Meeting Chen

After the children's kung fu class ended, a few adults began to assemble together, and the coach led them through the movements of the Yang Taiji 24 form. His demeanor with the adult taiji class was markedly less intense, and he smiled and encouraged the students during the class. For some reason, he did not seem to notice or acknowledge me or my friend, the only two non-Chinese in the room. We were sitting off to the side watching the class, yet the man never seemed to even glance in our direction. When the class ended, we continued to sit politely to the side while the students filed out of the room. It was time for me to go meet my teacher.

I walked across the room and greeted the Kung Fu teacher. He politely smiled, nodded and gave me his full attention as I began complimenting his teaching style, discussing my interest and experience in Chinese Martial Arts and asking if the classes were open to non-Chinese. For the first couple of minutes he looked very interested, before returning to that blank look I had seen during the kids kung fu class. He impatiently looked around and then pointed to his mouth and shaking his head. "You don't speak English" I remarked, brilliantly stating the obvious.
After a couple of minutes of searching for a friendly face, I convinced a woman to help me talk to the master.

At that point, the conversation really took off. I told him I had studied taijiquan and xingyiquan before, and that I was interested in pursuing xingyiquan. The man assured me that he knew xingyiquan, taijiquan, shaolinquan and he especially knew how to use those arts for fighting, not just for "show". That last part made my heart soar like a hawk. Here it was--a real martial arts master from China, and he was talking to me and answering my questions. But he wasn't about to accept me yet. He wanted to see me demonstrate some xingyiquan first. No problem. I had learned most of the Hebei style xingyiquan from a friend, and I had even gone so far as to attempt to teach it to others. I stepped into the middle of the room ready to show my xingyiquan off, when I noticed the man's expression as he watched me getting ready to get ready to do xingyi. Emotion-less. Vacuous. Serious. I went through a line drill of piquan, one of the basic five forms or wu xing. When I was finished I looked at the man and he looked at me. No words and no discernable expression--he spoke through the translator:

"Piquan?"
"yes".
He then mimicked my movement and shook his head, as if to say "wrong".
"But piquan is not a straight punch" he said, "it is moving from up to down"--he began to demonstrate the correct method of piquan, and I realized that I had never seen real xingyi before.
"Do you know how to use it?" he asked.
"Yes" I replied, a remark that I still regret to this day, because the kung fu coach asked me to show the useage of piquan. I had my friend throw a slow punch at me, which I deflected, grabbed and pulled down while simultaneously palm-striking at his face. This time the coach looked at me with a truly blank expression. All previous blank expressions could be described as animated compared to this new blank expression--my God, he was a master of blank expressions. Totally unimpressed by my demonstration of martial arts useage, he wagged his head and muttered his first words in English: "no, no, no".
Next, he wanted to show me the real useage of piquan, and I agreed immediately. My first real lesson from a xingyi master! Hooray!
He faced me and said: "Lai le" (which means "come on" in Chinese). I threw a lazy right punch toward him, this was for demonstration purposes I figured. The man stepped at a slight forty-five degree angle while absorbing the punch, and his next step seemed to go past me, taking my body backward and...........DOWN.

Yes, he had said that piquan was not a straight punch, that it went from up to down. I stood up, brushed off my clothing and smiled, convinced.
"I would like to learn from you sir".
He scribbled a phone number on a scrap of paper, with his name next to it.
It said: "Chen".

Next blog: Training With Chen