Jennifer Yuh Nelson

So I was listening to this pod cast about Jennifer Yuh Nelson who was very much a part of and one could say behind the Kung Fu Panda movies. Given how I have blogged about these movies to an obsessive degree in the past, like on the ethics and morality in the first movie, or applying the philosophies to my life
or Lord Shen's Death....I totally cried watching Kung Fu Panda 3... so basically even before I knew Jennifur Yuh Nelson's name... I was a fan. Hearing about the throught process that goes into making the movies... basically confirmed my suspicion's... that a true Kung Fu movie fan made the movies. Apparently the original concept for the film was going to be a parody... basically a children;s version of Kung Pow. Which, to be honest, before i had seen the movie, is what I thought it was. It wasn't until I had seen Kung Fu Panda several times that I began to analyze and think that it was awesome and worthy of being a Legend, a mythology, a bible for my own practice.

Jennifer Yuh Nelson talked about watching hours and hours of Kung Fu movies, Not just the good ones, but the bad ones as well, because some of them were so bad that they were good.

The truth is that even the worst Kung Fu movie has at least one or two aha! moments where maybe by accident or maybe despite all the BS that goes along with the movie making business they were able to touch a message, a truth, a higher meaning.

So I had always thought that Kung Fu panda, maybe by accident, had created an ultimate Codex of Kung fu by taking all those aha moments and putting them into one movie with a plot that flows.


"They don't put all that thought into it." people told me.

But people are wrong because Jennifer Yuh Nelson totally did put all that thought into it and she talks about it. Not just in terms of abandoning formulaic Kung Fu stuff, but abandoning text book story telling book stuff to go instead.. with reality.

And in terms of emotion, it was her intention to make Grown men cry. and she was successful and points to a large Football player type guy telling her that he cried as a point where she felt she had truly succeeded.

"You should interview her!" Grace said... "Because you ARE Kung Fu...the worst she could say is no."

In any case.. the pod cast was very inspiring. I think I will start drawing again and work on my books and what I am doing...and it would be awesome if I could get an interview of course or if one of the stories in my book became a cartoon. That would be incredible. But it got me thinking, I used to draw all the time... why have I stopped, and why have I not started  putting pictures to some of my stories? If for nne else... for myself at the very least?

Starting over.. slow.

Today we had our Saturday morning class. which actually went remarkably well. The reason why I say this is because my sons and students did a straight up adult class without any hand holding and that sort of thing. We just focused primarily on basics. For my students that have been away from practicing for a while this was a good thing, because many, including Noah, have forgotten much of the forms they knew. This made me feel like I was sort of starting over with them. Like I am going to have to teach Noah all the forms once again. It was aggravating actually.

But the basics were done. Done well? well the point is they were done without complaint, as long as in between sets of 80, they were able to run a lap around the house.

For the first round of forms, Dai Dai actually jumped in and challenged for most favorite son by being able to complete more of his form that he never really learned, than Noah was able to complete of any one form. This had Noah in tears of rage of course.

But eventually he "won" even though it wasn't really a contest, by completing two full forms.

And then when we went over one of the forms, chasing fist, slowly, like Tai Chi, I realized that we should be doing more of that. Going over the forms together, slowly like that. It's probably more important to go over the forms like Tai Chi than to do Mein Lei Jum... which he would have to learn anyway. Whereas reviewing the other forms might be enough to job his memory.

I have a new curriculum of jumping for Lion Dance too because I plan of starting them on that as well... and the brothers like it. Even though it is annoying that I have to start over with the forms.. in a way it is exciting too. It also gives Dai Dai some time to catch up.

Discipline

I have always been skeptical about selling "discipline." Mainly because I noticed that a lot of the undisciplined kids in a Kung Fu class are often better fighters. Also in terms of problem solving thinking all in one way can be a bad thing. However, after I went outside to water the plants and Noah had a bruise and cut under his eye from Jonah (you see Noah is bigger and better at Kung Fu... so Jonah threw blocks at him... Noah could not even say when or how he got hit. There is more to fighting than strength or skill.)

Well in any case.. I was getting tired of this nonsense. So I came down hard on "discipline" the only way I really know how... which is to have a traditional Kung Fu Class. we didn't do 20 minutes of meditation... but we did do a ton of basics. Well, we did what we used to do for the adults classes. I realized that they were willinng to go through with it as long as there were ample breaks. The breaks were running a lap around the house (instead of walking in a circle) That way they got a change in scenery. They didn't do that great a job at the basics... but I realized that even crappy half moves warm the body up to do the full motion. In other words eventually it makes them better. Also it was more about the ritual of bowing and following directions and all that. How am I going to fit this into the schedule once school starts? Well I am going to be teaching Lion Dance at Nativity Prep and the boys will have to do that. So that's a given. At least it has been proven to me that they can do a full on adults class. And then the other days? I guess we will do it outside the house just like now. In theory I can even do it after dark if I turn the outside light on. It's just good practice lining up and all that. I think our household should focus on that and take a step back from the militancy on the other activities... like violin and chess. Instead these should be the things that are done in recreation for rest. We'll see how that goes though.

Feeling the Heat

You know I think when I was younger, I would still practice in this full force... but now I'm like why? I mean I might meditate. But that's it. When it gets a little cooler in the afternoon I'll start doing my Mein Lei Jum Tai Chi thing... and I feel like, I won't really practice... instead I'll just do some of this... and I forget that some people JUST practice Tai Chi. So that should be okay to me to just do that too. Nothing wrong  with it.

Somehow since the kids came back I had trouble readjusting to practicing with them. Okay the basics and forms stuff, although I was doing moves with them, the energy that was taking place there with Noah complaining...at the end of that I don't feel like I practiced, because I don't have that feeling of endorphins and release and relaxation.  I'll have to start doing stuff in the morning by myself again. And it will have to be just a little bit of something before the kids wake up.

And at some point I have to start running through what we will perform too.

I have taken to painting the lion head with Dai Dai. It is painted not in the traditional Chinese way. I don't know what people will make of it, or when I should use it. It has a giant world tree in the back with a hand and an eye. If you read  my other blog with mostly fiction you can see a bunch of myths that basically blend the Chinese, Norse and Hebrew  and Christian Myths together into one thing that makes more sense with the current scientifically proven timeline and worldview... and is sort of Sci Fi in nature. Anyway, that's where the tree comes from, and I am going to have the 9 fire bird suns that Ho Yi shot down.. except I'm using an older name Shen I and mixing it with other stuff. In other words I am making heads that have a basis in mythology that I am also making up. All this has ties to Chinese culture.... but Klingon culture also has similarities to Asian cultures... doesn't mean it's the same thing. It would make sense to bring this head out for the Lantern Festival since the Moon lady features prominently in my stories.... maybe next year.

Basics and Forms

It's been a while since I made the kids do Kung Fu, like the traditional basics and forms.. but today I figured we would run through everything quickly before we started a water fight. But Honestly, my low standards... I was mad because I knew that they could do better, especially Noah. Jonah could do better to but he started just not participating, which wasn't okay to me. So I ended up taking a lot of time doing really simple stuff with them, when it could have just been a run through. In retrospect maybe it was a little much. I should focus on the big picture. Like maybe today they didn't take it serious... but what about after a week of it?

But I think part of it is also I was getting mad about lack of discipline. I mena these kids were acting like real punks every since they got back from Jersey. And for most things I just let everything fly. But for this I put my foot down. It's not like we were doing two hour horse stance or even 100 each basic. It was 10 of each basic... but you had to do it well.

I guess this will be an every day thing from now on, and Dai Dai is going to have to step it up. I had been only going over what we are going to perform, for the Lantern festival.. which I had still planned to do. This traditional stuff was just going to be warm up. But it's the end of the day... maybe we'll perform it for Mommy in a minute or so.

Onset

A lot of people get sick when it is too cold. But you know what? This is the second time that I've gotten sick just because I was out in the sun. I think I may have not drunk enough water. And Maybe it was because I was just sitting in wet sweat. But man am I weak in the heat. It's not like I was running around or anything either. And I'm not one to say "I'm dying!" I don't rush to get under AC. But I',m sneezing like crazy now after that Cape Verdean Festival in Onset. It makes me wonder if I should decide NOT to go to August Moon. But no.. I have to go. Plus, it's not like I will be working a tent or even performing so it's not the same.

I should have packed a swim suit to that Onset beach. Then I could have jumped in. I should have packed the ridiculous amount of water I usually do when I have the kids. I think I was deceived by how cool it was in the morning when I woke up at 6am.

Well going to the festival was an adventure to say the least. Pretty fun times. Should I blog about it though? I'm not sure. Maybe I'll save these stories for later or for fiction.

Excited about Saturday's Onset Cape Verdean Festival.

I'm going to be going to this tomorrow and part of it is I'm going to start writing articles about the Cape Verdean Community. This might seem sort of weird to some, since I'm not Cape Verdean, but the draw is to do something Like I have been doing with the Chinatown Blog.. except I will be a complete outsider. I am excited to do this because having blogged about Chinatown...I did notice a lot of benefits to being somewhat of an insider... but in many ways there were more draw backs to having those ties to the community. They were vulnerabilities and subconscious censorship as well as blindness to to things that only an outsider could see.

I'm pretty excited about this, like I'm travelling or at least stepping outside of my comfort zone. Part of it was talking to so many people in Chinatown who started off as outsiders but then quickly became a part of the community.

And getting mildly banished had something to do with it as well. It was a good and exhilarating thing, to be cast out, because it allowed me to look at everything as an outsider and travel elsewhere to do the same work and to learn from other people who are doing amazing things as well.

Then Sunday I will hang out in Chinatown for the August Moon Festival I won't have my kids and I won't even have my team. Which means I will have no responsibilities or strings or anything. I aim to have some fun being a tourist in my own community.