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Thread: Shaolin Europe Association & Shaolin Association of North America

  1. #16
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    Quote Originally Posted by GeneChing View Post
    As for standardization, it's difficult to test with out that. Unless we rebuild a wooden man hall.
    Quote Originally Posted by pazman View Post
    Except skill in taolu doesn't indicate skill in martial arts.
    It's for the kids.

    Have to give them something to aspire towards that is attainable within a reasonable timeframe to keep their attention.

  2. #17
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    Quote Originally Posted by wenshu View Post
    It's for the kids.

    Have to give them something to aspire towards that is attainable within a reasonable timeframe to keep their attention.
    I started training taekwondo when I was 7 and stopped when I went to uni. Trained 5 to 6 times a week. When we tested, we sparred, we kicked the heavy bag, we did pad drills, and we broke boards. We also did forms but that was the most boring thing, done at the end, almost as a cool down from the test. We even did the "cool" forms like passai and gaebek. Kids love to mix it up and have fun.

    I like learning and training taolu, but I can't feel from one day to the next if I'm improving or not. When I spar, when I hit the bag, when I wrestle around with my friends at the gym, I know exactly where I stand. That's why it's "belt testing" not "belt receiving."

  3. #18
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    Quote Originally Posted by pazman View Post
    I started training taekwondo when I was 7 and stopped when I went to uni. Trained 5 to 6 times a week. When we tested, we sparred, we kicked the heavy bag, we did pad drills, and we broke boards. We also did forms but that was the most boring thing, done at the end, almost as a cool down from the test. We even did the "cool" forms like passai and gaebek. Kids love to mix it up and have fun.

    I like learning and training taolu, but I can't feel from one day to the next if I'm improving or not. When I spar, when I hit the bag, when I wrestle around with my friends at the gym, I know exactly where I stand. That's why it's "belt testing" not "belt receiving."
    Oh, I'm not trying to defend it, just wanted to frame the what i see as the reasoning behind it a little more precisely.

  4. #19
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    Nothing is really clear, i think...

    Well, reading everything you said before... i'll ask this again...

    1) Who says how "legit" is a shaolin "school"?

    2) Why is every "shaolin school" (almost every single one) claims to be "the one and the only"? "certified by..." or "with the blessing of..." Why a "shaolin monk"* like Heng Jun in Europe or Yan Ming/Guolin in USA, for example, needs the approval of an association for "being legit"? They're a prove themselves of a "real shaolin tradition"**


    And again... i don't know why the word "money" comes into my head


    *: I wrote "shaolin monk" in quotes because i don't have 100% clear those discipleship stuff in shaolin buddhism and that stuff, please correct me if i'm wrong

    **: I wrote in quotes "shaolin tradition" because i know that's a really controversial theme to talk about and i don't know the details about who knows and who doesn't about that "real shaolin tradition". And again, please correct me if i'm wrong

  5. #20
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    There is an order to monastaries

    Quote Originally Posted by HmorenoM View Post
    1) Who says how "legit" is a shaolin "school"?
    The Abbot says. Those who have left Shaolin, like my teacher, can still consider themselves as former Shaolin monks or whatev. They can still be legitimate masters, but in terms of Shaolin Temple, the head is the Abbot and he has the power to approve, deny, eject or what is probably the worst, simply ignore.
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  6. #21
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    That is the new reality! Intellectual property has to be reinforced so we will never know the cost of association. "Yo soy el unico" usually means the endorsement is on par with the new unofficial licensing taking place. Even the descriptive Shaolin is now part of the cultural nomenclature! If one is not endorsed, then patent infringement can be pursued but it is one sided, of course!

  7. #22
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    Quote Originally Posted by ShaolinDiva View Post
    The North American Shaolin Federation was formed in 2011 to unify North America Shaolin schools and to promote the camaraderie of Shaolin students, masters and the Shaolin culture as a whole in North America.
    Again, this kind of things makes me think in "Give me money and i give you a paper which says you're legit"

    Who can say that this one:
    http://www.usashaolintemple.org/shiyanming/
    "...Shifu founded the USA Shaolin Temple and currently teaches authentic Shaolin martial arts or Chan Buddhism. The USA Shaolin Temple has six satellite branches internationally in Austria, South Africa, Trinidad, Chile, Argentina, and Mexico"

    is more legit than this one:
    http://shaolin-overseas.org/about_STOH.html
    "...is the official subsidiary branch of the legendary Shaolin Temple at Song Mountain in China."

    They both says they teach authentic and legit shaolin culture and all that stuff... And i don't see anything about North American Shaolin Federation or Shaolin Association of North America...

    As i said before, all schools (almost all) claims to be the one and the only?
    How can people know if the Abbot really approved "this" school or "that" school? is there a paper? a scroll? an interview? a signature? a logo?

    Quote Originally Posted by ShaolinDiva View Post
    Basically , the Abbot wanted to unify all of the Shaolin schools and traditionalize the forms based according to the books that were donated to the USA library of Congress
    The Abbot, the major authority in Shaolin Temple wanted that... and... was he successful? (i'm asking for real, i'm nor from Usa nor North America so i don't know how things are going there)

  8. #23
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    Quote Originally Posted by ShaolinDiva View Post
    First of all, you don't know me and what my knowledge of Shaolin , kung fu or martial arts at all except for some of my words that you already misconstrued.
    I wasn't talking about you, but Yanxu...

  9. #24
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    It's still the Abbot

    Take Catholicism for example. The Pope is the head. Now, there can be all sorts of variations of Catholicism that might be valid. You could even claim that something like Santeria was more authentic spiritually. But those have left the fold.

    All organized religions tithe. Shaolin is trying to organize, but it has a lot of post CR issues. Ultimately, there should be some international organization, lest we have more situations like Juan Carlos. Organizations set up abroad like SANA and NSAF (assuming they are different and I think they are) are run by locals with the blessing of the Abbot. Here in America, there has yet to be one that has succeeded. Prior to SANA, there was an initial attempt to copyright Shaolin in America in 2007. If you don't remember how that turned out, well, our forum remembers.
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  10. #25
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    Bad idea...

    Quote Originally Posted by GeneChing View Post
    Shaolin is trying to organize, but it has a lot of post CR issues. Ultimately, there should be some international organization, lest we have more situations like Juan Carlos.
    Juan went to Shaolin and was involved in it well before many foreigners and gave no indication of what was to come years later. Just get a guy like him officially recognized in your international organization, then you can't just write him off as a fraud that has nothing to do with you when he goes crazy and turns violent! You take responsibility or at least it reflects badly on your organization as a whole.

    Terrible idea, trying to bring all these people in around the world. Shaolin should just stick to governing itself back home at the monastery. It's getting too big for its britches and standardization is disrespectful to its history. You have to throw out a lot of good material to just stick with one way of doing something. Whoever's idea it is, it shows they either don't have a good understanding of Shaolin wugong or they just don't care about it.

  11. #26

    Shaolin Europe Association

    The association was put together acute (o well, the abbot wishes ..) with anyone, who wanted to be a member, there was not the slightest demand for qualitiy. Asking, why Shaolin doesn't care at all, what kind of people are members i received the reply, that they first want to set up a frame and later fill it with "quality". So what you find there now is a very strange mixture of schools who can be called "serious" (but also many "serious" Shaolin-schools in Europe are not at all interested in joining the SEA) and some who are just ridiculous and who got in only by "guanxi" (how immaterial these "guanxi" are, is another question). Fortunately after the Shaolin Europe Festival last year, the relation shiftet a little to the former, but the cheating part doesn't sleep.
    Some leaders of "Shaolin-schools" in Europe, probably in the US as well, just decorate their homepage with pictures of good Shaolin-masters, to create the image, that they are their students, but in reality had maybe on weekend's workshop or never received any teaching at all from these masters. Some start to teach, while they have only a deploring thin cover of knowledge or ability. In Germany there is a lot of cheating going on . If the Shaolin temple has the wish to create a circle of schools, who because of their quality can be taken as serious representative of Shaolin culture, it will have to change this policy. But apparently it doesn't. With its strong tendency of "big is beautiful", it might end up in some empty megalomania ...
    One of the members of SEA, Shi Yanhai, the nephew of Shi Yongxin, has recently delighted people with this performance (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJZ_J8Sb6o8). The problem was, that he wanted 7600 Euro for it ... The rest of his (hi)story is too miserable to tell in public.
    On the other end of the scale might be to name Shi Yanliang, who is a decent ordained monk, very sympahtic. He is a favourite of the abbot,- which is also visible in the many articles appearing about him in SS-Shaolin-temple's webpage. While the Shaolin Temple in Berlin, Germany, except his abbot, Shi Yongchuan, doesn't have any wuseng or monk known in SS-Shaolin-Temple and cannot hope for one in this kalpa, Shi Yongxin has sent (for a while) several wuseng to support Yanliang with their knoweledge not only in kungfu, but also medicine. Of course this not only out of sympathy, but also for political and tactical reasons. Still as a school for the different aspects of Shaolin-culture as they are taught in the temple, the one of Shi Yanliang might be the best in Europe by now, but this has its price. Social responsibility is maybe not one of the strong points of Shaolin-Temple in general.

    There is another point that i consider sometimes problematic: the changes that show up when the monks or wuseng from SS-Shaolin Temple stay in the west for a long time. On one side they like to keep up their "special treatment" as semi-holy, well at least always admired and privileged persons, on the other hand without the "temple-frame" their intensity and the quality of their gongfu is not seldom "fading", and they are becoming “normal” kungfu-teachers with worldly worries and needs, who want to built a house, drive an "adequate" car, are subject to women’s influence etc.

    Maybe concerning all this, it would help, if there was more "part-time"-fluctuation from the SS-Shaolin-temple to the members of the Association, on one hand to support and inspire the masters and the students abroad, on the other hand to really define who is just too far from Shaolin or not enough developed to serve as a master ... Of course that can only function on a level of trustworthyness.

  12. #27
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    Thanks breeze - that was an informative post.

    Quote Originally Posted by LFJ View Post
    Juan went to Shaolin and was involved in it well before many foreigners and gave no indication of what was to come years later. Just get a guy like him officially recognized in your international organization, then you can't just write him off as a fraud that has nothing to do with you when he goes crazy and turns violent! You take responsibility or at least it reflects badly on your organization as a whole.
    There is potential for this in any group, whether formally organized or not. One bad apple can sully any apple basket, no matter if it's mass factory-farmed or right off your own tree. To be honest, I'm not sure how 'official' Juan's recognition was from the Temple proper. I just posted on that thread that he was actually a Wushuguan student like me.
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  13. #28
    The homepage of "Shaolin Europe Association":

    Statement to the news of Juan Carlos Aguilar's crime in Spain

    We are very astonished to know the news of Juan Carlos Aguilar's crime.

    Juan Carlos Aguilar has nothing to do with the Songshan Shaolin Temple of China. He has nothing to do with the Shaolin Europe Association too. As we know, he had studied kungfu in 90s of last century at a kungfu training center in China, which has no relation with the Shaolin Temple of China. His teacher or instructors have never been a member of the Sangha of Shaolin Temple of China. Juan Carlos Aguilar has just misused the name of Shaolin.

    Compassion is the fundamental principle of Buddhism. Do not kill or cause to kill belongs to one of the basic commitments for every Buddhist. We hope people who love martial arts can take the crime of Juan Carlos Aguilar as a lesson. Whoever wants to learn real Shaolin Kungfu should learn Shaolin culture by a real Shaolin Culture Center with Shaolin monks or masters authorised by the Songshan Shaolin Temple.

    Buddha bless the victims.
    from: http://shaolin-europe.org/index.html

    what a joke ...

  14. #29

    Shaolin Europe Association & Shaolin Association of North America

    I'm not sure, but it looks like Shi Yongxin already defined Shi Yanliang with the Austrian temple/center as future head of Shaolin Europe Association and Yanxu with his school as future head of Shaolin Association of North America.
    ???
    Gene, what do you think?

  15. #30
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    All things are impermanent

    I can't really speak to what is happening in Europe as I don't know that many of the monks there. In America, the 'official' lead Shaolin Temple representative has shifted over the years. The Abbot is by nature, a diplomatic figure, as he must not only negotiate being the head of Shaolin Temple, but he must do so in the PRC, and we all know the chicom stance on religion. So it is unlikely that he would bestow the official title as overseas leader upon anyone. That's just not prudent as you never know who might run afoul. What he does do is visit and approve facilities - quite literally give his blessing - but even that can be difficult to sort to some degree.

    Shi Guolin was the most official for many years. Note that his position preceded the establishment of the Shaolin Cultural Centers that we have now. He ran into scandal and has since disrobed. Since then, several Shaolin Cultural Centers have been established in the U.S. Shi Yanran runs three, one here in Fremont, another in SF, and the last in Herndon, VA, most strategically located close to Washington DC. He picked up the torch, or perhaps reignited it, for Songshan Shaolin Temple Day. He is still very prominent among the official Shaolin representatives in America right now. However, this year, it is Shi Yanxu who is stepping to the forefront by organizing the 1st American Shaolin Festival. That is very ambitious and we'll see how it goes. Yanxu was a key player in putting together the Shaolin Summit, but there were other organizers.

    So, while Yanliang may be the most prominent in Europe and Yanran and Yanxu are both leaders here in America, that could shift at any moment.
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