forks are so rou-tine. ha!

If you're looking to email me, it's grahamrobertson@me.com. Use this instead of the U of A address, because I don't know how long I'll get to keep that.

Anyway, you're all probably wondering about the training. Now that I've had two weeks I feel sufficiently into it to describe what we do.

Every day I get up at 5:45 or so and go outside for the optional Tai Chi class at 6. We do that for 40 minutes or so, then practice qi gong (usually the standing cauldron) for about 20 minutes.

Breakfast is next, with a break until 8:30. Then we split into our individual groups and go for a run, about 1 1/2 to 2 km. We then warm up, which is mostly stretching and some basic techniques designed to limber us up, like hopping while throwing punches, stiff swinging kicks, etc. A favourite stretch is to put one leg up on the windowsill of the training hall and reach into it. I could barely get my leg up when I started but now I'm pretty comfortable. I can even touch my toes with one hand. Sometimes.

Monday and Tuesday we spend the morning practicing basics and forms. This often means holding stances with weights in our hands, such as horse stances with arms straight out. We also work on applications quite a bit, usually adopted from the forms. There isn't a whole lot of standing in a line throwing a particular technique--Master Wong (my Sifu here) seems to think the forms are sufficient for learning the techniques, or that we should be doing them with a partner. Usually form work involves him showing the student(s) a few moves, then we practice it for about 10-20 minutes or so. Then he looks at the form, corrects and lets us train more. If he thinks we have it, then he'll teach us a little more.

Wednesday morning is qi gong. It's at this beautiful little creek bed that feeds into a lake, where we stand on flat rocks jutting out from the water. We'll do the eight step qi gong form a few times, then practice standing and sitting meditation/qi gong. After that, when we're all chilled out, we do some hefty muscle conditioning. This usually involves bashing the backs of our forearms together and kicking each other in the legs.

Thursday morning we get into the padded sanda ring (which is actually a boxing ring with ropes, but whatever) and practice rolls and takedowns. We don't do a lot of acrobatics in our group, which I'm fine with. I'm hoping to at learn at least some fancy stuff before I go though, perhaps on the weekends from other students. The takedowns are all very fast and aggressive, due to the 3 second clinch rule in sanda. I kind of suck at these, but that just means I get to progress more. This is essentially the only time we train with mats. Everything else is on concrete.

Friday we'll do a bit of basics, but it's mostly power stretching. It's painful, but do I ever feel limber after having someone pull on my leg for 10 minutes.

Morning training ends at 12 (we have two sessions of 1 1/2 hours, with a 1/2 hour break at 10). Lunch goes on until 2:30, Usually I eat and then go have a nap or listen to music.

Master Wong loves Sanda (basically it's kickboxing with takedowns) so we train that Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday afternoon. It's mostly pad or bag work, usually with emphasis on a particular technique or combination. Pretty straightforward, with emphasis on repetition. The bags here are much harder than the ones at Silent River, so my shins are taking a bit of a beating.

Thursday afternoon is power training, which is by far the hardest activity. Lots of angled planks, wheelbarrows, bunny hops, bench pressing, vertical sit ups and weighted squats. When not doing that, we're hitting the bags. Both times have been brutal, but productive.

Friday afternoon is the mountain run, which I've already described. A great way to end the week, as after doing that I feel like I've earned two days of rest. Sometimes (such as yesterday) we have a theory class instead. It's nice to get a new perspective on the martial arts. Nothing earth shattering, but certainly different than what I've heard before.

All this is done by 4, though the afternoon training usually runs a bit late. Then both shaolin groups do the form He Ha Ha together. It's only five moves long, 3 of those are similar to the narrow kneel stance. We shout either "he" or "ha" together, sort of like doing Hsieh Chen. We'll do it around 5-10 times and while I'm always really tired and not stoked to be going so low and shouting, it's an invigorating way to end training.

Finally, at 4:30 is qi gong class, also optional. Usually it involves a half hour of the standing cauldron qi gong, though there are other stances and moves we do occasionally. Then we'll practice Hsing I or conditioning. I've tended to skip this class on Wednesdays, as I had spent the morning practicing the very same thing. I'm conditioning every day, however, even on the weekends. I hit tree (not particularly hard at this point) with various body parts (palms, forearms, shoulders, etc.) a few hundred times. I'm also falling in love with Hsing I. I haven't done much, but it feels great. Soft but explosive.

After dinner there are optional classes. Mon-Wed is a very disorganized Mandarin class, with massage on Thursday and Buddhism theory on Friday. Friday also has a calligraphy class instead of qi gong, but I haven't made it out yet. The massage classes are fantastic, as I get to spend part of the time as the dummy for my partner to massage. I'm into that, especially after a week of training. Then a shower and by 9:30 I'm in bed.

Weekends so far have been spent on walks, reading, watching a film or two (predictably, most of the people here are fans of old kung fu movies) and going into the city--mostly for groceries but occasionally just to wander around. Chess is pretty popular, both European and Chinese (which I haven't learnt yet), so I can usually get a game or two in every day.

So there is my routine in (probably too much) detail. It's varied enough through the week to hold interest, which is good. I starting to settle into the rhythm of the place, discovering I have a decent amount of time to myself. I was worried I would have to be so involved in training my other interests would get shunted off to the side, but I feel like I can maintain a healthy balance here.

Two more things. The first is that every day I do a form from Kempo, just to keep my memory up. Even though I'm sometimes destroyed from training, I know I need to stay committed to my kung fu and keeping it mine. Think about that next time you're thinking about skipping training, because I'm beginning to realize every time you do it's a step backwards. I've joined some of the students in doing a little bit of training Sundays, mostly because I'm working so hard now I can see myself progressing every time I practice.

Second is that I've been doing a lot of knuckle pushups here. On concrete. It really, really sucks. I'm working on back of the hand and tiger claw pushups, which will both take a while. I saw the Mantis Master doing dragon fist pushups. That's right, pushups only on the middle knuckle of his middle finger. I've made that one of my goals for the year.