Tai Chi Training

As part of my continuing battle against an encroaching 啤酒肚, and in order to prepare myself to one day possibly begin thinking about starting to train to eventually win the first-to-a-six-pack competition, I've been taking the University-sponsored 太极拳 (Tai Chi) classes.

A word about the art. 太极拳 comprises the characters for 'too', 'extreme' and 'fist'. If that makes it sound pretty hard-core, it's really not. In fact, it's the sport of choice for pensioners here. At daybreak, scores of (mostly female) retirees can be seen in parks and public squares across the Middle Kingdom practising the martial art - exercise and social gathering in one handy package.

There are also competition styles which I understand are government-approved demartialised versions of traditional patterns and movements. These often up the difficulty level by featuring such movements as kicks held for extended periods far above waist height.

There are even combat versions featuring 'pushing-hands'. It's somewhat similar to wrestling. Strikes are not allowed, and combatants try to floor their opponent or hurl them out of the ring by using their foe's momentum and weight against themselves. It involves a lot of pushing and pulling, and manoevering of knees. The sport is in turns oddly elegant and surprisingly brutal.

The 师傅 is a relaxed guy in his fifties, who likes telling us his blood pressure is that of a thirty year-old, and boasting of his feats of physical prowess (Shaolin-style Kung Fu, riding a bicycle backwards). He's so relaxed, in fact, that I don't think he's ever bothered to tell us his name.

Like most practitioners of traditional arts, he attributes Tai Chi with mystical properties. To be sure, it has scientifically-proven, peer-reviewed benefits, but I'm definitely more than a little sceptical about his claims of its self-defence uses.

On the other hand, he wears a permanently glazed expression - a product of the meditative calm which Tai Chi produces in expert practitioners - which only goes to prove that he has Real Ultimate Power.

To my surprise, Tai Chi actually feels like a good work out - it involves a lot of slow, controlled movements and holding one-footed stances, interspersed with defensive and attacking hand movements such as the 包球 (hugging a ball) and bird-beak movements (pictured).