So, what have I been doing for the last few years in MA terms. I’ve already mentioned my rare appearances at Romsey and at James’s dojo. Most evenings I manage to go through a Hsing-I warm up (called the 16 Nei-Gung Exercises) and the Bagua Form. Occasionally a Kata will be done. I also had the opportunity to view some instructional DVD’s that came my way. One was by a guy named Dave Turton and another by Kevin O’Hagan. Both were very much street combat orientated so most of the techniques were done from a confrontational standpoint – so definitely not for children’s ears. The Dave Turton one was interesting in emphasising that training should be ‘experimental’ once the basics were learnt.
This is the sort of thing that James and I have been doing for the last couple of years; we just attack each other and see what happens. Sometimes it’s a total disaster but now and again it all comes together and it just feels right. Usually the other one has a ‘Stargate-SG1 moment’ and exclaims “what just happened?” as they pick themselves up off the floor or the other side of the room. I do get some surprised looks from students when I show them a technique but then tell them to also ‘go and play with it to see if it works for you’. I’m a bit mean really as I still found this difficult to do as a 2nd Dan.
Next time its going to be a bit more controversial after finding some interesting stuff about Kyushindo on another website….
