by abiraghi » Mon Oct 12, 2009 12:53 am
Uh, what a question! Well, you know, I am not quite familiar with today's Hung Kuen, because since the last time I went to Hong Kong, I trained by myself. So my Hung Kuen has been kept in a time capsule, frozen exactly as I learned in Master Chan Hon Chung's gymn and later in Cheung Yee Keung's gymn (IF I have been able to really frozen it, in 30 years changes are likely). Of course I trained with other people, mostly sparring, light kick boxing and such, but never the Hung style.
What makes a real difference today is the availability of documents, both text and video, that made possible the understanding of various aspects of the art that were not easy to decrypt in the 70's and 80's. I had Lam Sai Wing's book about Tit Sin Kuen translated by a student of Chinese in the late 80's, but being him totally unaware of Chinese kung fu the translation was not really useful. Of course having a better (yet not really perfect) translation helped understanding several details.
Also, YouTube is an outstanding resource, I had never seen my Sifu young rehearsing for a martial arts movie, I even didn't know he played as an actor. Whatching those b&w seconds of a young Chan Hon Chung has been a great emotion, but what is more important it has been a great hint to understand some details of the "wild goose that lands on the sand dune" technique that I had missed while learning.
There's some shortcomings in this wide availability of information. At Chan Hon Chung times, learning the art was a privilege that you paid with long searches for the best master, great efforts and expenses, specially if you were a western guy. If you were an European, the only option to see Tit Sin Kuen was following a sifu for 7-10 years, then - once you were admitted to learn it - you were also admitted to watch it. I couldn't watch the full set Tit Sin Kuen until the day I started learning it. The Chinese kung fu people were very discreet with the higher knowledges of their art. Today, if you want to see Tit Sin Kuen, don't even need to raise from your chair, click on YouTube and you find tons of clips, a few of them pretty good (some really horrible) to compare. This new deal might seem more… democratic (?), but it will necessarily change (or already changed) the essence of the art. I don't say "better" or "worse", just "different".
I see just one undeniable blemish in this new situation: a good part of the magic, the hidden secrets of the art are not secrets anymore. This is a real pity, because the magic of entering the mysterious and completely unknown Chinese world used to be an emotion that cannot be replicated today.
Re. my brother Lee Yun Fook, whom I nicknamed Mr. Lion in 1977: he is just the strong but gentle, honest, clean, lovely person he was many yeras ago. He has been the best lion dancer of the universe in the old days and I bet he is the best lion dance teacher of the universe now.
alberto
