Northern Black Dragon Martial Arts
Kung-fu Gongfu Wushu
As of July 2022, I've decided not to run adult Kung-fu Program
Kung Fu (or Gongfu, Kempo, Karate) is more than just a term referring to Chinese martial arts. It is also a term meaning the attainment of a skill or ability through a sturdy endeavor of time and effort. Hence, I would prefer the term of Kung Fu as a verb rather than a noun. When we use the term of Kung Fu, it means the lasting ability or skill attained in learning and training.
There are people that have learned many martial arts routines, but don’t understand the applications of the movements or have the ability to apply the techniques. Their training is considered a performing art, not martial art. A martial artist must do Kung Fu attainment training. Each and every style of martial arts has its unique system of Kung Fu attainment training methods. The training methods we teach here are all realistic, proficient, and effective.
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Originally Black Dragon Martial Art's roots are from Central and Northern China, which were well known for their martial arts skill. Its strengths were the uses of high and powerful kicking, long fist punching, Chin-na (seize and control) and Jiu jitsu fighting techniques. In order to test and promote their skill and knowledge, they sometimes traveled in a small group or alone all over Asia, to meet with other martial arts experts in exchanging fighting skills. Some of the fighting was open challenges with no rules at all; others, just a light contact. I was told from my teachers that they had won nearly every fight. Although I have no means of verifying it, there is one thing that I am sure of that my teachers were all possessed of extraordinary martial arts skill. Regardless of how they performed in the fighting contests, they nevertheless had brought back valuable martial arts' experiences, knowledge and skills, especially in the Southern China Martial Arts which was commonly called Kung-Fu, and which was well known for their hand techniques. Regardless of Northern and Southern systems of martial arts, they were all derived from a variety of sources such as Shaolin, Wu-don and countless numbers of individual styles of martial artists, which were well documented, although some of them have been lost.
I honour the past, but I do not worship it. Just as the old martial artists were inspiring with adding to the knowledge of man, so are the new martial artists equally invigorating. Martial arts never died, it purely evolved. This upsets some who wish to live obstinately in the past and ignore the present. Martial artists will continue to be born, do their work and pass their knowledge on to the next generation, just as they have since the dawn of human.
Upon any system of martial arts introduction into society, some modification and assimilation naturally occurs over time as part of its acquisition and discovery. Without the openness of constant learning and improvement, and preserving the strong traditional martial arts, the arts will become stagnant and eventually wither and fade away. Our system of martial arts is no exception. It has gone through a great many changes in the last two hundred years. Even with respect to my generation, I am a strong believer that there is nothing as permanent as change. Therefore, after over 50 years of training in martial arts, I believe it is my responsibility to modify and strengthen our martial arts system.
Kung-Fu is regarded as the cradle of the martial art is an art for all people. Since everyone is unique, student will be given experiences in many arts. Training is conducted at all ranges of skill and techniques: Kicking, punching, weapons, trapping, and grappling. If you are looking for a well rounded training, this class is the one you have been looking for.
The essence of Kung-Fu is a private language that speaks on deeply primal levels, and it never conveys precisely the same things to any two people. For me, it is an act of discovery, of the self and of the surrounding world. Though I often make deliberate attempts to connect students - through exploration of concepts that have strong personal meaning for myself-there are time I enjoy playing with pun, and taking a phase out of context.
The spirits of martial arts, like springtime violets in the woods, have their season which no human can hasten or impede!
Kung-fu is an art and science, though I like to look at it almost more as an art than as a science; for the activity of the martial artist, constantly creating as he/she is, guided although not controlled by the external world of senses, bears a resemblance, not fanciful I believe, but real, to the activities of the artist, of a painter, let me say. Just as one cannot become a painter without a certain amount of skill, so one cannot become a martial artist without the power to reason accurately up to a certain point. Yet these qualities, fundamental though they are, do not make a painter or martial artist worthy of the name, nor indeed are they the most important factors in the case. Other qualities of a far more subtle sort, chief among which in both cases is imagination, go to the making of a good artist or of a good martial artis
The Wisdoms Of Dragon:
- Seeing the paths within chaos
- Facing life with dignity and courage
- Moving without fear in the darkness
- Carrier of souls from darkness into light
- Existing between thoughts
- Exploration of the mysteries of life
- Understanding nature energies & beings
- Grace & appreciation for the beauty of balance
- Understanding the circular of nature of time
- Access to ancient wisdoms
- Ability to pass unseen
- Acknowledge the truths that have been denied by souls
- Seek to assist others on their pat
The Goal of studying Kung Fu is the realization of yourself. Please do not put the emphasis on colour of sash/belt. As you learn and train diligently, the colour of sash/belt will come to you rather than chase after it or pay for it.
Kung-Fu-Conversation between Master Po and Caine
"Now," Po say, “what do you hear?”
Caine listens. Sounds come at him from the silence and he picks at them in a way that a child might pick at little blades of grass in a field.
"I hear the water," he says. "I hear a bird. I hear the wind."
"That is obvious," he hears Po says, "All of that could be heard with your eyes open. You have merely to come to a kind of concentration. Listen harder and tell me then what you are able to hear."
Caine holds his position. Now he forces himself to disengage the other sounds from consciousness, moving beyond those surfaces of a still pond to find another quality of life.
"Do you hear your own heart beat?" Po says.
"Yes," Caine says after a while, when he is sure that the sound is real.
"Yes, I do."
"Do you hear the grasshopper which is beside you?"
Caine stays in position. He listens.
"No," he says, "I do not."
Ying and Yang, two seemingly incompatible conceptions can each represent an aspect of the truth ... They may serve in turn to represent the facts without ever entering into direct conflict.
Ying and Yang that includes two,
The Peace that includes strife,
The Joy that includes pain,
The Knowing that includes illusion,
The Life that includes death, These are the ways of Ying and Yang.
Candle of Thoughts...
People know how to read a book with words but not a book without words. People know how to play a stringed instrument, but not one without strings. People know how to perform Kung-fu form with movements, but not Kung-fu form without movements. If you only know how to recognize something practical and nothing spiritual, how can you appreciate the wonders of books, music, and Kung-fu.
Kung-fu is a form of poetry which transcends poetry in that it proclaims a truth; a form of reasoning which transcends reasoning in that it wants to bring about the truth it proclaims; a form of action, of ritual behaviour, which does not find fulfillment in the act, but must proclaim and elaborate a poetic form of truth.
Master Paul Chau
