There are a number of misrepresentations about Complete Wing Chun which have been, and still are being spread around the Wing Chun community. This series will address them as we go along (or as they pop up).

We’ll start with Savi, on KFO:

Honest HFY Question- – Page 16 – Kung Fu Magazine Forums

Now, that chapter on Hung Suen Wing Chun was originally written by John Murphy (HFY member, not a TWC member), altered and edited by the authors of CWC (non members of either family)

We (neither Robert Chu, Y. Wu, nor myself), altered or edited anything in the Hung Suen chapter. If anyone said we did, they are mistaken. I’ve had to correct this already far too many times, so I would appreciate everyone’s help in propagating the correction wherever possible.

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John Siracusa, writing on the proposed Microsoft/Yahoo deal, opens with this little pearl:

Knee-deep in the dead

This Yahoo/Microsoft thing presents another case of the Cynic’s Dilemma. The classic example is the leader of a wacko religious cult. Either he’s a brilliant student of the human psyche, consciously manipulating people for his own benefit, or he’s a true believer. Which scenario is more scary? Which is more evil? Which is more likely? Which would make you feel better about the world? Maybe it’s a little of both?

While often heard about in the technology sphere (Reality Distortion Field anyone?), any claim they’d make to patent cult-like activity would be drowned by martial arts’ prior art. We got tons of it.

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I don’t know anything about the specific situation in this thread over on KFO, nor do I have interest in the specifics, but there’s a great old Kung Fu parable that applies to all these situations:

“Master, I wish to open a school, may I use your name?”

“Disciple, why not use your own name?”

“Master, your name would attract more students, and intimidate those who would challenge me.”

“Disciple, if your own name doesn’t attract sufficient students, and your own skill doesn’t intimidate would-be challenges, perhaps you are not yet ready to open your own school.”

Bottom line, everyone teaches and applies everything differently. We aren’t Agent Smith Matrix clones. Trying to preserve WCK is like trying to take a slice out of a river: A waste of time and a missing of point.

All great masters of the past evolved their art naturally over time. The obsession to preserve one slender moment of that evolution is a type of procrastination, of avoidance of the responsibility to give back as much as you received. To return to the art.

It’s like a 2d photograph, a single still frame when the whole video, the whole 3d world, is just one step back and one shift of perception over.

The rest is just BS politics.

If you stick around long enough, the same people have the same problems (one student represents them… no, no.. another one… no, not them either… and the previous one was bad… not as bad as the previous one to them, or the next one when they become the previous one). Past behavior is the best indicator of future behavior. What happens to previous person before will happen to the next person soon. But that’s the parable about the monk giving the scorpion a ride across the river, and a parable for another thread…

There’s an internet cliche which goes something like: 

Reasonable person + internet (access + anonymity) = @$$hole. Of course, non-anonymous posters can get into it just as much, and some can remain reasonable, but in broad strokes there does seem that intelligent discourse on the internet rapidly devolves into something close in kin to “OMG!!111 u are the sux” or “In ur dojo making fight challengz”

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It’s sometimes heard in Wing Chun Kuen that power is generated from the ground. This is actually heard more frequently in other arts, and personally I never heard this while learning Wing Chun Kuen. I heard something slightly different.

One of the qualities Wing Chun Kuen favors is adaptability; we change according to feeling and circumstance. If we put a hand out and our opponent does nothing, we hit them. However, if our opponent defends, we don’t stubbornly plow through, overcommit, stumble and leave ourselves open for counter. No, we change to another hand and continue on towards our target. This is referred to as “asking the way”, where the opponent lets us know exactly how to defeat him or her.

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From everyone at W1NG and WingChunKuen.com, here’s wishing you and yours peace, prosperity, health and happiness over the holidays and into the new year.

Trying to guess what will happen in the coming year is always equal parts fun and futility, but here’s a semi serious, semi farcical take on it.

1. The unprecedented availability of different Wing Chun approaches via online video hosting services, allowing us to actually see each other over the span of continents and cultures will continue, and emerging “live” streaming video services will lead to broadcasts of actual Wing Chun Kuen classes over the ‘net. Follow along with a Pien San class from HK, a Wong Shun-Leung class from Australia, or an NHB training session from the UK right from your home computer. (We’ll wait on direct neural transfer emersion until 2009, k?)

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When the first Wing Chun Kuen teachers came West, many passed down stories about how they or their sifu or their system were the One True Traditional Authentic Orthodox Real Deal, and otherwise placed other teachers and branches into lesser roles.

In a cultural context, this is not a big deal. Fishing stories are a good Western example of this type of exaggeration, at least in part. Some sifu would always credit famous legends (from books or even fairy tales like gods or immortals) as founders of their art because it was considered arrogant to claim credit for creating something. Likewise, if you ever wanted to teach for business, you either had to earn your reputation in public duels (which became very difficult later under the PRC), or by linking your art to someone or something famous (i.e. Ng Mui or the Shaolin Temple), or by claiming to be the one true source of something (which exists not just in WCK but virtually every MA).

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In order to increase our reach and make it as easy and convenient as possible for our readers to keep track of updates, news, and articles, we’ve set up some new social network feeds for W1NG (you’ll find them in the sidebar to the right)). Please take a moment to “follow” or “friend” them, and if there are other networks you enjoy (we might do Jaiku next!), especially international ones, please do let us know!

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Renowned for over a half-century in China, grandmaster Sum Nung (Cen Neng) has remained a well kept secret to most in the wing chun kuen family outside of the Bamboo Curtain. It is hoped that this article can help share with the reader grandmaster Sum Nung’s incredible legacy and his great contributions to the art of wing chun kuen.

Born in Peru, South America in May 1925, Sum Nung was brought to Foshan, Guangdong province, China by his father as a child so that their family name would continue in their native land. Originally from a well to do family, the Japanese occupation of the 1930s caused great hardship for the Sum’s, stripping them of much of their wealth and cutting them off from their relatives abroad. Eventually, to help support his family, Sum Nung took a job at Tin Hoi, a local restaurant in which his aunt was part owner. That is where it all began.

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