Kung Fu is a traditional practice in Chinese culture. More literally translated, kung fu refers to any skill that is acquired through practice, so many forms of martial arts are included in this term. It is said that Chinese martial arts originated in the Xia Dynasty, when the emperor introduced fighting systems to China as means for self defense, hunting, and military training. This past week we discovered a Kung Fu class being offered here at Peking University, so we decided to try it out!
Our instructor turned out to be an extremely experienced kung fu artist who even majored in kung fu in college. He took us through some of the basics at our first practice to give us a taste of Chinese martial arts. We began with some “qi,” which is an internal style of martial arts where we really focused on controlling our bodies and blood flow. Then, we moved on to “hand pushing” where were learned 2 basic patterns that actually turned out to be self defense moves (if performed correctly). In the second portion of our class, we did paired up and practiced a self defense move used to escape another person’s grasp.
Overall I found the class to be not only fun and useful, but also extremely interesting as our instructor filled us in on a lot of the history that has come with the practice of kung fu. However, kung fu is an extremely complex practice and has a deep history, so I hope I can continue to learn more throughout the rest of my stay here in China.
