chuan.

And out of nowhere Wing Chun.

Wing Chun was made for the internet.

In 1988, External Kung Fu had its roots outside of China, namely the Buddhist traditions of India.

In 1988, Internal Kung Fu had its roots inside of China, namely the Daoist traditions of places like Wu Dang Monastery.

In 1989 the Internal/External argument erupted and is still making money for everyone involved.

It is a con, plain and simple.

From 2000 we were all so conditioned by the Internet and the movies, and dare I say it from the need to see the action on a small screen, from the cheap seats, that reality has gone out of the window and training is following on its coattails.

It is not very hard to visualise/realise the problem…

…if you can intercept someone’s wrist as they throw a punch, they were never trying to hit you in the head.

If we are talking weapons, the same story is playing out, how could something have a hope in hell of hitting me if I am intercepting it in real time a full metre in front of me.

Wing Chun, more than other styles, is well placed to pass this off due to the fact that we are always and only working with the IDEA and not the reality.

Everything is a method to test the IDEA of contact.

Made for T.V. Please do not try this at home.

More to come, much more, watch this space.

THE HORROR…. THE HORROR.

Colonel Walter Kurtz