A new challenge (1)

Reading time: 6 minutes. Video: 2 minutes.

And there I was,

suddenly in a stately Greek-style building that had previously served as a hotel on Shenjing Shan, a sacred mountain for Taoists in the Shandong province in eastern China.

The past year has really flown by. On 8-11-22 I consulted the I, Ching (the famous Chinese oracle Book of Changes) with the question whether I really needed to pursue my desire to learn Tai Chi with shifu Qu (or Master Chu) in China. I used the coin method and from that came the following answer: “What are you waiting for?!”

It's not that a long-cherished dream is now coming true. I started this adventure a bit the same way I started physiotherapy training: relatively blank. There was always an interest in the body, but I had never been to a physiotherapist and knew nothing about the profession or workfield. In the same way, I have been interested in Tai Chi for quite some time but have never taken a class. Apparently, I like to jump into the deep end without a lifebuoy.

Anyway, Tai Chi fascinates as a dance, movement and art form. Not only is it aesthetically beautiful, but proper execution requires incredible mental and physical balance and coordination. Perhaps the lack of it in periods of my life has been an incentive for the fascination, yet what is certain is that I recognize its value for entering the second half of life happy and healthy.

Video & edit: Erik Stout
Music: REDproductions

There are suitable arrangements for every stage of life and that also applies to sports and exercise activities. Explosive sports like football, tennis, basketball etc. we can perform fine at full strength in the first half of life, but for the second they are less suitable due to obvious reasons. Nevertheless, the body can still be kept in optimal shape and condition, provided we have not become entangled with the desire to perform as if we were still 20 (whereby I now look mildly but somewhat sternly at some of my very beloved and terribly stubborn clients from Amstelveen, you know who you are).

For a long time I was an evening and night person and loved to go to bed late. During the active period in music, I was at home several nights a month between 3 and 4 a.m. and for the past six years at least three nights a week around midnight. That was wonderful but in recent years I began to notice that the fuel tank was getting a little emptier than before. At the same time, getting up earlier gave noticeably more energy than before (or so it feels anyway). Those experiences turned the thinking towards a reset: what would life look like if we got up early every day and went to bed earlier?

In other areas, curiosity also began to be aroused. The longest period outside the Netherlands was almost three months in 2016, after visits to India and Chiang Mai in Thailand. How would a longer stay in an unfamiliar country with said culture and language change my perception? How would I cope with physical or mental suffering? Can I adapt to a tight daily rhythm that’s not my own? By learning Tai Chi in China, all these issues are addressed.

Let's go through the daily rhythm. Every working day there are four trainings: at 6:00, 8:30, 10:30 and 14:30 (the weekend is free time). Monday looks like this:

06: 00 hours: about 1 km of warm-up jogging, stretching, gentle tai chi movements, static qigong.
07: 00 hours: breakfast
08: 30 hours: a lap of more than 2 km of warm-up jogging (with about 100 meters of altitude difference), stretching, joint warm-up exercises. Then kick and stand exercises and then form (in my case Tai Chi). Ends at 10: 00.
10: 30 hours: about 1 km of warm-up jogging, stretching, form.
12: 00: lunch
14: 30 hours: the 2 km round of warm-up jogging, stretching, joint warm-up exercises, Sanda (Chinese kickboxing). Ah, I hadn't taken that into account, but what an incredible kick to learn (pun intended!)
16.15 hours: half hour Chinese lesson.
17: 00 hours: dinner.

The time schedule is similar for all working days. Yet there are accent differences in the workouts, for example extended qigong on the Wednesday morning, power training on the Wednesday afternoon, Chinese massage/TCM on the Thursday morning, a mountain run and calligraphy on the Friday afternoon. But that's not all, because not only do we learn the Tai Chi as we know it in the west (the slow movements), but the application for self-defence is also immediately taught here.

In one of the first forms of Tai Chi, we hold an invisible ball with the right hand in front of the chest and the left hand below the navel. Then we make an exit axis to the left, turning the body counter clockwise and stroking the palms flatly along each other, bringing the left hand to face level, and the right hand sliding down towards the right hip. Beautiful graceful movement. But as self-defence, we grab an opponent's arm with the right hand and pull it towards the hip while the left hand goes towards his face and we plant our shoulder in his armpit. In this way we almost break a person's elbow and he is therefore under control.

How do we practice that? Just by simulating this against a birch tree. That sounds uncomfortable and it is, provided the right technique and the right place are used. To be honest, the little that the tree gives makes one enthusiastic for quick learning.

Looking back at the first three weeks, the first week was very getting used to. With stretching on Day one I already stretched the muscles on the inside of both upper legs resulting in beautiful blue-yellow spots and the following week I walked as if there were pads between my upper legs. But now the rhythm is settling in and honestly, there is an energy and focus emerging I have not experienced before. At 05: 30 I get up and at 21.30 I go back to bed (then wifi and lights go out). I find being physically active every day incredibly awe inspiring, not least because we train outside for the most time. Between trainings and in the weekends I work on this website and Mandarin. The food is delicious and the surroundings beautiful. Even the weekly room inspection I welcome with open arms!

In other words, sofar so good. An interesting part of the adventure is that, unlike most cities in China, cash is still used here in the countryside. So far, only the Bank of China has been gracious enough to accept my passes, but for that I have to drive about an hour and a half in a small bus to get to a city where that bank can be found. Fortunately, there is a French fellow student who is quite handy with Chinese public transport apps, so I didn't end up stranded somewhere completely unknown, because my Mandarin is still far from adequate to move independently with public transport. But hey, we live and learn.

I will report on the environment and the way of teaching in a subsequent blog.

Finally, I love working on this website, both to create the content and to get the site working and running. Since I am not a webmaster there will still be enough aspects that do not work well so feedback is appreciated!

Jolly greetings,
Erik Stout

Featured image: Sasint