Chuk Kai's Famous Battle at the Bamboo River

[Taijimantis]

Any of you Yai Chi Mantis practitioners know anything about the Bandit that Master Chiu Defeated?

All I know is he was "One of the Most Notorious Bandits" around....

Help?

Namaste.

[Enlightment]

I haven't heard many stories of sigugn. Chuk Kai actually means "Bamboo creek." Sigung's name is Chui ____ something. William Fong said that one day chui chuk kai was almost defeated by this mantis fighter. That inspired him to learn praying mantis. The bamboo creek could be where he and his partner were ambushed by 100 people and won. Hard to believe but it's in the papers. who knows? =]

[Taijimantis]

Enlightened: I would like to see copies of those papers if you know where I can find them...

Sigung's name was Chou Chu-Hsi : )

Any other referrence material for my article can be mailed directly to me if you like at Taiji Mantis@aol.com

[Oso]

Robert, any more info on this?

[mantis108]

GM Chiu's name in Mandarin is Zhao Zhui Xi and it sound's like Chou Chu-Hsi in different Pinyin.

As far as the "famous" battle, which is one of the many, goes. He was escorting a shipment with his colleague when they met some bandits who determined to seize the whole shipment. Normally, this could be resolved by giving them some money as road toll but these guys wanted more. Anyway, they have to get down to business with their weapons. It is said that GM Chiu faced some one with a spear. This guy was amazingly good and got GM Chiu near the throat with one of the spear techniques. That injury left a scar on GM Chiu for the rest of his life. The guy pressed on with the attack and won't let GM Chiu off. As the pursuit and flight went on, GM Chiu had to unleash the rope dart which was tied onto his body (standard issue of the trade) to discourage the pursuit. It hitted the opponent on the head. This saved his life. This event impressed GM Chiu a lot and he later on found out that the person was a Praying Mantis practitioner. So this prompted him to sought after Praying Mantis Kung Fu.

Mantis108

[Oso]

Thanks. Sounded like a cool story.

What did Master Chiu train in before the mantis?

[mantis108]

He learned Shaolin Taizu Men Kung Fu which has a corpus of 12 areas:

1) Ba Shi (8 Stances)
2) Shou Fa (hand method)
3) Bien Hua (Changing method)
4) Na Fa (Seizing Method)
5) Po Fa (countering Method)
6) Da Fa (Striking Method)
7) Die Fa (Falling Method)
8) Qigong (energy work for health)
9) Yinggong (energy work for impact training)
10) Bing Qi (weaponry)
11) Ju Zhong (weight lifting)
12) Qi Ma and She Jian (horsemanship and archery)

There were also troops deployment and battle formation after studying these 12 items but that's the thing of the past. Those 12 are classical Kung Fu in a nutshell.

Warm regards

Mantis108

[Oso]

cool. would that basically be 'emperor's long fist' ?

Sounds like it really would be considering all the military style training.

Interesting that after that he felt he needed mantis.

[yu shan]

Oso- really appreciate you digging this one up. I would like to hear more about Zhao Zhui Xi. According to Shifu Scolaro, Shr Zhengzhong speaks very highly of Zhao Zhui Xi. A Wah Lum kung fu brother even told me that Chan Pui held him in high regards.

[Oso]

yea, it's pretty cool history.


like I said in one of these I pulled up...I was going insane at work with a particular task and needed stress relief and since I couldn't beat anybody at work up...

I'm fixin' to call you.

[Ou Ji]

Wow Oso, you work with highly skilled martial artists?

Oh, you mean you aren't allowed to beat them up.

Nevermind. :-)

[Oso]

actually, my boss has two, not just one, but TWO black belts in different TKD styles.



He wanted to 'talk shop' with me when I first started working there. Then I did some competitions in 2003 (Sport Jujitsu and a Lei Tai match) and he asked to see the tapes. So, I showed him and he was like 'Oh...' and hasn't talked to much about 'martial arts' in a while.

*disclaimer: not that what I showed him was all that but compared to what he had been doing....*

[mantis108]

When Kevin visited me, he related the sentiment of Shrfu Shr towards GM Chiu to me. I was like "Wow, that's awesome!". I have great respect for Shrfu Shr because of the experience with Kevin's material. That encounter is still one of the finest moments of my Kung Fu experience. I only hope that one day in the near feature I will be able to shake Shrfu Shr's hands and personally thank him for the honor and recognition that he expressed toward a great teacher such as GM Chiu. I would also like to meet up with the Ponglai clan for sure. Now that Kevin is back in the state, I am looking forward to see him start up a school there as well.

Warm regards

Robert

PS Thank you Matt, for reviving this thread.

[Oso]

Master Shr made a reference to Tai Chi PM at the big seminar week last year...now I can't remember what it was...need to review the tape and see if I caught it.

yu shan or 18elders: do you remember what he said? or, rather, what Shifu John translated? or am I mis remembering the reference?

[yu shan]

Renowned for his knowledge of applications for one thing.