Gene,
Rather than produce what I learn in NSL I thought it would have more meaningful if I produce a near total of KYC’s curriculum. Although I learnt some of these sets, there are still so much more that I do not know.
The following is what I could determine what KYC’s curriculum was in the 1930’s. This list is far from being complete and accurate. What is known and documented is that KYC learnt all 18 traditional weapons as well as the 10 sets in NSL, 10 sets in Liu Ho Chuan, and 10 sets in Cha Chuan. Besides his Iron Palm skills he also learnt Small Golden Bell which allows the body to absorb punches and kicks at full force.
What complicates my research on his curriculum is that as the years went by, KYC started to narrow his curriculum as did his number one disciple, YSW. KYC narrowed his original intent of teaching his knowledge because his curriculum was dictated by government policy and by the country’s state of constant turmoil. Also many of his students had previous CMA background and so rather than starting them at the beginning stages of NSL, he started them at the intermediate level.
However, in YSW’s case, he had different reasons to narrow his curriculum. During YSW’s period, his students spend less time practicing and thus even though he had students numbering in the thousands, many of his students did not reach a level where the opportunity to learn some higher level sets were offered. Later, YSW decided rather than teaching a beginning, intermediate and advance level saber set, he selected one saber set out of the three different levels and that set would represented the basic overall flavor of NSL saber.
Another factor was YSW’s age; he was slowly forgetting sets as he got older. There is a story of how YSW stopped in the middle of teaching a sparring set because he could not remember the next move. After a month of waiting, the students inquired about their lessons and YSW’s response was that if he could not remember any parts of a set, then he rather not teach it at all.
Anyway, specifically this list is what I found that was KYC’s curriculum at one point in time. Many of the weapons are of the light variety because KYC favored the lighter weapons rather than the heavier weapons and thus this may have had an influence in what he taught. He was also know to have knowledge of the art of throwing darts and a weapon that best described as a sling shot that shot small iron balls. While a majority of the knowledge was passed to his top disciples, many of these sets were not passed down. Sets listed are in no particular order.
Please do not confuse this as NSL’s curriculum. It is only represents whatappears to be part of KYC’s CMA knowledge and not specifically in the area of NSL. KYC, like most teachers of his time and thereafter, had students that demonstrated special talents, who were program or pre-determined by KYC himself, as to what the students were going to learn in his curriculum. They would learn the regular program material and then go way beyond it. The next level down were semi- special students who followed a standard program and were also allowed once in a while to deviate from the regular program in order to learn selective subject materials that were not offered in the regular program. Lastly, there were the regular students who were only allowed to learn the standard program and were never allowed to deviate from the regular program.
Hand Sets
10 rows of Tan T’ui
Shaolin Battle set - Cross battle
- Escape Battle
- Big Battle
- Short Battle
- Combination Battle (Arm Locks)
Shaolin #1 to #10
Shaolin Sparring
Shaolin 18 Hands
Lui Ho #1 to #10
Cha Chuan #1 to #10
Small Golden Bell (Chi Kung)
Lan I Chuan (Seize under the cloth fist)
Iron Sand Palm
Tai Chi (Yang/Sun Hybid)
Sun Style Pa Kua Chuan
Hsing I (Sun Style)
-12 animals
-five Elements
- Linking Elements
- Create Elements
- Destroy Elements
- Continious Fist
- Eight Shape
- Mix Shape
- Five Element sparring
- Eagle Bear Spearing
- Five Element Saber
- Continious Saber
Weapon sets
Eyebrow Staff
Nine Island Staff
Capture the Lamb Staff
Pei Chi Saber
Lui Ho Saber
Swallow Tail Saber
Ground Rolling Double Sabers
Lui Ho Double Sabers
Wonderful Fish Tail Double Sabers
Pa Kua Double Sabers
Dragon Shape Sword
Seven Star Sword
Wu Tang Sword
Tai Yu Sword
Tai Chi Sword
Plum Blossom Double Dragon Swords
Raise Blocking Spear
Liu Ho Spear
Five Tiger Spear
24 Iron Spear
Double Tiger Hooks
Double Daggers
Single Dagger
Ma Ya La
Double Axes
Chi Lang Mallet
T’an Lu Mallet
Ground Rolling Chain
Nine link Plum Blossom Ground Rolling Chain
Plum Blossom Double Chain
Dragon Head Cane
Long Bench
Triple Staff
Continious Link Triple Staff
Horse Knife
Choi Yeung Big Knife
Spring Autumn Big Knife
Snake Lance
Hua Halbeard
Two Section Staff
Snake Halberd
Monk Spade/Shovel
Staff vs Saff
Saber vs Saber
Spear vs Spear
Spear vs Staff
Saber vs Spear
Spear vs Big Knife
Empty hands vs Spear
Empty hands vs Double Daggers
Double Daggers vs Spear
Triple Staff vs Spear
Triple Staff vs Triple Staff
Wu Tang Sword Fighting (Fix Step)
Wu Tang Sword Fighting (Active Step)
You will notice that some of the classical 18 weapons are missing because I could not confirm nor verify that these particular weapons were ever taught by KYC. Some of the weapon sets are not specifically NSL because KICK learned these particular sets from his internal teachers and some others were from his Northern peers at the KMT Province Schools.
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