How much floor space does $300 of liquor take up?

So I got a few bottles of cognac today.

A few.

As in: three.

My Kung Fu master likes Cognac. And as a direct consequence of having met him, I've acquired a taste for it that I didn't possess before.

Anyhow, there's a big celebration and banquet coming up during which I happen to be one of three central figures. This is not a minor event, although very few people outside of thos who actually practice Kung Fu seem to realize just how non-minor it is. I'm being accepted as a disciple to an art which dates back 500 years. In short, it's been decided that I'm one day going to carry on the legacy and pass the knowledge I acquire on to someone else.

Yeah, this is a big deal.

So, traditionally, one gives the master a gift which he would enjoy. He has a great love of Cognac. Cognac, it turns out, is not cheap. Especially if you get very nice cognac. Cognac which has been aged many years to smooth it out; and if I'm going to be taught things that have only been taught to a select few throughout history, I'm not gonna cheap out on it.

Now, this cognac I got my hands on was not as expensive as some cognac out there (I saw a bottle which cost $7000), but it's not exactly a cheap acquisition, and it takes up less than a square foot of real estate on my floor.

Anyhow, I don't want to write about the price of cognac in Canada (title notwithstanding), but I guess I'm feeling a little introspective as the New Year has passed, and as I'm about to take a couple of big steps over the next few months. I'm becoming a disciple to a remarkable martial artist, I'm receiving my PhD. after four years of work. I'm taking my infinitely-better half to Europe for six weeks (a place neither of us has ever been). And throughout that time, I've had a constant companion in the martial arts.

I really wish I had the eloquence to explain what this means, but the truth is that I don't. The best way I know how is to say how it started.

Four years ago, I was in a bad place. Not that things weren't going well for me, mind you. I'd been accepted into a Master's program (the switch to PhD would come about a year later), my research was going well, but the bottom line is that I wasn't happy. A friendship had just ended under unpleasant circumstances, and I was dealing with it badly. I'm not generally prone to emotional outbursts, but frankly I spent about three months walking a very fine line between uncontrolled rage and deep depression. You'd be surprised how close together those two can be.

So I needed something to replace the hours that I was spending feeling sorry for myself. Hey, I'm not proud of it, but without going into detail (which I omit to protect the guilty), you can trust me that it warranted a little wallowing. I'd toyed with the idea of taking up a martial art before. I'd given Aikido a try while I was at UBish; a loooong time ago (picture a 12-year-old Drew in a white uniform and a green belt), I'd tried Tae Kwon Do; a mere few months before the events which lead up to this, I'd tried Kendo. All of which, it should be mentioned, are admirable martial arts. They just weren't for me. Tae Kwon Do, I'd done because I thought it was cool. Aikido, I took up because my significant other at the time had suggested it. Kendo, well, I don't know why I decided to try that one. It looked cool I guess.

The bottom line is that I was sick of feeling sorry for myself and decided I needed somewhere else to focus all that feeling-sorry-for-myself-energy, at least for a few months. Kung Fu seemed as good a place as any. One of the students I shared an office with ran a Kung Fu School; or rather he helped his brother run a Kung Fu school in his spare time, and three questions later, I was learning the White Tiger Style of Kung Fu, along with two buddies from High School.

My life improved rather sharply. I'm not sure to this day whether the two were related. But I was happier, I was healthier, I lost weight, and my endurance and strength increased beyond what I thought was possible. For the first time I could remember ever I realized that I could say that I was happy without a little voice in the back of my head saying no, you're not.

Some time after I came to that remarkable realization, I met April. To say that the two of us hit it right off would be both a cliche and an understatement. I'm not prone to romantic language, but in her I found a half of myself I didn't even realize was missing. Ugh, that sounds so... ugh. Not untrue, mind you. But... ugh.

Like I said, I'm feeling a little introspective, so bear with me.

So we're at now minus three years or so, and I'd been studying the White Tiger Style of Kung Fu for about eight months. I was learning a lot. I ascended quickly to the Blue sash level, and was working on the Green Sash forms and techniques. I managed to pass my test for the Blue sash while doped up on decongestants. An accomplishment I'm actually kinda proud of to this day. It had taken me almost two years to get to that point. I wasn't an asskicker by any description of the term, but I had learned a lot in those two years.

And somewhere in there, the completely unexpected happened. Suddenly, Kung Fu wasn't a crutch anymore. It wasn't something I did to smooth the wrinkles of my life. It wasn't something that made my life easier. It was just something that was there. It was something that just felt right. Like it belonged in that one spot in my life. Like it had always been there.

Keep in mind, when I'd started, I'd intended to keep with it for a few months at most. Now I was going on two years.

October, 2005.

The White Tiger school my two companions and I had been studying at was closing its doors. The young man I'd studied under directed me at a Grand Master of a different, but related style of Kung Fu, and that's where my pursuit of Bak Mei began.

I'm not going to go so far as to claim that it was a moment that changed my life, but I will say that it was a moment that I still use to describe it. It was one of those moments where we describe all the others as "before this," and "after this." This was one of those moments. I started learning this style of Kung fu in a cold basement in the middle of Chinatown. A tiny little building that I'd never have noticed if not for the fact that I needed to climb down into the basement three times a week to learn a style of Kung Fu that I'd never even heard of a month ago. I know, it's weird when I put it that way, but the fact is that for the last almost-three years, Bak Mei has been a dominant positive force in my life.

And I learned. Under the steady tutelage of a Chinese Grand Master and his two existing disciples, I learned the art. I learned to Lion Dance. I Taoist philosophy and somewhere, something was unlocked. Another piece of me that I didn't even realize was missing was added, and suddenly I found myself wondering how I ever managed without it.

Again, I draw your attention to my lack of eloquence. I don't want to say this sounding as if Kung Fu was just a crutch for me. The best way I can put it is that it's part of me. It isn't something I do anymore. It's part of who I am.

On March 10th, I take another step. I'm taking it with the same two companions that have been with me since the beginning. The people who shared the same journey. I'm taking it with April, and I take it surrounded by other students and by the man who got me started on it all.

There are worse ways to spend an evening.

The year of the pig

Okay, so every Chinese New Year, I do a whole pile o' lion dances all over Chinatown, and every year I end up pretty much immobilized by the Lion Dancing marathon that inevitably takes place every time we do it. Every year I swear that the next year, I'll take it a little easier, and every year, I make myself a liar.

Yeah, it's that time of the year again.

We started our hefty Lion Dancing schedule this weekend where we threw ourselves with hopeless abandon into the traditional Chinese lion dance at every store, every mall and every establishment and organization in Chinatown, and a few outside of Chinatown. We did a couple of Kung Fu demonstrations and, yes, we all ended up feeling pretty damn sore at the end of it.

Right now, non-steroidal Anti-inflammatory drugs are my friend. Ibuprofen, very good stuff. Without it my neck would be so stiff that my field of vision would be uncomfortably small.

I'm knee-deep in lion dances, Kung Fu demonstrations and Chinese food. I'm fed, I'm fed up; I'm sore, I'm stiff.

I'm loving it.

Welcome to the year of the pig.

Define "Glutton for Punishment"

So.... Chinese New Year.

You know, I can't even claim I didn't know what I was getting into this year; 'cause I did it last year and I remember how pretty much every single muscle in my body was aching for the subsequent month.

At least last year, our lion dancing for Chinese New Year was spread over two days.

Not so this year. We did it all in one day. Eleven hours straight of Lion Dancing. Now that may not sound like much, but I was pretty much exhausted by the time we called it a night at 8:00 pm.

But the good news is that I survived. I'm alive and breathing.

Tired, yes.

Sore, hell yes.

Every muscle in my body feels as if it's been beaten with a rubber baseball bat.

Next year, I really can't claim that I didn't know what I was getting into.

Welcome to the Year of the Fire Dog.

A world of hurt.

I've been taking Kung Fu now for about two years; and that's a pretty hefty workout regimen. Three nights a week, I spend three hours working out with the school; on nights when I'm not in the school, I spend an hour working out alone (beating the snot out of a heavy bag, practicing forms, etc.); and as if all that wasn't enough, a buddy of mine comes over once a week and we spar for about an hour.

Suffice it to say that until this weekend, I thought I had a reasonable idea of what pain is.

My mistake.

My Daai Si Ying brought some of his best and brightest (and me) in for a private lesson on Sunday wherein we learned some of the deeper secrets of Kung Fu; and believe me, there is quite a bit of depth there. The great thing about this is you learn so much by doing it; the unfortunate thing is that you come to realize just how much you don't know.

Suffice it to say that in terms of workout intensity, this we're sitting in an entirely new ballpark.

In hindsight, it probably wasn't the smartest idea for me to do a long day hike (a little over 13 km) the day before, followed by a three-hour Kung Fu class that night, followed by a three-hour private session the following morning.

In short, I hurt. A lot.

Dances with Lions

So, we did another lion dance this weekend.

One of my office mates was gettin' hitched. I wasn't actually invited to the wedding, but I ended up crashing it 'cause my Kung Fu Studio was hired to do a lion dance at the reception.

So, as of right now, I'm officially the only bachelor in my office. Kinda scary considering that one of the people I share an office with looks about 16. I think he's mormon; although in fairness, I don't actually know exactly how old he is.

I do know that there's no way in hell he's over 20, though.

An old high school pal of mine is about to pop out her first kid, another just announced his engagement, another former acquaintance of mine (I don't really talk to her much 'cause, frankly, she's a bitch) had twins a few months back, and now I have an office mate who just got himself Ball-and-chained.

Wow.

When the hell did I get all grownupy!?

It kinda sneaked up on me. I'm thinking career, home, life, family. What happened to the day when the biggest concern I had was when the latest Transformers toy would be on sale? And, yes, I am aware of how much that dates me.

Not that I'm feeling any particular pressure to change my current marital/familial status. Things are going very well (amazingly well, considering the jackass April has to put up with) right now, and at the moment, as far as I can tell, neither of us really feels the need to change anything. Granted, things may change in the next few years, but for the moment, what's the rush?

On the subject of not wanting to grow up, April and I went out to see the latest (and, I'm hoping, the last) installation of the Star Wars franchise. Actually, this one wasn't so bad. The first two "prequels" were, let's face it, lousy in a way matched only by the Lord of the Rings trilogy (although, I must confess that watching Yoda hop around like a green monkey on speed almost makes Episode II worth watching in and of itself... almost.); so I walked into this one with my expectations low. Maybe it's because my expectations were so low that I enjoyed it, I dunno. That's a philosophical debate for another time.

Episode III will likely not go down in history as a masterpiece of cinematographic work. It's well-done to be sure, the special effects are spectacular and very nearly make up for the (many) shotcomings in the script; frankly, a lot of the dialogue needed some work. Ewan McGregor and Natalie Portman; both very talented actors; were noticeably struggling with this movie, and many of their lines came off as forced and/or hoaky. Not through any fault of theirs, the script was just a litle weak in some places. And Hayden Christensen spent most of the movie pretending to act. But, one could forgive his stony, semi-emotionless exterior in this film; he's turning evil, after all. He almost managed to pull off cold, obsessed and emotionless in this film. Of course, that's not too different from his performance in Episode II when cold, obsessed and emotionless wasn't quite called for, but here, it actually worked.

So, without spoiling the movie, I suppose I can offer the following critiques:

Ian McDiarmid plays "creepy" better than any actor in the universe.

Natalie Portman: easily the most talented performer in the entire movie, pity the script wasn't good enough for her.

Ewan McGregor: Manages to accomplish what can only be described as a miracle, considering the aforementioned weakness of the script

Hayden Christensen: One day, he will learn to act, I just know it.

Samuel L. Jackson: Who's the black private dick That's a sex machine to all the chicks? Shaft!

Yoda: Easily the best-acted character in the entire film, and he's entirely computer-animated.

Okay, that's me signin' off for now.

Lion Dancin', Beer Drinkin', Stuff breakin'

I'm starting to wonder if I have some inherent desire to hurt myself. Wouldn't surprise me, 'cause right now, I hurt like a sonuvabitch, and all of it is voluntary (if not self-inflicted).

We did another lion dance yesterday. It went very well. We ended up doing what's called a "bridge dance;" which, believe it or not, is actually kinda tricky. It involves dancing back and forth on a rather narrow (about 10 inches wide) bench, doing some impressive acrobatic maneuvers, and making it all look good. Rather difficult, actually.

So, when we actually get on the bench, my partner and I need to do some rather impressive maneuvering. It's not traditionally part of the dance, but we have to do it 'cause my partner's short and she can't quite pull off the mount. Dismount she's fine with; 'cause gravity does most of the work; but the mount is a little finicky. Since nobody really pays attention to the Lion's tail, she uses her hands to help her get onto the bridge (it's about a three-foot hop that she can't quite make).

Now, things get tricky. Do do most of what we need to do on the bridge, she now needs to be controlling the lion's head, and I need to be the tail for the simple reason that most of the maneuvers we need to work our way through involve the person controlling the tail lifting the person controlling the head in the spinning them around a few times, and depositing them back on the bridge (I would like to take this opportunity to reiterate that the bridge is very, very narrow). So, as she climbs onto the bench, I duck and cover as she leapfrogs over me, grabs the lion's head and takes over.

As I dropped, my left foot slipped, and my shin slammed hard into the edge of the bench.

I don't think anybody noticed, but it hurt like a sonuvabitch. This would be the first of several injuries I would be subjected to that night. The rest of the dance went without incident (which my lion dancing partner greatly appreciated, since a screw-up in this part of the dance usually involves her faceplanting on the bench; it's a small miracle that she hasn't broken her nose yet).
Then came the Kung Fu demonstrations.

Now, Bak Mei is generally not a flashy art (nobody will ever make a movie where the protagonist uses Bak Mei); but the demonstration I was doing was a form called Daai Sek Sze (directly translated: Big Stone Lion), which involves the one flying kick that exists in this particular martial arts style.

One unfortunate detail: you have to both push off and land on the leg that I'd just whacked against the edge of a wooden bench (and which, I hasten to add, now has a bruise roughly the size of a large orange, or a small grapefruit, on it). Walking on this thing hurt. Imagine what landing on it must've felt like.

And this kick is performed twice in the form.

Ouch.

The first one went well, relatively speaking. I don't think anyone in the audience saw me wince as I hit the ground. The second one didn't go so well. I think I new what was coming and I braced myself for it. But when I hit the ground, my leg buckled, and my ankle rolled over.

Ouch.

I finished the form; but I was pretty much limping off the stage at the end of it.

So we finish the demo (I had another form I was supposed to do, but I had to hand it off to my Daai Si Ying; the top student; largely 'cause I could barely walk, much less hop around looking like I was beating the crap out of someone).

So, the night ends, we all take a bow. We weren't required to do another lion dance (Thank God), but I was hurting pretty bad at this point.

And the night had barely started.

One of my fellow students was having a housewarming party. Lots o' fun.

I mentioned in an earlier posting that Kung Fu practicioners like to break stuff. Not necessarily in huge quantities; but we do like to break things. Usually after consuming a beer or four, because alcohol allows Chi to flow more freely. Or so they tell me. Either that or it's just an excuse to get drunk and break stuff.

Anyhow, after everyone's had a couple of beers (or more), we start breaking things. We start easy: beer bottles. Hell, we had a bunch of 'em anyway; so we might as well, right?

The only hard part of a beer bottle break is not ending up with a bunch of shards of broken glass in your hand at the end of it. The object of the exercise is to strike the lip of the bottle, and make the bottom of the bottle burst outward. You start easy: filling up most of the bottle with water, and as you get better, you progressively remove about an inch of water from the bottle. I've seen people do a beer bottle break on completely dry bottles. I can't do that. The people who do it with dry bottles are the ones who can break rocks with their pinky fingers (which, by the way, I also cannot do). I can do it at about 2/3rds full, but it takes me a couple of tries.

So, my Daai Si Ying is getting somewhat impressed. We decided to proceed to chair lifting. This consists of grasping one of the legs of a chair where it meets the ground, and lifting it off the ground.

Try it; it's a lot more difficult then it sounds. You have to manage to shove that leg under the chair's center of gravity, then lift it straight up. All with one hand.

And as if all that wasn't enough; my Daai Si Ying decided to put some weight on it. He found a box of somethingorother (I think it was books), and told me to lift it.

So I tried.

I failed miserably; twice. At which point he handed me his half-empty beer and said "drink this, and try again." So I hammer it back, next attempt is successful.

I'm starting to get slightly ripped at this point. And the Chopsticks come out.

Chopstick breaks are kinda fun. The object of this exercise is to punch into the air, holding a chopstick in the punching hand, and the force of your punch combined with the inertia of the chopstick makes it snap. We use plastic chopsticks; but I've seen it done with Bamboo; again, by people who break rocks with their pinky fingers. So, Daai Si Ying hands me a chopstick, and says "break."

It takes me a couple of tries, but the chopstick breaks.

So, he hands me two chopsticks, and tells me again: "break."

This one took me a little while. These were thicker chopsticks than I'm used to; but they broke nicely.

So, he hands me three chopsticks.

I can do three on a good day. And these ones were just being damned stubborn.

"Does anybody," Daai Si Ying asked, "have a beer they can loan this gentleman?"

Immediately, six people are thrusting half-empty beer bottles in my direction.

Not that I'm complaining, mind you, but at this point I'm starting to think I have to work tomorrow and I really don't wanna be hungover. Fortunately, I took the train to the party, so I didn't need to worry about that; but a hangover was really the last thing I needed.

And lo' and behold, they break.

So I'd had enough of chopsticks, so I sat down.

You'd think I'd have quit while I was ahead, right?

No; my Daai Si Ying had one last thing he wanted to show me. He stands me up and he shows me a series of joint locks; which is basically the ultimate in mercy fighting. The basic principle is that if you force the wrist to the point where it can't bend any farther, the elbow bends to copensate. If you force the elbow, the shoulder takes over. You force the shoulder, and the hip takes over. Once you've got the hip, they're screwed. You can basically force them to the ground by shifting the position of their arm very slightly (the farthest he had to move my hand was about eight inches). So this exercise meant that I spent a disproportionate amount of time saying something to the effect of "Okay, you can stop right there; I like my arm in one piece thank you very much," or "pray, dear sir, could you see your way clear to not breaking my wrist?"

Just 'cause I'm in pain is no reason to be rude.

So, my wrist is now the size of a canteloupe; or at least it feels that way.

Yeah, I'm starting to wonder if I'm a glutton for punishment.

Ouch.

I'll say this for Lion Dancing, it has a way of making you rather brutally aware of every single muscle in your body.

We probably put in a total of about thirteen hours of lion dancing this weekend. Thirteen hours. That's a long time to be dancing under what amounts to a gigantic blanket. Actually, it went very well. I enjoyed it enormously, and I have a really good partner for the dance. We've got a solid level of communication going on between us.

She was a huge livesaver yesterday, and I'm not at all certain that I mean that figuratively. We were dancing around a mall. Lots of fun, stopping at stores all over; doin' a little dance, grabbin' a hunk of lettuce, taking our paycheck; etc, etc. etc.

My partner and I had just completed five consecutive dances (which doesn't sound like much, but trust me, it takes a lot out of you); three of which required me to lift her onto my shoulders. Suffice it to say, we were both rather tired. Nobody was coming in to spell us off, and it was getting to the point where I thought my back was going to be permanently fixed at a 90 degree angle from my legs. So, someone comes in to replace my partner, and at this point, I'm dying. We do two more stores; my partner's replacement is all fresh and energetic, and here I am just trying to keep myself upright. We do another store during which I'm pretty sure I heard my lower back screaming in protest.

So, my Lion Dance partner (God bless her) shows up after only the briefest of breaks to let me out of the tail, while I'm wondering if she's gonna have to physically pull me out of the lion tail and roll me out of the way. It very nearly got to that point.

She managed to get her butt out of the lion a little farther down, but I cannot emphasize how much I needed that one break.

All in all, this weekend went well. About eight hours of lion Dancing on Saturday, another five-ish on Sunday. I think I lost about 30 lbs in the last 48 hours, and it ain't even over yet.

We have another dance on the 18th, which includes some rather nicely-done Kung Fu demos.... well, hopefully nicely done. The first demo we did turned out quite nicely, so I can't complain there.

If all goes well, we'll give a hell of a show on Friday.

Lions and Kung Fu and Swords (oh my!)

So, we survived our first show, managed to keep ourselves breathing, keep ourselves together, and the show went without any real hitch. All in all, no complaints.

We started with the Lion Dance (and that's L-I-O-N, not L-I-N-E), which was probably the single most solid lion dance we've ever done. Everything just came together. Linda and I walked through our corners and did our routines without a hitch; something which pleased me to no end, since there was a time when we weren't sure if she'd even be in the dance tonight. She was, which made all of us very happy. It would've been kinda a bummer for her to be put on the bench 24 hours before the show.

My solo form went very well. Not perfect, mind you, but it was solid. I messed up in a couple of spots, but I don't think that anyone in the audience noticed.

Rock breaking, wire breaking, chopstick breaking... Kung Fu folks in general like to break stuff.

We then jaunted over to the local Chinese restaurant, loaded up on more food than I thought I could fit in my li'l stomach, and more cognac than I knew I could afford, and generally had a good time.

All in all, last night goes in the books as a success; for SiFu, for the school, for me personally, and for all of the students.

Yay.

Hoppin' around in a lion suit.

We're learning Lion Dancing right now.

And when I tell people about it, you'd be surprised how many people confuse it with "Line Dancing." The looks on their faces are really quite classic. It's as if they expect me to suddenly sprout giant shitkickers and a belt buckle the size of a dinner plate.

But I digress.

Actually, all told, I'm quite happy with the way things have gone so far. I'm learning more than I ever thought possible in Kung Fu. I'm becoming a half-decent dancer. Quite impressive, considering that I currently buy my shoes in left pairs.

And, of course, having to stare at a young woman's butt for the duration of the dance is not exactly something that I find problematic.

All in all, I'm quite happy with the way things are turning out.

I'm really wracking my brain to see if I can remember the last time that my life was this good, and to be honest, I can't. Everything seems pretty much perfect for me right now. My career is starting to take off, my life is in some kind of order, I'm happy, I'm healthy...

April and I will be hiking the West Coast trail in August; just after we hit the two-year mark. My dad says that may make or break the relationship. Frankly, I don't think that it's something we really need to worry about. Seven days, 75 km. We've hiked trails that had roughly the same "miles per day" factor, and were much more strenuous. A friend of ours said that "if you can hike Three Isle Lake, then the West Coast Trail should be no problem." Three Isle was the first trail April and I ever hiked.

Suffice it to say that it's going to be something of an adventure; and I, for one, am really looking forward to it.

We're going to do a lot of weekender hikes this coming summer, once all the snow melts and we can get our butts out of town. I want to hit Three Isle again, just so that we can both see how much easier that trail is now than it was for us when we were just starting. I'd also like to hit Turbine Canyon. That's a little more grueling, but I think that we can manage that one pretty easily.

And April's a good hiking partner to have. I tell ya, that girl is tough with a capital "T." With all the things that went wrong on our first jaunt, I was shocked to find out that she wanted to go out and do it again, but go out we did, and we slowly escalated the level of difficulty until we were hiking Yoho at the end of the summer. Next summer's climax, methinks, is going to be the West Coast Trail.

The only problem is: what the hell are we going to do to top that!?