San Soo and five families

[Kevin73]

So you get to have your own theory that San Soo is kenpo. How come I can't wonder why both Jimmy and Ark list the same five families?

Speaking of kenpo, although I'm not convinced yet that San Soo came from that, I am intrigued if there is any additional information out that that can shed some light on that angle.

Read my post #57 on that.

Problem with the history of San Soo is that none of it can actually be traced to something. While Woo probably did have some training in kung fu and was probably a good fighter like people have said. The evidence kind of points to a made up history as to the origins of his art. Maybe he lists the same five families because of Wong's school/style because it was good marketing or they weren't really "family styles" but categories of technqies. When you read what each one represented it sounds more like this was the case with San Soo
http://www.realkungfusansoo.com/abouttheart.htm

[Grasshopper101]

Read my post #57 on that.

Problem with the history of San Soo is that none of it can actually be traced to something. While Woo probably did have some training in kung fu and was probably a good fighter like people have said. The evidence kind of points to a made up history as to the origins of his art. Maybe he lists the same five families because of Wong's school/style because it was good marketing or they weren't really "family styles" but categories of technqies. When you read what each one represented it sounds more like this was the case with San Soo
http://www.realkungfusansoo.com/abouttheart.htm

I did see your post, and I forgot to comment on it. Your post is along the lines of what I've been able to gather off the net and talking to some San Soo practicioners from back in the 60's and 70's.

To my untrained eye, what Jimmy did doesn't look like Kenpo, but I do see that the Kenpo techniques are just that - techniques, which causes it to look San Soo'ish in the sense that they are hitting a guy a bunch of times and often ending in some sort of a takedown.

As far as the five families go, from what I understand the San Soo techniques from each "family" represent a distinct sort of fighting style and application. One might focus on chin na type leverages, one might focus on throws, another on punching kicking combinations, etc. Supposedly, they are then all blended together and meant to be used at the same time and that is the pinnacle of the art, which is called top ga, but may have another spelling.

Now, apparently there is a five families style of kung fu that is taught as a complete style and is included in Ark Wong's teachings. The videos I saw on Youtube look nothing like San Soo. Is that the only five family style out there?

[Mulong]

Grasshopper, I'm curious what is your objective with this research; to write a book or do you think knowing this will improve your personal skills?

[Grasshopper101]

Mainly satisfy personal curiosity. I'm not an author, and i'm not getting anything except for grief!

[Grasshopper101]

On a side note, i chose this forum because when i was looking around for answers to some questions i had about ranks, the posters on here seemed pretty knowledgable.

[extrajoseph]

Eric Thomson did a lot of valuable research on Jimmy Haw-Woo (please refer to post 30 in this thread) and like Eric said Jimmy's art has connection to Choy Lee Fut. If you look at the five names Jimmy used to call his art, Choy Lee Haw (Ho) Fut Hung, he gave us the clues already.

There is Choy Lee Fut for obvious reasons and Haw or Ho referred to his adopted name, which he has to change from Chan Siu-Dek to Haw Woo when he came to America, and Hung referred to Chan Siu-Hung, his teacher in China, who taught him Choy Lee Fut.

What Jimmy was hinting to us was that he has modified Choy Lee Fut and Shaolin Kung Fu as taught to him in China to suit his newly adopted country, but it is still Shaolin Kung Fu (and not Japanese) by putting the characters Haw (Ho) and Hung (the adopted and the old) to either side of the character Fut.

"The simplest explanation is most likely the correct one." - Ockham's razor.

[lkfmdc]

This below has to be one of the most absurd things I have ever read!

Eric Thomson did a lot of valuable research on Jimmy Haw-Woo (please refer to post 30 in this thread) and like Eric said Jimmy's art has connection to Choy Lee Fut. If you look at the five names Jimmy used to call his art, Choy Lee Haw (Ho) Fut Hung, he gave us the clues already.

There is Choy Lee Fut for obvious reasons and Haw or Ho referred to his adopted name, which he has to change from Chan Siu-Dek to Haw Woo when he came to America, and Hung referred to Chan Siu-Hung, his teacher in China, who taught him Choy Lee Fut.

What Jimmy was hinting to us was that he has modified Choy Lee Fut and Shaolin Kung Fu as taught to him in China to suit his newly adopted country, but it is still Shaolin Kung Fu (and not Japanese) by putting the characters Haw (Ho) and Hung (the adopted and the old) to either side of the character Fut.

"The simplest explanation is most likely the correct one." - Ockham's razor.

So people are now claiming his REAL name is Chan, but he really used WOO but he also adopted Haw (ho)?

And he adopted "hung" because of CHAN siu hung, even though CHAN was that teacher's name

(MY GUESS, you don't really know which are family names and which are given because TWICE now you've mixed them up in a single post)

Has anyone ever been able to PROVE his real name was Chan?

Has anyone ever been able to PROVE he studied with Chan Siu Hung?

[hskwarrior]

Lou Sifu Chan Siu Dek A.K.A "Jimmy H. Woo"

Current moodeaceful
San Soo » Jimmy H. Woo

Chan Siu Dek, aka "Jimmy H. Woo"

taken from this WEBSITE

There's no question that the art of Kung Fu San Soo wouldn't be alive in America today if it was not for the legendary and mysterious fighter known as Jimmy H. Woo. And while most knew him as Jimmy, in Cantonese his real name was Chan Siu Dek, (Chen Shou Jue in Mandarin, Zhen She De in Pinyin, Chin Siu Dek in Hoisanese). We discuss the history of his art, Kung Fu San Soo, and his lineage, in depth in the history and lineage sections of this web site.

And we have to preface this section with our own disclosure. In the Kung Fu San Soo world, there is a great deal of confusion and personal divide about the memory of Chan Siu dek. We simply cannot pretend to speak for everyone or by absolute authority. Some of what we say here we actually remember ourselves from our time with him, although even those among us who were first generation students do not claim to have known him as well as the first generation masters who spent decades with him. Some things we attempt to document through outside sources. And some we simply hold to be 'accounts', and disclose them accordingly. We do our best to come as close as we can to the truth as we see it, although as with all of Kung Fu San Soo, it's a study in flux.

Family accounts now hold that Chan Siu Dek was born in Sanba Town, Taishan City, Guandong Province, China, in the early 1900's. He began training as a child, but we're unsure exactly how old he was. Various assertions range from four years old to seven years old, but he told one of us his father started teaching him at six. As with many of the confusing accounts, the disparity could be something as simple as this: he may have begun form practice on his own at four, began to learn technique from his father at six, and began formal training at seven. That would be a perfectly logical explanation for the kind of variation we have with respect to all memorable accounts about the art. We simply don't know.

But we have heard that according to an interview with his cousin, Chan Sai Mo, son of Chan Siu Dek's great uncle, Chan Siu Hung, conducted in China on October 28, 2003, his formal training was exclusively in the art of Choy Li Fut. Chan Sai Mo said he did not know if Chan Siu Dek studied any other family of Chinese martial art after leaving China. Chan Sai Mo also said Chan Siu Dek's first trainer was a distant cousin, Wing Cheung, a student of Chan Siu Dek's great uncle, Chan Siu Hung. When Wing Cheung sustained a leg injury, Chan Siu Hung took over his training. Some recent accounts through Chan Sai Mo also suggest that in addition to Chan Siu Hung's Hero's Victory, Hung Sing Choy Li Fut training, Chan Siu Hung studied Hung Gar and Eagle Claw, suggesting that Chan Siu Dek may possibly have known at least something of those art families as well. We know nothing more about Wing Cheung, but Chan Siu Dek's own accounts hold his great uncle largely responsible for both his martial training and the development of his fighting character.

Everyone who knew him seem to remember him as a person so confident, so colorful, that almost no one ever forgot him. Smug as we are in an age of Caged Fights, "No Hold's Barred" Mixed Martial Arts competitions, and video tapes of desperately brutal underground fights, few today can even remotely envision the kind of person who would stand up at a Kung Fu San Soo demonstration before hundreds in a venue like the Los Angeles County Fair — a county of millions, and not a place known to be particularly tame — and invite anyone who thought he might be tough enough to come up and fight him, on the spot, and with a conviction that was downright chilling.

"You might speak more better English", he would calmly say with a confident smile, pointing his finger right at various individuals in the crowd. "You might play more better music. But I doubt very much if you a better fighter! But if you think you are," he'd say, his demeanor hardening and eyes narrowing, "I invite you to come up and prove it, right now! You life or mine!"

This could be in front of virtually anyone, of any size, and of any fighting background. When he demonstrated before representatives of the other Chinese martial arts schools, we remember him calling out, "You all know who I am. You know what I can do. If you think your Kung Fu is better than mine, come and prove it now." To our knowledge, no one ever successfully did, although many probably wanted to with great desperation, and there are stories of a few who tried.

His was always a full public challenge. He fought so many times only the visible scars might hint at his true inner experience. Several reports hold that by the age of 20, he had lost so many teeth by fighting that he had to be fitted with dentures. He possessed an astounding range of martial skills, so large in fact that first generation masters are still having difficulty placing all his skills into known Chinese martial 'styles'. And in the end, he died of old age. This is without a doubt, the right stuff, the stuff from which legends are made.

Individuals who never witnessed these challenges have a great deal of difficulty imagining them to be true. What they fail to take into account is the rare set of circumstances that occassionally come together to make a person great in any given field. Chan Siu Dek was first a fighter by nature. His great uncle not only taught him technique, but constantly urged him to fight with others around him in the streets of China from his early childhood to test and employ those techniques. He also learned the uncommon skill of almost completely dissassociating himself from consequences.

He would rather kill than loose a fight. He would rather die. So any opponent had to face a tough fighter, trained and practiced at techniques designed to injure, maim, or kill, and was perfectly willing to go to the extreme in an escalation. And that extreme was not unlike the 100 pound woman who goes mad, requiring five strong men to place her in a straight jacket, or the teen ager who lifts an automobile off of his injured brother with his bare hands. These traits did not make Chan Siu Dek unbeatable, but they definitely made him formidable. While Kung Fu San Soo is a remarkable fighting art — admittedly among many notable fighting arts — perhaps the art did not so much make Chan Siu Dek a great fighter, as his instructional efforts, real world examples, and training methods made Kung Fu San Soo a great art for true fighters.

In the center of all this, unable to take him on face to face, there were those who made attacks on his character, sometimes attempting to connect him with Chinese organized crime. But anyone purchasing into these attacks know almost nothing about Chinese American history. To understand anything about the man, one must put this all into context.

from the same article follows:

"For years, Chan Siu Dek taught through the Los Angeles Sing Kang or "cousin's club". But somehow the lineage never caught on and no one seems to know of a descendent school from the Sing Kang."

The Sing Keung - my sigung Jew Leung was a president of this youth group in SF- is a youth group of the Hop Sing Tong. it was not a gung fu school. Jimmy Woo may have taught gung fu "FOR" Sing Kueng but it is not a SCHOOL per say. you will find no outside lineages of Sing Keung.

The same goes for the Hong Ying Ser -the youth group for the Ghee Kung Tong- in which i am the VP - Hong Ying will never have lineages that spawn from it. Same for Sing Keung. it belongs solely to the Hop Sing Tong. there will be no lineages spawning from it. people can claim their teachers taught for Sing Kueng or Hong Ying Ser but thats about it.

He left Los Angeles for San Francisco just about the time Chan Siu Dek arrived. Some accounts have Chan Siu Dek replacing Lau Bun as security consultant for the Hop Sing Tong.

Jimmy may have taken over for the Hop Sing Los Angeles branch, but he did not REPLACE him as Lau Bun was sent to San Francisco to teach for the Hop Sing Tong here.

[extrajoseph]

Hi Frank,

You are shooting at your own foot again. First you insisted that I lied and then quoted a website that gave exactly the same information:

1) Jimmy H Woo's real Chinese name was Chan Siu-Dek.
2) He studied with Chan Siu-Hung.
3) He has roots in Choy Lee Fut.

He insisted that he was born in Hawaii until the end of his life, thereby implying that he was an American citizen by birth under the Fourteenth Amendment to the U. S. Constitution, and always went by his assumed legal name, Jimmy H. Woo. This is particularly poignant because he was in fact a member of the very famous Choy Li Fut Chan clan with roots going all the way back to Chan Heung, the founder of Choy Li Fut, and while he did often assert it, he really freely couldn't use it to publicly support his art.

[extrajoseph]

This below has to be one of the most absurd things I have ever read!

So people are now claiming his REAL name is Chan, but he really used WOO but he also adopted Haw (ho)?

And he adopted "hung" because of CHAN siu hung, even though CHAN was that teacher's name

(MY GUESS, you don't really know which are family names and which are given because TWICE now you've mixed them up in a single post)

Has anyone ever been able to PROVE his real name was Chan?

Has anyone ever been able to PROVE he studied with Chan Siu Hung?

His adopted Chinese name was Haw Woo (Jimmy is a western add-on), most likely Haw or Ho in Cantonese was the surname and not Woo, because Chinese use their surname first.

He used the character "Hung" instead of Chan to denote his teacher because their name came from the same generation using "Siu" as the middle name - Chan Siu-Hung and Chan Siu-Dek, because the first two characters are the same, it does not make sense to use Chan the surname since they both have the same surname.

I am Cantonese so I am familiar with Chinese names and I have met Chan Siu-Hung's son in China. San Soo has roots in Choy Lee Fut is not that absurd, given the social and political situation Jimmy H Woo went through at the time.

[extrajoseph]

nah, you lie about everything. you are not to be trusted as a source of information. you're a seasonal individual. you're info changes with the seasons......

I'm clearly saying you are not to be trusted as a source of info.

Frank,

Personal attack do not contribute to any worthwhile discussions. It is not the first time and it won't be the last; I'd take note and let it pass.

[lkfmdc]

most likely Haw or Ho in Cantonese was the surname and not Woo

Except when he claimed his family name was "Woo" and in Cantonese "Ng"

He used the character "Hung" instead of Chan to denote his teacher because their name came from the same generation using "Siu" as the middle name - Chan Siu-Hung and Chan Siu-Dek,

If you are actually Cantonese how can you type that with a straight face?

San Soo has roots in Choy Lee Fut is not that absurd,

Again, where is there ANY EVIDENCE of this? Any evidence at all.....

[hskwarrior]

Personal attack do not contribute to any worthwhile discussions. It is not the first time and it won't be the last; I'd take note and let it pass.

the truth hurts don't it? lol

[extrajoseph]

Except when he claimed his family name was "Woo" and in Cantonese "Ng"

If you are actually Cantonese how can you type that with a straight face?

Again, where is there ANY EVIDENCE of this? Any evidence at all.....

The surname could be both but no written character was given so we can only guess and I think Jimmy wanted that way. Haw (Ho), Woo (Gg) are both surnames and can also be the second character in a name.

Some of the San Soo first generation went back to China and did their research, they tracked down Chan Siu-Hung's descendants and compared notes but like most historical evidence not written down (and even if they did), each side will argue the opposite. So what good is evidence to a believer?

Again, I think Jimmy wanted that way. I am an overseas Chinese as well, we really don't want to leave our home land but circumstances forced us to, so we have to decide either to adopt and change or to hold onto our tradition and culture like a die-hard, everyone deals with it in a different way.

I cannot change what you want to believe in, this is a discussions forum so I just throw in some of my takes on the subject, ones that I think I know a little about or have an interest, take it or leave, it but please don't be like Frank, personal attack hurts and get us nowhere.

Play the ball and not the player.

[extrajoseph]

Hi Frank,

I didn't made up anything or just guessing, my take was based on research done by some of Jimmy H Woo's students.

http://sansoosifu.bravehost.com/GreatUncle.html

Interesting, part of the notes says CLFNole asked the question, and Sisuk Howard Choy answered the question. You know both of them, why not ask them for a verification?