Kalarippayattu

[Iole]

I've seen this Indian martial art. Some say was the beginning of CMA imported to China.

Does anyone know if it has an internal branch? Or is it for the young and strong only?

[shawnsegler]

FIrst off this is more of an on topic sort of thing, even though it's indian.

As to the internal external thing...like a lot of old sophisticated systems I'd say it's got both. It's incredibly rigorous, but they do tons of yogic exercises that would encompass developing what I would call "internal".

If you think that doing something so you don't have to exercise or put any effort into it makes it internal, I'd say you're a little confused.

Anybody who isn't completely old and decrepit can benefit from hard training as long as they train safely and use the ole 70 percent rule. I wouldn't reccomend something that does a lot of full contact sparring or body hardening (muay thai etc), but Kalari or Longfist or Tantui or any of that stuff is prolly good for any age. You just have to be ok with putting out some effort.

I'd check with some of the brits on the board that may have trained with Paul Whitrod. Also there was a pretty good documentary floating around on the net a few years ago...a couple of them actually. One about a woman who joined a Kalari and another that was a basic documentary on the whole style as it were....broke down the differences between the various northern and southern styles of it.

Best,

S

[Andy_S]

From what I have seen, it is not "internal" in that:
Its moves and body shapes are linear rather than curved and its stances are strongly extended;
There are no apparent spiral movements;
Lacks slow motion or standing meditation training;

I grant it has many yogic attributes, but whether Yoga is the same as a CIMA is something I am not qualified to speak on (never having done Yoga). IMHO, being internal has more to do with simply breathwork, and, again to me, Yogic stances - rigidly extended - are very different from CIMA stances.

Beyond Kalari, there are a range of other MA in India. When I was at School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) Univ of London, I recall a book in the library about Indian MA and there were a whole range of things in different regions. Some of those might (or might not) be internal, but of course, one of the many, many definitions of "internal" is geographic - ie internal MA came from China, external MA came from India.

[shawnsegler]

I guess there's more than one definition of what internal is...go figure.

Maybe we should start discussing that and try and figure out what it means once and for all....

[Andy_S]

Segsy:

Good point re internal definitions. Once we have established THAT to our satisfaction, we can move on to:
- Resolving the Israel-Palestine dispute;
- Finding and implementing a solution to world poverty; and
- Discovering, conclusively, whether there is, indeed, life after death
(Hell, if we are REALLY brave chaps, we might even dare to pose the hitherto unaskeable question: Coke or Pepsi?)

Seriously, while I agree that there are a million definitions of internal, by a much more limited number of definitions (as per above) Kalari clearly is not.

IMHO, of course.

[Doc Stier]

http://www.cvnkalari.org/

http://www.devavision.org/html/kalari-martial-arts.html

[yusuf]

hey up..

from talking to Kalari people, and seeing various schools I can say the real deal work heavily with internal energetic movements, similar to the pranayama of yoga..but shaped for combat..a very interesting by product of the kalari pranayama training is that the internal energetic aspect can be trained constantly, whatever one is doing.. very cool.. another overlap is the linkage between ones internal states and the marma (vital) points on the opponents.. you then link this into an higher level 'energetic' map of the battlefied..

i can imagine Jab, strawdog and the ilk decrying this but here is a video of how it works..



yusuf

[Waterway]

Here is a very interesting take on some "traditional" Kalarippayattu, from the UK show Mind, Body and Kick Ass moves. The host Chris Crudelli is not impressed:

[Michael]

The BBC documentary Way of the Warrior from 82-ish spent about 45 minutes on Kalari, showing a northern and southern branch. For me, internal means incorporating profound energetic concepts into the normal training regimen. The documentary showed one teacher as a local doctor and the other teacher as at least a man with extensive healing knowledge from fighting, who also applied specialized massage techniques for body changing methods on the students. The other interesting thing was the northern group's interior training room was specially shaped according to religious doctrine, typically a sign of using architecture and geometry to establish a specific energetic signature or vibration pattern that influences those who are present. All of that at least hints at internal, IMO.

[3 planes]

I have spent four months in South India, and seen countless Kalari demos as well as visiting three Kalari schools.

Kalari has a northern and southern school (as in north and south of the state of Kerala). The southern school tends to be entirely external, while the northern school has some aspects of internal practice, but not at the same level of tai chi, bagua or yiquan training.There is a strong link between massage, healing and Kalari, and many of the teachers have a good knowledge of the bodies vital points and are expert at deep level massages. Northern Kalari does utilise aspects of meditation and chakra philosopy.

Kalari guys train HARD, and tend to be very athletic, flexible and physically strong. I have no experience of Shaolin, but I would imagine that it is similar, and the link between Kalari and Shaolin is easily identified.

Kalari emphasis weapons training before empty hand training, and many practitioners have countless scars on their forearms and thighs. The scariest weapon I have ever seen is the Kalari "ribbon sword" which is a sword handle and two flexible blades of springy steel. They wear it as a belt, and then whip it out to cut an opponent to shreds in a second.



I have crossed hands with a couple of experienced Kalari guys. Generally I wasnt impressed as I found I could control their centre quite easily and they had no significant internal power. However they were very good at whipping out kicks at lightening speed.

All in all I have spent a year in India and a month in China. I found it a LOT easier to find good quality martial arts in China, this suggests to me that martial arts have evolved in China, but stayed the same in India.

[yeniseri]

I would agree with Crudelli!
That demo is just a reverse engineering synthesis to re-institute lost art! Kalarippayattu was on the verge of extinction until some former strongholds of the art statrted an anthropological projct to bring it back. There is no doubt that India was the birtplace of a martial tradition.

I would draw the same conclusion about taekwondo. The Korea martial tradition is a true and documented one but the renewal of TKD began with a similar reverse engineering straegy/concept with Shotokan since all o the major 'do' designers were black belts in Shotokan and a few had access to aikido (hence the moden art of hapkido). Interestingly the founder of hapkido was a servant (yes, this is real and documented) of Daito Ryu by way of Sokaku Takeda!

[Andy_S]

A lot of external gongfu systems teach vital point striking, do medical work (acu, massage, linaments), include qigong systems and have religious or superstitous paraphanelia in their kwans. In fact, I would say (bar Wing Chun) most traditional Southern Style MA schools in Hong Kong include ALL these elements. But IMO, none of the above makes them an "internal" MA - a la Taiji, Bagua and HsingI.

I dont really understand why Crudelli's guy would have to reverse engineer Kalari from something else, when clearly, the art is still taught widely in Kerala. And I would say that in terms of its conditioning methods, its weaponry, its weapon training, its clothing, its training spaces and a number of techniques, it is pretty distinct from CMA, SEAMA, JMA, KMA, etc.

[Dr.Rob]

Instead of watching something . Read a book...

http://www.amazon.com/When-Body-Becomes-Eyes-Kalarippayattu/dp/0195655389/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1262111055&sr=8-1

This was brilliant read..read it twice. Cause I didn't understand it all the first time! The story of the chicken knockout was brilliant.

[WongYing]

On the other hand I am really not impressed with Chris Crudelli !

I recall Paul Whitrod having an interesting story to tell about the times he met Chris Crudelli in India and Hong Kong, when Chris met both Pau'ls teachers in HKG and India

[Dr.Rob]

do tell pls?? Not to cause issue. I have heard many stories of Mr Crudelli's ineptness...especially in regards to behavior to the seniors that he is in the midst of.