Is Shaolin Do for real?

[LeiWuLong]

Wing Chun really? wow doesnt look anything like it to me, learn something new every day!

[WC_Lun]

80% of JKD is from principlies and teachniques from Wing Chun that Lee started to understand on a higher level. Just out of curiousity, what does real Wing Chun look like to you?

[LeiWuLong]

lol loooks alot like snak and crane, which is wat its based off i think

[WC_Lun]

Wing Chun itself doesn't have specific animal forms it is based on, other than to say it is a distillation of Shaolin martial arts. Naturally that means some of the movements will resemble the previous animal forms. I find it interesting that different people see different animal form traits in Wing Chun. When I was asked the same question, I saw snake and mantis, with a bit of tiger kung fu thrown in.

[LeiWuLong]

mmmm thought so.....

[Them's Fighting Words]

Originally Posted by Militis

I study an art called Shaolin Kempo Karate. We where karate gis and use japanese terms like dojo. Supposedly Grandmaster Fred Villari went around the world, got a bunch of really good styles, and combined them to make the four ways of fighting: Kicking, striking, felling, and grappling.

We use the 5 Shaolin animals: Snake, Crane, Leopard, Tiger, and Dragon. We have 108 Combonations, a thousand kempo techniques, and practical defence in every way. I know 10 forms right now, and I know that the high ranking black belts know way more forms than I do.

So I know there is a lot of valid stuff in my art, but is naming it Shaolin wrong? We do a lot of stuff from so many different styles. Our master seems to know a LOT.

I was always proud to say, "I do Shaolin Kempo", but after being on this forum for a while, I have come to just say "martial arts". It is like now I am ashamed to say I am apart of "Shaolin" because so many people here have said it is just a money making scheme or something like that.

So we have a completely legit art with seemingly unlimited material, and it has a name that people think is fake?

Someone please explain to me whether or not I can say I am a student of Shaolin Kempo proudly or not. It seems like if I did, I would just get cut down and told that I am not legit.

I've only seen American Kempo (Jeff Speakman's stuff I believe). They also use Shaolin in there name depending on thier target audience. Is you're school at all related? Btw: Interesting that you use exactly the same animal forms as Choy Li Fut. But then again, I guess five animals system is quite common. Though I have seen a system that replaces leopard with mantis.

Originally Posted by LeiWuLong

Damn straight! havent u seen The Tai Chi Master by Jet Li, he makes the dudes go down a rocky hill and recons if u die by getting a cracked skull your weak.......go figure crazy chinese warlords.....hehehe

Tai Chi Master rocks! But then again you're a Tai Chi practitioner so you'd probably agree.

Originally Posted by WC_Lun

Yeah, definitley some diferences...starting with the stance work. Hard to take a deep, long, northern stance on the side of a steep hill

Wow, I had always thought northerners had a higher stance and southerners had the lower stances.




What was the original thread about again? Shaolin Do. Um, yeah, got nothing much to add on that. Maybe I'll google it some time.

[WC_Lun]

TFW, don't waste your time looking up Shaolin do. Its a kung fu McKwoon