For The Silk Road Kung Fu Friendship Tour Part 35, click here.
Grandmaster Liu Huai Liang started Shaolin Boxing at the age of 8 and Changquan at age 11. His family is from Shuibo, Liangshan in Shandong Province. That auspicious location is very well known in Chinese history. The awesome hero Song Jian was from Liangshan.
The character Song Jiang is immortalized in the classical series of books titled "Outlaws of the Marsh."
Song Jiang was one of the leaders of the "Robin Hood" style outlaw group that supported the emperor but were forced into becoming outlaws by government corruption. Song Jiang was a master strategist and a mystical character. He’s also called “Gongming” which could mean bright or wise citizen, “Jishiyu” which means timely rain, and “Filial and Righteous Dark Third Son.” By any name he was a highly moral man and guided by heavenly spirits.
After all the 108 Stars of Destiny come together at Liangshan, Song Jiang went by another nickname, "Protector of Justice", emphasizing his conviction in life. The books “Outlaws of the Marsh” are based on real historical characters from the Northern Song Dynasty (960–1279) though the books were not written until 14th-century. Anyone who hasn’t read them really should because they are fantastically creative and reality-based stories from another world but applicable to all.
Back in the 21st Century…
Not one to rest on his laurels, Grandmaster Liu has been busy promoting the newest style of Chinese martial arts that he invented and originally named Xiang Zi Dao, AKA Bing Dao.
It’s a form of stick fighting done with two very lightweight medium-length soft padded sticks. They are so soft children can spar with them without the slightest bangs and bumps usually associated with martial arts. On the other hand, the techniques employed in this new martial art can be employed in real two-handed, two stick or two sword styles of fighting.
His introduction to this art began by asking me some questions about the differences between modern and traditional martial arts. I answered with the histories articulated in the book Asian Fighting Arts by Donn F. and Robert W. Smith Draeger (1973). In that book, the authors distinguish real martial arts as secret killing arts, usually preserved and propagated within families for the purpose of war as compared to modern sport martial arts the authors call “civil arts.”
He seemed satisfied with this answer. He also asked me several other questions which I answered. Consequently, he concluded that I am a “peace-promoting martial artist” which made me feel good.
He also mentioned that collectively there are 330 Olympic sports and not one has a Chinese origin which he said is surprising considering China’s 5,000 years of history and that so many martial arts are part of the Olympic games. That fact was one of his motivations in inventing this new/ancient martial art he calls Xiang Zi Dao.
He is committed to having some Chinese martial art be included in the 2032 Olympic games and he believes his new/ancient martial art may be just the ticket. He also said the scope (size and costs) of the Olympic games has been declining since the Beijing Olympics and martial arts need to change to meet international standards.
Grandmaster Liu then went on to tell me in history real martial art training always incorporated weapons. “No martial art master would go to war without weapons,” he said. He briefly mentioned the Shaolin 18 weapons but focused on describing five weapons categories.
Long sword – Da Dao
During the Ming Dynasty fighting against foreign pirates, the long sword was called Dan Dao (Fa Xuan). During WWII the name changed to Da Dao which simply means ‘Big’ or ‘Long Sword.’ This category also includes the exceptionally powerful halberd (Qinglong yanyuedao) of Guan Yu fame.
Short sword – Bishou
Also called a dagger. This is probably the oldest blade weapon as metallurgy had to evolve through the bronze and iron ages to produce fine long steel swords.
Double swords – Shuang jian
This can be double daggers or swords. The legendary Three Kingdoms hero Liu Bei for example wielded a pair, of double-edged swords called Shuang gu jian.
Other weapons including ruanbing (soft weapons) like whips (bianzi), rope darts (sheng biao), etc. Other concealed weapons including Nunchukus (erjiegun) and throwing stars (touzhi zhi xing).
With that introduction he told us he worked on creating Xiang Zi Dao over a 10-year period. Xiang here means mutuality, to help each other, balance, and meet in the middle. Zi here means “son” and enlightened. Dao means “the way,” and also sounds similar to the word used for knife and sword in Chinese. He said this art rests on three primary principles: Yangsheng (nourishing life, health & traditional nutrition beliefs), Spirit, and Balance. He also mentioned several core beliefs: Gong Shang – Discuss together, Gong Jian – Construct together, Gong Xiang – Share together, and Gong Zuo – Work together. Gong in the above mean “public,” “fair,” and “justice.”
In terms of a fighting style Xiang Zi Dao is very different from other two stick and sword styles. For one thing, the target zones only include the top of the head, below the middle chest level and above the waist line, and outer legs. Another major difference is in the broad potential angles of attack.
For example, in Western Fencing the attacker generally comes in a straight line. In Xiang Zi Dao the attacker can come from a much wider range of angles. Also, most Kendo fighting is done with one sword, but Xiang Zi Dao uses two. It deploys much softer sticks, so the banging and crashing is virtually eliminated. Kendo attacks are also generally straight except for the waist strike which veers only slightly off from straight. All experienced unarmed fighters know that learning how to play a wide range of angles of attack greatly increases the probability of winning a real fight or competition bout.
After that we learned about another incredibly interesting project of Grandmaster Liu. He also has a company developing Virtual Reality technology called Luo Lin Technology Ltd. It has been going for eight years. He gave us a brief introduction wherein one gets to experience all kinds of sports firsthand while being an active player. He’s in business with his son in this endeavor.
What is truly incredible is mixing Xiang Zi Dao and Virtual Reality. Two people can spar with each other in different rooms or across the world. It’s a very amazing mix of martial arts and technology.
https://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XNDMxMDY0MzI5Ng==.html?spm=a2h0c.8166622.PhoneSokuUgc_5.dtitle
Then Master Liu told me about the 50-year anniversary of the original Chinese and American Ping Pong teams recently held via Virtual Reality. It was a touching and heartfelt story of now much older people getting back together to play again even though half a world away. Sports diplomacy can be a wonderful thing and sometimes technology does really help.
After these stimulating conversations about old friends and a most ambitious, highly creative, and interesting new Chinese martial art, we all retired upstairs in an adjacent building for a fantastic dinner on a rooftop. After dinner I went to another part of the rooftop with a friend of the Grandmaster Liu to play a bit. I persuaded him to follow my Yoga-based stretching routine and showed him some of my kick-punch combinations. After that he showed me some of the Xiang Zi Dao equipment and movements. It was an enjoyable time. The martial art circle (Wulin) expands. Time passed too quickly and finally we bid farewell for the evening. Of course, we got each other’s WeChat names and are staying in touch.
Incidentally Grandmaster Liu and I were born in the same month of the same year, but he is a couple of weeks older, so he is Dage which means ‘older brother.’ He’s a splendid older brother who is a great host with a fine mind, good heart, and sense of humor (and great food too)!
Both Miao and I were honored to meet with him and his friend and share that space in time. I hope we meet again before too long.
What’s next for the Silk Road Kung Fu Friendship Tour?
I have only a few more years to go to equal the 30-year travel record of the world’s foremost Silk Road Traveler, my role model, Ibn Battuta.
Whether that is possibility remains 50/50, given economic issues and travel restrictions along the Silk Road countries at this time, but the next stop is fairly certain.
Where is my next stop? A visit the Kung Fu school of a Chinese brother in another – not too distant country. But you’ll have to stay tuned KungFuMagazine to find out which country and brother that is. Another most excellent adventure!
As for our company in Hainan I’m a) working on proposals and 2) vaguely keeping my eyes open for potential investors and joint venture partners. Probably I’ll share the company name and internet site URL before too long. It’s still very much in the formative stages.
Before concluding these most recent stories of ancient and modern Kung Fu along the Silk Roads, many thanks to Master Liu and many others who made this trip very exciting, educational, healthy and all-around fun. One of my major goals in writing this series is to encourage other martial artists to travel more (when COVID-19 abates) hopefully soon.
As with any and all the Silk Roads there are no distinct beginnings or certain endings to this story. Positive thinking (within reasonable limits) does help. All that aside, quoting the wise words of old Disney cartoons I’ll conclude with: “That’s all for today!”
https://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XNDMyNzQ3NzcwMA==.html?spm=a2h0c.8166622.PhoneSokuUgc_4.dtitle
For Silk Road Kung Fu Friendship Tour Part 37, click here.
