Translation appreciated!

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Translation appreciated!

Postby AllanF on Sun Dec 13, 2009 9:38 pm

This is a video of Li Chugong explaining a little of the shenfa of taiji.

Unfortunately i can't really hear what he is saying and i was hoping that someone with superior Chinese skills to my own would be able to translate what he is saying?

http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XNDY4Njc5Mjg=.html

I tried to upload it to Youtube but for some reason it only uploaded the first 55secs but here is that snippet anyway.
[EDIT: Problem fixed full clip uploaded!]



Allan
Last edited by AllanF on Mon Dec 14, 2009 12:09 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Translation appreciated!

Postby ChenFist on Mon Dec 14, 2009 9:03 am

Allan,
I too would be interested in knowing the translation. I will give a little interpretation based on observation. He's teaching Hong's method and explaining the role of the knees and how the legs coil. In the thread about Yu Guo Shun taiji this was mentioned:
Andy_S wrote:SNIP
In Chen Yu's method, the knees would not swim or collapse inward
SNIP

Having the knees lose peng (their pushing outward quality) is a mistake in all lines of Chen...bar the Chen Zhonghua people, AFAIK.


From my limited experience Hong's method and Chen Zhonghua they don't collapse their knees inward. The video above starts to demonstrate how the knees adjust during leg coiling.
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Re: Translation appreciated!

Postby AllanF on Mon Dec 14, 2009 6:53 pm

Ok, my wife tried to listen to it and she said that it was very difficult as he speak in a dialect (shandong) and the audio isn't too good.

But she said basically he is talking about how the feet must be stable and not rock, that the 'chan si' should spiral up from the feet and around the body. The knees should not collapse only move up and down (and maintain 'peng' i've added this bit)and that the there is a acupuncture point in the middle of the chest (name of which escapes me at this moment) above and below which the body should be able to turn.
Last edited by AllanF on Mon Dec 14, 2009 7:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Translation appreciated!

Postby bailewen on Mon Dec 14, 2009 8:40 pm

lol.

I could have sworn it was southern. I was thrown in that I kept feeling like I could almost understand but not quite. Usually with southern dialects I can't understand a thing but if this was Shandong then I'm embarrased. Usually I can make out Shandong. Never had much problem listening to Liu Yunqiao. Maybe he just speaks with a heavy Shandong accent as opposed to an actual Shandong dialect.
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Re: Translation appreciated!

Postby Bao on Tue Dec 15, 2009 4:01 pm

If you know how to shift your weight just like that, you will never have trouble with your knees...
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Re: Translation appreciated!

Postby AllanF on Tue Dec 15, 2009 7:32 pm

Bao wrote:If you know how to shift your weight just like that, you will never have trouble with your knees...


Yeah that's exactly why i am trying to find out exactly what he is saying, as i have had a knee problem for about 6 months now.

bailewen wrote:lol.

I could have sworn it was southern. I was thrown in that I kept feeling like I could almost understand but not quite. Usually with southern dialects I can't understand a thing but if this was Shandong then I'm embarrased. Usually I can make out Shandong. Never had much problem listening to Liu Yunqiao. Maybe he just speaks with a heavy Shandong accent as opposed to an actual Shandong dialect.


Thank god i'm not the only one, when i first listened to it i though, "bloody hell my Chinese has got worse!" :-\
Thankfully my wife also has problems understanding him.
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Re: Translation appreciated!

Postby Bodywork on Wed Dec 16, 2009 12:18 am

Hi Allen
I would tend to agree about the knee winding translation. but he might be showing some deeper things (I don't know Chinese).
Twining the knees is indicative of the hips being tied to them, (this is how most people move, and it is more pronounced in western fighters)all in all it's something which I would avoid. Coiling or winding is an accurate statement but mores the point is what is coiling from where. I think it's very important to understand that the legs are coiling and the feet are stable and grab the earth. The feet rock most often because the knees pull them out of line. and its the hips that pull the kness out of line. The bones of the legs need to remain stable and the muscles are pulled coiling up and opening on one side and coiling and winding down on the other. But the bones stay straight and therefore the feet are stable. If anything the knees may go back and forth (like in and out from front to back) but never are they pulled with the coiling as to sway side to side with the hips. Twining the knees weakens the peng and in training it also can hurt the knees over time. Proper coiling makes VERY strong and stable knees that function independant from the hips. they are held stable by opposing spirals from the feet up through the kua drawn by the dantian, turned by the waist and supported be the lower back (with the psoas). Trainng this way stabilizies the entire chain, so walking and being "rocked" by uneven terrain (like he comically tries to demonstrate at the end when he is mimicing a stumble) is less likely.

Video: you might want to watch the first part as he is deliberatly moving wrong and showing how the bad connections I outlined above look. and how they will pull and rock the feet and weaken the knees. Something else to consider is this collapse is the fuck-up you see so much in modern Goju and Uechi ryu kata.
If you look at the correct pull with the dantian at 1:10 you will see the waist and upper sternum connection turning (this is the central axis) and that the hips do not move as much as the waist. He opening and rising on his left while closing and sinking on the right. Thus he is in balance.
At about 1:30 the guy to his left (in the black and white track suit) shows a more complete spiral with the shoulders staying down and neutral and the arms potentially sending while drawing with the elbows sinking.
You also might want to consider that Hong considered chansi-jin to be more in line with "the one jin," and not rooting and bouncing out. I think a better discussion is how these simple mechanics lead to avoiding double weighting and a much better set of usable skills that are more inclusive and complex than a simple ground path.
Anyway, the pulling is an additive quality to the coiling; pulling up by the psoas through the kua and turned through the waist it gets joined with the spine and the arms into the hands. Thus your feet...are in your hands. Side benefits are that the hands connect to the feet across the body left to right. This avoids the classic one-side weighted so often used in throwing people. With coiling happening around the spine people have a bitch of a time finding your weight and center.

There are much more complicated and fun things to work on such as being able to shear in the kua; one spiral, from the other, splitting at the kua, and the fajin it creates. And this without dedicating to a fajin! This also contributes to in /out, up/ down, and the ability to "change" force at speed; not to mention heavy hands and kicks with no wind up. Again after you really start to get into years of doing this it increasingly involves more tissue, and as you do it continually you loosen up...and then....more tissue gets involved... till it starts to attain a real snapping quality. Then you can add the fact that the body moves in these coilings which in and of themselves then wrap around the bodies central axis and thus become spiraling continuous arcs. Any point along each arc can then have a positive and negative side to it. A yin and yang held in balance without you doing something dedicated on either side. Then again you can offer continuous pivots to any contact point with their own yin and yang involved. What I am telling you here is gold- for fighting and moving; It's also great with grapplers trying to get in for kuzushi while you are left to "change" every contact point and rain punches and kicks and set-ups of your own.
It would be interesting to hear -his- explanations. I've heard some of LCD's (also of the Hong line) and some of the Joe Chens. LCD moves very free and loose, then wham!
I would You tube LCD as well.
Cheers
Dan
Last edited by Bodywork on Sat Jan 30, 2010 9:54 pm, edited 7 times in total.
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Re: Translation appreciated!

Postby WongYing on Wed Dec 16, 2009 4:51 am

Very nice shen fa, exactly what I was taught between right and wrong in the knee's, kua
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Re: Translation appreciated!

Postby ors on Wed Dec 16, 2009 6:04 am

Dan!

Your comments are just a pleasure to read! You should have to write a book or a blog or something similar! I will read that for sure! ;-)
Just one thing. In Hong's "practical method" book he wrote that the knees allways went up and down. One up, one down, not back and forth, but I think the meaning of this and your description is the same... :)

It is interesting to compare this shenfa to some other big chen names like Feng Zhiqiang or Tian Xiuchen.

I would love to hear your oppinions about their movements! :)

Örs
Last edited by ors on Wed Dec 16, 2009 6:04 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Translation appreciated!

Postby Bodywork on Wed Dec 16, 2009 7:25 am

ors wrote:Dan!

Your comments are just a pleasure to read! You should have to write a book or a blog or something similar! I will read that for sure! ;-)
Just one thing. In Hong's "practical method" book he wrote that the knees allways went up and down. One up, one down, not back and forth, but I think the meaning of this and your description is the same... :)

It is interesting to compare this shenfa to some other big chen names like Feng Zhiqiang or Tian Xiuchen.

I would love to hear your oppinions about their movements! :)

Örs

Glad you liked it. The quality of the knee going "up" leaves it no where to go but back. The knee going down leaves it nowhere to go but forward. so up /down is in/out.

Cheers
Dan
Last edited by Bodywork on Wed Dec 16, 2009 8:37 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Translation appreciated!

Postby Bodywork on Wed Dec 16, 2009 8:36 am

If you look and stop the vid at 0:30 you will see him demonstrating where his right knee is out and it "rocks" the foot to its outer edge. and this causes his left knee to collapse in and rock to the instep.
Then at 0:38 -0:40 he shows it done right; the right knee goes up and back and the left goes down and forward.
Though he shows it I think he moves the hips too much with his central axis. LCD is much looser and uses more dantian or waist pull and "pops."
The hips tied-to-knees is big hold back for those attempting the spiral energy I talk about.
I think that sums up what he is doing, I suspect it will line up with what he is actually saying.
Cheers
Dan
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Re: Translation appreciated!

Postby D_Glenn on Wed Dec 16, 2009 5:17 pm

In our style of bagua there are 2 primary ways the legs work: (the knee is always a hinge joint) 1- Hip and ankle work like ball joints produces a spiraling force called 'deng'. 2- Hip and and ankle work like hinge joints produces a straight force called 'beng'. The 'deng' force is more like a straightening and the force exits the back of the knee while the 'beng' force is more like a bending and the force travels out the front of the knee. Both are leg attacks against the opponent's but are also done in every step. One of the main reasons that IMAs practice without changing height and staying level is to develop power in the legs without raising or lowering the height of the body i.e. if you have to lower your height in order to develop a 'beng' /bending force of the leg then it will never fully develop, it all needs to happen between the hip and ankle.

Just my way of describing Bodyworks: "No up/down just in/out", or rather just forward/back.


On the hips/legs/knees there are different stances: 1- regular horse (kua and tailbone neutral), 2- 'bai' stance (feet point in opposite directions, kua fully open, tailbone untucked), 'Kou' stance or 'squeezing horse' (toes pointed towards each other with knees squeezing together, kua completely closed, tailbone tucked.


.
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Re: Translation appreciated!

Postby AllanF on Wed Dec 16, 2009 7:26 pm

ors wrote:Dan!

Your comments are just a pleasure to read! You should have to write a book or a blog or something similar! I will read that for sure! ;-)
Just one thing. In Hong's "practical method" book he wrote that the knees allways went up and down. One up, one down, not back and forth, but I think the meaning of this and your description is the same... :)

It is interesting to compare this shenfa to some other big chen names like Feng Zhiqiang or Tian Xiuchen.

I would love to hear your oppinions about their movements! :)

Örs

Dan
I completely agree with Ors post!

The was a wonderfully detailed and insightful post from you Dan very gratefully appreciated. I had wondered about Hong's "the knees go up and down" and though it meant straight forward/back (in/out) so it is great to get some conformation from someone with more experience than i.

Certainly give me a lot to think about and work on while i get the dicky left knee my mine fixed.
Allan
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Re: Translation appreciated!

Postby Daniel-san on Thu Dec 17, 2009 12:28 am

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Last edited by Daniel-san on Sun Apr 02, 2017 8:25 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Translation appreciated!

Postby ors on Thu Dec 17, 2009 1:54 am

Thanks Dan!

At 0:30 I think he actually speaking about what you have written the wrong way. He is showing and saying to his student something like: "If you used to do to move your knee inward the result will be that" and showing... So you are right.
I was taught to keep the "dang" (the arch between the two knees) round, while moving from the kua (inguinal kreese). How I see it is almost similar...

Have you ever seen my late shiye Tian Xiuchen performing chen style?
I would love to hear your oppinions!

Here it is:



Thanks a lot!

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