Yu Bin gave me a task, which concluded writing an article about how traditional Gongfu (especially Tanglang Quan) should be trained and I’m happy to tell you, the first draft is already finished. For now it’s in German and will be posted here on this blog, but I’ll be working on a translation as soon as I finalize the German one.

We also talked about how to get the abstract theory and basics that are inherent to Tanglang Quan more clarified not just for students in our family, but for everyone out there. So (hopefully) starting soon, we’ll post more and more translations and explanations of the basic theories like 12 keywords, 5 principles, 7 long 8 short, 12 soft 8 hard on the website of the Wan Fu Qingdao School in the philosophy section (under training). Some are already online – thanks goes to Yu Bin’s Tudi Felix, who besides his job, managed to translate all those for the website. For now it’ll be just these bits and pieces, but maybe they’ll find their way into a book of sorts, but keep in mind all of these won’t make you a better practitioner, a good teacher and hard work does!

It’s been more than 5 weeks since I moved here and I know it’s also been nearly a month since my last real post on this site. We took lots of pictures, but most of them are inside of restaurants. Seems like the only thing we’re doing these days is working, sleeping and – on weekends – watching movies and trying out nice food places – doesn’t sound very interesting, but it’s been relaxing and fun. I’ve also been cooking a bit more these days.

As for gongfu, it kind of looks like my blog activity. First I was busy, then I was lazy and now I got problems with my wrist, but I’m planning on definitely starting training in May! – I promise

A really well done and creative self-introtuction by gradtuating designer 马文

Source: 八八吧 :: 88 Bar

Today I’m gonna look at some apartments around Wudaokou. Seems like there’s lots of nice and cheap ones free at the moment – the recession also has its’ good sides

Nothing very special these days. Seem to be allergic to something floating around in the air these days. Oh, nearly forgot: NEVER drink a “Green Tea Latte” at Starbucks!!! The “Green” in doesn’t mean real green tea (like any normal person would think), but some kind of sea-weed tea!! I posted a pic of that “delicous” brew and yes, it really tastes as bad as it looks!

The past weeks were filled with my last exams, a (really interesting) scientific paper we wrote, finding someone to take our apt in Cologne and miscellaneous – seemingly never ending – last preparations. But there were also lots of “goodbye meetings”, which – though kinda sad by definition – were lots of fun.
I really have to thank my girlfriend and my family for bearing me and my stress-induced moods.

But now I’m here and staying (at least for 6 month). And as lots of people asked me to keep them updated I thought of reviving this blog and add more personal posts to the automatic del.icio.us news and occasional videos I’ve been posting lately.

As I got a nice new cam (Canon IXUS 980 IS), I’m also gonna try to post some more pics from time to time.

The flight with Air Emirates was ok. I met a young Chinese guy, 啊佐 , who works as a cook in Den Haag at Düsseldorf Airport who coincidently had the seat right next to me on the plane to Dubai. Scince he didn’t talk any other language than Chinese it was quite a good way to get used to talking more Chinese. We talked nearly the whole 6 hour flight and spent the tiring 5 hour delay in Dubai together. The next flight we were seated seperately, which gave us both an opportunity to sleep a little.

Arriving at the new Terminal 3 in Beijing half an hour early, we got through passport check and customs quite fast. Somehow everyone bringing food to China got checked, but packing only (lots of) chocolate I got let through after a quick look into my bags.

The rest was quite uneventful: taxi – hotel – text parents – sleep

And now? Here a quick excerpt from my todo list:

• find an apartment
• extend my visa
• meet the professor
• start working
• meet the gongfu teachers
• start training
• …

I’ll keep you posted

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After training we got invited to 火锅 (hotpot) with some chinese friends of my 师伯 and too much beer. So training today in the morning was accompanied by a little hangover. At noon we (together with a korean taekwondo master and two men from chinese customs duty) got invited to lunch by some co-worker of my 师伯. The rest of the day is still not planned out, but it’s also good to have some time for relaxing (and writing blogentries) right now.

I’m staying with german friends (Hanno and Marcel) who live close to 五道口 (Wudaokou), which is my old neighborhood, so I can easily find my way around. They’re pretty cool folks so I’m most probably staying with them longer than planed. We get along quite well – training and partying together.

The first day already started quite nice. I arrived at 11 am and after getting some food and fixing my mobile, we already had Taiji training. Afterwards we invited my teacher to 火锅 (Hotpot) and had some beers. Then we went to meet some people at Lush and had more beer and some absinth And as it wasn’t too far we moved over to Propaganda for some dance action. Even this club hasn’t changed much, stll HipHop music and full of Koreans… ^^ and it was still fun, so that we were home at about 7 am.

The next day at 9 am my good friend 费艾 (Fei Ai) called me and wanted to go shopping. I was already awake so I joined her to a tour of 西单 (Xi Dan). Afterwards her parents invited me for dinner, which was very nice, even if I was really tired. In the evennig we went out with about 8 chinese friends to 三里屯 and partied till about 2 am. This made me get over my jetlag pretty fast.

So what else am I doing here? Besides one day I attended Taiji Training everyday (yesterday even twice). 张老师 (teacher Zhang) has imrpoved a lot and his teaching method, too. He now tells me lots of background info and corrects every movement very detailed. At the moment I’m working a bit on my 一路 (first form) and started out working on my 二路 (second form) intesively again, which this time really feels a lot better. I’m getting explained a lot of the 发力 (fali/fajin) movements and some of the ones I never got before, now are working at least a bit. We also did some 推手 (pushhnads) yesterday.

We also had the Birthday of my 太极 (Taiji) teacher on Monday. We just had ordinary training at the BLCU campus when one of the guys told us that it’s 张老师’s Birthday. So we asked him to get some food after training. He was happy to hear that and invited some of his friends and some other close students to have a small dinner at a restaurant not far from his place. As we were a bit early he invited us to see his home, which was a really interesting experience. 张 lives right next to a train station not far from 五道口 (which he finds very comfortable, but should also be very noisy). His home is a small hut with two rooms, made completely out of concrete. There is no flooring and there are only public toilets and showers. He lives there with his wife and two daughters (one is 5 years old the other one just 6 month). He even told us that he’s paying 700 kuai a month for it and that he can’t afford anything else cause of two kids and his only job being teaching 太极. But he’s still happy having anything he needs and doing the thing he loves most.

At the restaurant – as usual – we had lots of great food and also lots of beer and 二锅头 (Er Guo Tou). One friend of my teacher, who is a tailor mostly doing gongfu and taiji uniforms, had the great idea to outfit all attendees of the dinner with a specially made taiji uniform for free (advertisement purposes), so he took our heights and preference in color one by one even calling his wife/girlfriend to get detailed measures of us. The night ended with most people really drunk (not me) at about 2 am.

Also I feel my chinese has imrpoved a lot. I don’t have any trouble communicating with anyone and most things I wanna express get understood pretty ok. I even talked to some people about politics and other “deeper” topics.

Till now, I haven’t met up with too many people, as lots of them are working or attending classes, but that will hopefully change soon. Also I’m planing to visit my 师伯 (gongfu uncle) 于斌 (Yu Bin) in 青岛 (Qingdao) next weekend. Really looking forward to that one. This weekend I’m most probably meeting up with Rene (my kungfu brother over here) and also with some of the other gongfu teachers I know (and maybe don’t know).

Pictures of the first night

Pictures of the second night

Pictures of Zhang Sheng Yi’s Birthday

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