I showed up early, for me, for my first class of 2009 at the park. Only a couple of students were there, but Teacher X, Mr. V and Qingfeng showed up later. It had been so long since I practiced that I lost my place a couple of times while practicing the sword form. The empty handed form is feeling better, though.

An older guy came up and introduced himself as being from Yuanshan and wanted to practice tuishou with us. Teacher X said ok, and the guy started to practice with Mr. Hu. Next he practiced with me. He was very soft on the outside and rigid inside, and we soon began to do moving tuishou instead of stationary for some reason. I could smell some kind of alcohol on his breath and wondered if it were medicine or just booze. He got weary of pushing at me with no real results; I was disappointed when he began resorting to quick, violent shoves. Still, it was interesting to practice with someone outside our group.

I then practiced with Qingfeng, who is really into researching and thinking about tuishou. He is the hardest of anyone there (besides Teacher X, of course) for me to push. I then practiced with Mr. V, who has given up on the quick shoves but is still convinced that rigid, unidirectional power is the way to go. I got pretty tired as I’ve been out of things for a while for various reasons, but it was good to get back into it a bit.

I was sick last week so I didn’t go to classes until this morning. When I exited the subway station in the park I couldn’t spot any of the familiar purple uniforms our group wears, but as I approached the spot I found Teacher X and Mr. V sitting talking with the guy who bangs his wooden stick on things. Nobody else had bothered to show up for some reason.

Mr. V was tired of sitting around, so we started practicing tuishou immediately. Usually I like to warm up with forms first, but it’s not that big a deal. Mr. V’s technique has improved a lot as he implements more subtlety to his strategy, but eventually he will resort to the quick shove. One of the biggest differences between us is how we lose. When I get pushed, I just take a gentle step back, but when Mr. V goes down, he quickly jumps back a few steps, even though I never use that much force. He’s like a spring in that respect.

The weather was strange today, warm and sunny one moment, cold and cloudy the next. After the others left I went through the forms, but I felt like I shouldn’t have still been there. Tai-chi practice in the park is mostly a morning thing, and by the time I left it was pidgeon-feeding time for the kids and families.

Many years ago I sustained a fairly serious injury to my left knee, and as a result it’s a little weaker than my right knee. Therefore, I’ve been practicing more with my left foot back when doing tuishou than with my right foot back, to compensate. Lately I’ve found that I actually do better with my left foot back than the right. Does this mean it’s recovered? No, I think it just means I get more practice in that position.

“Merge your energy with that of your opponent,” Teacher X told us as I practiced with the UPS guy. I guess it’s the only way to manipulate them.

Last Saturday at 2/28 park was brilliant. The weather was perfect. A really old guy sat watching us practice, the same guy from last time. I keep meaning to ask Teacher X who he is, and then forgetting. I was practicing with UPS Guy yet again, and doing pretty badly, when Teacher X told me to forget about what was going on in front and concentrate on pushing “the skin of his back” instead.

It was like night and day. Using this mindset, I didn’t get all bothered about what was going on with all the hands and elbows and shoulders; it didn’t matter. All I had to worry about was the skin of his back, just that, and suddenly it all became so simple and easy. Of course, visualizing oneself in the same way is harder, and I didn’t do so well with that. But I was pretty happy to have gotten at least that one idea down.

UPS Guy also had some advice. Actually, it wasn’t new advice. People are always telling me to “relax” and pushing will become easier. However, we were talking about just what that word meant, and I realized that it wasn’t just to relax your muscles, though it also does mean that. However, in this context it primarily means to put your body into a more comfortable, stable position, even if that means tightening and moving through less comfortable positions on the way there. For example, if I am being twisted and pushed by someone, I could either relax like a rag doll, but ideally just returning to a stable “default” position instead of resisting or just relaxing works much better.

I will have to look into this idea more carefully in the future.

Since construction has completely enveloped the opera hall veranda, and the staff didn’t much like our tromping on the grass in the park at CKS Hall, Teacher X decided to move our weekend practice sessions to 2/28 Park, formerly Taipei New Park. The park is a traditional arena for pushhands and other martial arts groups to train, in the shade under the trees on nice, flat (if dusty) ground.

Our group was easily identifiable by our purple uniforms. Later, Little Mountain Pig told me he doesn’t think we should wear uniforms, as he says it causes other people to be hesitant about engaging us. Pig almost never wears his own uniform, though. He says he’s “not the uniform type” and simply let his wear out. I suspect he places a certain amount of value in the fact that he’s been studying so long he’s worn his uniforms out, and doesn’t want to be seen as a newbie student. I could be wrong, but he seems keen on assuming a teacher-brother” role in the group, especially since he fell out with Little Qin.

Teacher X was talking about a guy wearing a red shirt leading a nearby group. “He loves to brag,” he said, telling us how the guy boasted that he was then-President Clinton’s Tai-chi advisor when all he really did was make a weekend trip to the US. I wondered if there was some history there, as the guy was almost near enough to hear what Teacher X was saying. It’s not really my business, though, so I didn’t ask any further.

Nearby drink machines ate my money like the stock market, so, unlike the average US house buyer, I decided not to give them any more and went out of the park to a 7-Eleven for water. Pig said the water fountains in the park were safe to drink from, but I decided to play it safe for now.

I pushed with the UPS guy and Yang Qing-feng, who hasn’t shown up in a while. NL Guy and Mr. V were there as well, grappling around with each other. Although the ground is level and smooth, every gust of wind blew up a miniature sandstorm that left us coughing.

I felt a lot more on display at the park than I usually do at other practice locations. Although I didn’t catch anyone staring openly, I got the feeling that people were curious about us. I’ve heard many stories about outrageous challenges and fights going down in the park between rival groups. “Some of those guys will stop at nothing to make sure you lose a bout,” Teacher X told me, which explained a little how Weeble was so interested in practicing there. Still, practicing with other groups could be educational.

Teacher X is climbing Yushan this weekend, though, so no class. He wasn’t at Sun Yat-sen Hall last night, either. I’m sure the other students will go, but I probably won’t. The weather’s supposed to be crappy, anyway.

Three older men showed up at practice today at CKS Hall. We’ve moved from the opera house down onto a grassy field by one of the lakes due to construction work. The three men were from Tainan, Teacher X told me later, and were part of a group of people studying tuishou by themselves without a teacher down there. The three, Seven-Samurai-like, had come up to Taipei to seek out a real teacher. Presumably their village isn’t under siege by bandits.

Teacher X talked with them and gave them a few lessons. For some reason. No Lose Guy decided to impart a few lessons of his own, with less than stellar results (let’s just say his nickname isn’t a terribly great description of the encounter).

The three had their pictures taken with us and then left. I talked with Teacher X about a group with no teacher, how that could possibly work. I also asked him about the Hung-men group, which I’d seen on a Discovery Channel program recently. “It’s a KMT-group, founded back in the days of Sun Yat-sen,” he told me. “They’re a good organization; they help each other out.” I was surprised to hear this from Teacher X as he is generally as pro-DPP as they come, but then again I shouldn’t be surprised to find a more subtle understanding of this society from him as compared to English teachers who can only hiss and spit whenever the KMT is mentioned.

Politics aside, the day was clear and bright, with a refreshing breeze. Teacher X taught me some more form moves, including a rather difficult one that involves quite a bit of knee work. I’ll have to get used to that one gradually, I think. “When doing tuishou, remember that you have many joints in your body,” he told me. “Usually, flexibility in just one is all you need to deal with anything your opponent can throw at you. Of course, two or more is even better.”

I didn’t get to do any tuishou, unfortunately. After the others left, I went through the sword form a couple of times, more difficult on the uneven ground, and then went to take pictures of the floats for the upcoming Dream Community parade, which was starting from Liberty Square.

I’ve been going to class three times a week lately, and practicing during my daily hikes up the hill behind my house as well. All of the practices seem to flow together, though; it’s hard to describe any one thing.

Basically, I’ve been working on connecting. I am able to disconnect during tuishou, but connecting everything together takes more work. Little Mountain Pig said that ones arms should not move of their own accord, rather every movement should derive from the torso’s movement. I find this quite helpful, actually. Teacher Xu said that, most of the time, ones elbows stay around the 90-degree angle, whereas more goes on with the shoulders than most people realize. He also told me to get more in the habit of spreading my hands flat instead of cupped, as is natural. Apparently this helps with the whole connecting thing.

The construction fumes at the opera hall at CKS Memorial were overpowering last Saturday, so we adjourned to the park under some trees, which was nice. I twisted my leg practicing with the UPS guy, though. I really need to protect myself better with some of the more violent students, and not get into it with them so much. On the other hand, I think I deal with them better than used to.

I’ve been going to more classes recently, so it’s hard to document each one. I may just stop doing a post for each class and just write when I feel like it.

In any case, the more I study tai-chi and tuishou and the like, the more I realize how deep the rabbit hole goes, and how little I actually know. There are a million things about each little thing; you could spend a lifetime on just one move, let alone an entire form. While this is pretty cool when you think about it, it’s also not a little disconcerting.

Little Mountain Pig has kind of taken me under his wing, so to speak, lately, and is putting me through his kind of training, which sometimes gets pretty intense, for me, anyway. It’s good practice, though. He does a lot of moving-feet tuishou, as well as scimitar work. Though I have a scimitar at home, I’m not going to study that for a while yet.

“Push like you’re trying to hold a fish in the water,” Teacher X told us the other day. I think he meant gently, not with a sudden jerk, though. There’s a woman who practices with us at Sun Yat-sen Memorial during the week. She’s very violent and even left No-Lose Guy with a bruise on his chest (though that may be his fault; I imagine that he is the Really No Lose Guy when practicing with a woman). I practiced with her once and came away with a sore arm that she nearly yanked out of its socket. I don’t know what she feels she has to prove, but I wish she’d get it out of her system.

This last Saturday Teacher X told me about keeping my hands straight and positioned so that my energy is coming from my spine and stance rather than from my arms. I think this may be quite important and one reason I have such a hard time attacking effectively and efficiently. By twisting and holding your hands and fingers just so, you are connecting the energy in your body. I’m not bad at disconnecting, but I need to work on connecting and utilizing this energy.

I went to Sun Yat-sen Memorial on Thursday night, as I’m thinking of changing my class schedule to Tuesday-Thursday-Saturday instead of just Wednesday-Saturday. Yonghe is also a bit out of my way and runs too late. Also, I am looking into maybe adding another night of badminton, which I enjoy, on Wednesdays.

The space at SYS is smaller and more crowded, however, and it’s hard to find space to do the forms. I suppose it’s more about tuishou anyway; CKS Hall is better for the form stuff.

In addition to Teacher X and the one woman in our group, as well as Little Mountain Pig, NL Guy and some of the newer students, there were several students there I didn’t recognize. One of them was NL Guy’s 17-year-old son. He was surprisingly easy to push, the opposite of his father. He asked me if I was going practice there regularly. I said probably.

“That’s good,” he said. “I need to practice my English.”

“What does you’re English have to do with me?” I asked. We were conversing in Chinese, by the way. He hemmed and hawed a bit, then changed the subject.

“How long have you been in Taiwan?”

“Longer than you,” I said.

The other unfamiliar student turned out to be all attack and no retreat, I found after practicing with him for an exhausting 15 minutes or so. It’s good to practice with other people and extend one’s experience.

I borrowed the woman’s sword to practice that, but the balance was really strange, and I had a hard time of it. Pig lent me his scimitar, which, though shorter than most, was also really heavy. With a scimitar, however, you pretty much let it do all the work. I’m not sure I want to start on the scimitar form just yet, though. There’s also tai-chi staff, which I think would be more accessible, but again, I’ll leave that for later.

On Saturday I went to CKS Hall’s opera hall to find it practically taken over by people affiliated with a basketball contest. Our group was smushed into a corner. Little Mountain Pig wasn’t there, so Teacher X and I talked about how much he likes to teach other students. An older guy, not in uniform (I don’t think he’s really part of our group) was pushing with Mr. V and another student while NL Guy chatted with Teacher X and another student, the new guy from the kung-fu school.

I practiced the empty-handed form and then watched a firetruck crew release a pigeon that was trapped in the hall’s roof netting before going through the sword form. After everyone else had left, NL Guy and I had a pretty good practice. The reason it went better than usual, I’m guessing, was not only because I was avoiding attacking him, as he seems to take any hint of an attack as a personal insult against him and his entire family, but also because I figured being generous is the way to go when pushing with him; whatever he wants, he gets, basically. As little resistance as possible, just a smidgen of sideways effort to put him off course enough to disarm him. When I tried to explain this to him, he just said, “Yeah, but your attacks are terrible.”

Saturday was interesting. I got some good advice on my form stances, mainly that I shouldn’t go up and down so much. I have bridges where I should have on-ramps, in road-terms.

Little Mountain Pig and I practiced moving tuishou, which was a real chore for me. Incorporating footwork into the equation really shakes things up, at least if you’re not used to it. Pig was performing quick, forceful attacks as well.

After class we went to a nearby apartment building so that NL Guy could pick up a new sword. The woman who operates the place let us in after Teacher X called her from the stairwell where we were all congregated, earning us a few curious stares from the other residents. The apartment, about the size of mine at a bit over 20 pings, was full of swords and other weapons. We all got to try out many different swords and other things. I was tempted to get another sword, but I can’t really justify spending the money, and my swords suit me just fine already.

That was Saturday. On Wednesday night, everyone was already at the park at 8:30pm, which is early for them. I practiced with Guo for a bit before being able to go through the form, working on correcting my stance and other problems Teacher X had pointed out. Then I practiced with one of the new guys, who adopted a prizefighter stance, sans the bouncing, for his pushing. All I had to do was wait for him to unbalance himself, but it was interesting anyway. I practiced with Weeble, who apparently has gone out to Tucheng to challenge a group out there, and “won”. “You should try it,” he said to me again. “You’d do well.”

Yang Qing-feng was there, and I practiced with him a bit. Practicing with Qing-feng is different than it is with the others, as we both know when the breaking point is about to be reached, and he stops before pushing me over most of the time. It was more like a game of chess than a wrestling bout.

Teacher X told us that pushing should be without force, as force destroys the very thing you’re trying to achieve, force simply creates more opportunities for your opponent. “So it’s kind of like pushing bubbles,” I said, and he nodded. “Like pushing very expensive, million-dollar bubbles up onto a shelf,” he said. He also reiterated the fact that in general straight lines are easier to manipulate than curves, and it’s not a bad idea to keep this in mind when considering one’s stance and strategy. “Why concentrate only on the points of resistance?” he said. “There are so many other points to use!”

He also cautioned us against signaling our intentions with our hands. “Just place them,” he said. “Energy flows towards emptiness on its own.”

I’ve decided to keep writing in this account, at least what I feel appropriate, for now. If this means omitting a few things here and there, so be it. I’ll just have to decide it myself.

Little Mountain Pig, Weeble, Guo, Teacher X and his son were all at the park last night when I got there, relatively early at 8:30. Usually nobody shows up until around 9. I warmed up with the form while Weeble and Guo went at it. After that, Pig got out his wooden swords, and we practiced “tuijian” or “pushing swords”. Basically it’s just tuishou with swords. I used to do it before with another sword student friend of mine who disappeared, but that was many years ago, and I’m really rusty at it. It was interesting and instructive, though, complementing the form as tuishou does, in that it’s more real-world and interactive. “Not bad,” Pig said afterwards. “You’re not afraid of the blade, anyway.” I had to switch hands every so often as my shoulders got tired, even though the wooden sword is much lighter than either my real sword or my practice sword. I don’t get tired doing the sword form, but tuijian lasts a lot longer, and you’re actually dealing with another person’s force.

Pig tried to get Guo to practice with me, but he refused, insisting that he was just learning sword. I found this odd as Guo was practically teaching Teacher X’s son the sword form. Weeble was game, though he would only use his right hand. I was a bit wary of Weeble; if it was anything like his tuishou, he’d be doing quick surprise thrusts that could hurt someone, even with just a wooden sword. Fortunately, he never got his weapon into position to do anything of the sort. He started to run around in order to get into an attack position, but I called him on it.

After that we put down the swords, and Weeble and I practiced normal tuishou. Weeble is still very rigid and unyielding, committed to pushing with pure force. I asked him why that was, and he told me “someone” told him he was too soft. “That’s hard to believe,” I said. “No one in our group, I hope?” He said it was someone outside our group, in another group. “Why are you listening to them?” I asked.

“Because I want to compete!” he said, trying to get me to attack with more force. He highly recommended going around to other tai-chi and other tuishou groups and trying them out. While I’m interested in experiencing different styles, etc., I’m not remotely interested in competitive tuishou. It just seems like the antithesis of the whole idea behind tai-chi.