Baji-Pigua in many exercises from teacher Mike

Since training under teacher Mike, I have noticed that many of his warming-up (proper word: basics) contains the foundation of his power-building and body structure. His basics are part of the complete Kung Fu training, yet it is so easy and complex that it is like an art on its own. One can easily only focus on basics and get really strong with his body.

The most common and frequently exercise is the one where we stand in mabu (horse stand) and swing the relaxed arms from left to right and right to left (continuous). I am fascinated with this simple looking exercise, because apart from not being simple at all, it is also the foundation of pigua Kung Fu. The exercise we do generates power and corrects body alignment for all kinds of martial arts. Baji-Piqua remains for me a fascinating fighting art. Here I found an interesting example, though not from teacher Mike:

Group flow 2: Twenty four form, sent by Mike Laoshi

A nice poem, sent by Mike Laoshi

"Tai Chi Chuan is plain, yet rich;

Pa Kua Chuan is changeful yet subtle; 

Hsing Yi Chuan is simple yet strong.

Tai Chi is calm as an old scholar;

Pa Kua is as bright as a youth of genius;

Hsing Yi is as confident as a learned scholar.

This is to speak symbolically -- one should not be trapped by the words."

"The excellence of Tai Chi is to be smooth, soft yet not weak;

to be continuous from the beginning to the end;

to be plain and calm without a bit of temper.

The excellence of Pa Kua is to be flexible yet well-balanced;

to be unpredictable; to be in great harmony without a bit of arrogance.

The excellence of Hsing Yi is to be strong yet not clumsy;

to be distinctive in motion;

to be serious in appearance without a bit of roughness."

-T.Y. Pang

The missing photos: Mike Laoshi's birthday

During the Belgium camp, we celebrated teacher Mike's birthday, which was on the 5th of October. We tried to surprise him, but as usual, he was ahead of the game. Lesson number xxxxx: never try to fool your teacher ;).

Anyway, we got him in the room with all the teachers and the students and we gave him our best wishes. I waited to put the photos on the blog because the camp info needed a bit of time to digest.  Here they are, the missing photos!

A poster of teacher Mike composed of little pictures of his students.

A scroll which teacher Mike has been looking for but was hard to find.

A card signed by all of his students and a high end photo printer (Teacher Mike is a skilled photographer in his free time).

Mike Laoshi: "Pass the card and the photo to the students so they can see it."

From the German students: a nice bottle of whisky (one of the students: "Pass this one too, Mike Laoshi!")