Yong Chun (02)

Dong Zhi (Tung Jik), Deng Suan (Tang Suen) learning Yong Chun at Bu Guo Xuan (Bo Guo Hin - name of place)
Xinjin's "liu dian ban gun" dominated the kung fu circles in the Southern part of China at that time. Since Feng was his student, Xinjin started to teach him his acrobatic and kung fu skills on the red boat. (The red boat was so small that when Xinjin tried to teach Xiaoqing the skills of using the kung fu gun, Xinjin had to use a shuang tou gun) (again this was recorded wrongly in the original article as the Luk Dim Boon was a long pole which was only 6 ft 4 inches long (this is Chinese length measurement which is longer than the English foot and inches). They also installed a Kwun Chong on the red boat, the Kwun Chong was made from a rectangular wooden frame , hanging onto the wall. The Chong looked like the Chinese character "fieri", with three poles at each side and one pole at the centre. The guns Jong (Kwun Chong) were hung onto the wall, and they have to be movable such that they would have the required flexibility. When practising the gun, the (chong) should be treated as a simulated enemy, and one has to practise liu dian ban gun of "seizing, fencing, pointing, revealing, cutting, transporting and dripping" till one can master all the moves flawlessly. All these kung fu techniques followed the Yong Chun school of kung fu. On one hand, Feng Xiaoqing was learning Xinjin's kung fu, on the other hand, he was responsible for folding up Xinji's theatre costumes. When Xinjin first asked for Feng Xiaoqing as his student, his intent was to train Feng as a kung fu actor such that Feng could replace his position in Li Yuan (Chinese name to describe the opera profession, Li Yuan is the Pear Garden, a place where the artist was trained) when he retired. After Feng Xiaoqing left the red boat with him, Xinjin continued to pass on his kung fu skills to him, as well as having Feng to practise his vocal. Yet when Xinjin asked Feng to try to sing a few lines, he found that Feng's voice was too low and hoarse to attract the audience. Xinjin knew very well that if one wishes to become famous in the theatre business, one has to have the voice, the looks and the skills. Even if you have the looks and the skills, without an enchanting voice, it would be very hard for one to develop a career in the showbiz world. Once he realized the weaknesses of Feng's voice, which made it difficult for him to get started in Li Yuan, Xinjin changed his mind. Instead, Xinjin decided to train Feng as a well-known Chinese kung fu master, in the hopes that one day he could promote the arts and skills of Yong Chun to the world. Xinjin went ahead and told Feng about his plan so that he could concentrate on practising kung fu and get ready to develop his career in the kung fu field.
Knowing that Xinjin had been devoting all his time to train him as a professional Yong Chun practitioner, Feng listened to his master's advice and focused on practising kung fu. Six years passed and Feng was now a twenty-something young man and his kung fu skills was superb.
Another two years went by. Getting older and older, Xinjin decided to retire. With Xinjin's retirement, Feng Xiaoqing had no choice but to leave his place. Upon leaving, Xinjin told Feng to introduce Yong Chun to the common people and carry forward the fine arts of Yong Chun. Feng complied and he first went back to his hometown Shunde, where he stayed for a short time. Meanwhile, most of Feng Xiaoqing's friends were residing in Fushan.
Situated at the lower stream of Xijian (West River), Fushan was one of the four largest cities in Canton (Guang Tung Province). As Fushan had good business ties with Guangzhou, Feng Xiaoqing decided to go there to try his luck. After bidding farewell to his family, Feng Xiaoqing went to Fushan and first visited his best friend Dong Weng (Tung Yung - Yung here describes a wealthy man). Dong Weng was from Nanhai.He had been keeping a flower shop at Huahong (Fa Hung - flower red which means red flower) Street in Fushan and the business was doing quite well. Even though Dong was older than Feng, they had become very close friends when Feng was still working in Long Feng Tailor shop. So once Feng arrived at Fushan, the first thing he did was to go to the flower shop to visit Dong. Feng and Dong had not seen each other for over ten years, and when Feng first appeared at the shop, Dong was very happy and introduced Feng to his two sons right away. His two sons, Dong Zhi (Tung Jik) and Dong An (Tung On) were both in their teens. Dong Zhi was the older one at eighteen whereas Dong An was sixteen. The two brothers had already finished school and were now working at the flower shop. In fact, Dong wanted his two sons to start taking care of his business as he wished to retire at an early age. The house of Dong Weng was located at Bao Guo Xuan in Daji. Bao Guo Xuan is a village town where hundreds of buildings were built in the area. The buildings were tall and spacious and Dong Weng's family resided in Bao Gou Xuan too. Every morning Dong left his house for work, and would not return and rest until late at night. Since Dong wanted his two sons to start learning about doing business, every day he would take them to the shop to do some hands-on training. Dong Zhi and Dong An had already met Feng Xiaoqing before, but it occurred when they were still little boys and they could hardly recognize Feng now.
When Feng Xiaoqing arrived at the flower shop that day, Dong Weng instantly introduced his two sons to him. Dong then started to tell his sons the remarkable story of Feng, being a student of the famous kung fu actor Xinjin on the red boat since he was a kid, and that his kung fu skills was brilliant. The brothers became very excited when they heard this, and both claimed that they had always had a love for kung fu. Back then when they were still in school, they would always make time to learn the Hong kung fu (Hung Kuen or Hung Gar) from a master Zhang (Cheung) at Yu Long Qiao every evening. That lasted for four years. Since Uncle Feng was such an experienced kung fu master, it would be a great opportunity for them to learn kung fu from him.

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