My Sifu asked me to give a brief recount of my experiences and opinions subsequent to joining his school two years ago. Probably the biggest impact on me has been in my views towards the fighting arts, and the state of martial arts today. I have no particular insight into the theories of the arts and am a far cry from being a hand to hand combat expert, but I have witnessed a fair bit and my insights, while autobiographical and anecdotal, might prove informational to the layperson. From a young age I have had considerable interest in the martial arts. As a youngster I took Tae Kwon Do for a year. In University, I took Aikido, and also was fortunate to spend a considerable amount of time studying Shotokan Karate. I have also attended classes in Tai Chi, Kempo Karate, and Boxing. Strangely enough, during the period in which I studied Karate in Saskatchewan, a plethora of martial arts schools were open in Saskatoon. Besides Karate Schools, there were clubs or schools for Judo, Tae Kwon Do, Kendo, Kung Fu, and even Ninjitsu! This was all quite interesting, and I had some exposure to all the styles, but I really preferred my Karate instruction as nothing else seemed quite as practical.
I dropped out of Karate, some years passed, and I went through a sedentary couch potato phase, and then after some years passed, I went into a fitness kick, where I ran and lifted weights. After two years of this, I was bored out of my mind and contemplated plunging back into the martial arts. Owing to the popularity of Kung Fu thanks to a lot of films, plus the huge Chinese influence in Vancouver, I thought I would give Wing Tsun a try. I went to the one of Sifu Ralph’s demo nights which was advertised on the web. I thought the website was sufficiently “pumped up” that it might be interesting.
My wife and I arrived a bit early at the school’s location and I was a little surprised to meet the instructor who turned out to be a rather large, somewhat heavy German fellow. I have been to a lot of martial arts demonstrations from frauds and/or crazy people and pretty much figured this would be another one of those experiences. I mean, a heavy-set German guy, teaching Kung Fu –please!
Come back tomorrow and read part 2.
