looking for a kung fu club

wewantchilly

hey am looking for a decent kung fu club in the louth/meath/dublin area. anyone have any suggestions?

aidan13

wewantchilly wrote: »

hey am looking for a decent kung fu club in the louth/meath/dublin area. anyone have any suggestions?

Where are you living, a new club opened up in Naas 3 weeks ago if that was any good to you.

paul moran

Op,
That's a wide area you are searching for a Kung Fu school. If you can let us know where you are we could probably help you better.

I for one run a Branch of YMAA in Deansgrange, Co. Dublin if that's in your range?

Goodluck with the hunt

wewantchilly

don't really mind travelling,based in drogheda,louth.
more interested in finding a style that is traditional then convenient so don't mind going out of my way.
have been doing a lot of research online and most of the info seems to point towards kung fu having no competitions or grading systems as it was established by monks. this is something that really interests me,so if anyone knows anything suitable...thanks again for any replies

Craptacular

Not sure what you mean by traditional but there's a wing tsun Kung Fu club in Blanchardstown.

www.wingtsun-Blanchardstown.ie and I believe the organisation also has a school in Finglas.

Doug Cartel

wewantchilly wrote: »

have been doing a lot of research online and most of the info seems to point towards kung fu having no competitions or grading systems as it was established by monks. this is something that really interests me,so if anyone knows anything suitable...thanks again for any replies

OK, a few things.

First, I think you would be better off seeing what's available locally and then picking from that. These kinds of threads come up all the time on the internet where someone sets their hart on something they've only read about on-line and then either gets disappointed when it's not available, or overlooks a great school on their doorstep because it's not exactly what they want.

Second, kung-fu is a seriously broad term, incorporating a wide range of very different martial arts. It's so broad, that you might as well just say you want to do martial arts.

Third, a lot of kung-fu places will do grading - even if gradings weren't originally part of the art.

Fourth, don't be so quick to overlook competition. It's a great motivator for improving your skills and testing your character. People do MA for all sorts of reasons, so I don't expect everyone to be solely focused on competition, but I think everyone should be open to testing themselves at sometime.

hisholinessnb

http://www.navan-lau-gar.com/

these guys have classes in Drogheda too I think

Michael O Leary

From what I know, the term "Kung Fu" literally means "Hard Work" and can apply to cooking for example. It is also used as an informal term to describe all martial arts, chinese and non chinese. The term "Wu Shu" is more of a formal term.

By contrast the term "Kwok Sut" is used to describe the national martial arts of China of which there are so many, the term doesn't really have any meaning in describing a style.

Also the term "traditional" can be subjective. Traditionally there were no gradings in Kung Fu. Also, traditionally Kung Fu was not taught to white people so the instructors who harp on about tradition can't have it both ways.

Traditionally in China a Kung-Fu student would live close to their teacher for their whole life and sooner or later they would receive the full system. However in more of a fast paced Western society it can help to have a defined syllabus and gradings and more Kung Fu schools do them now. For example I started Wing Tsun in Manchester and got my first student grade. Then when I moved back to Ireland I joined the Dublin branch of the international association. My 1st grade was recognised, I knew the same stuff as the Dublin 1st graders and I started on my 2nd grade.

I also find that students focus a little more when there is a grading coming up so I like having a structured syllabus. Is it traditional? I don't know and don't care. I am not a monk.

Also the issue of competitions is divisive. Some people feel it is a good way to pressure test the art. Others feel that a different skill set is required. I would lean towards the latter. I was in a Chinese full contact rules competition in 1995 and while I won my fight decisively, I felt that the skills needed for a competition were different to that needed for self-defence.

Hope this helps.

Regards,

Michael

Niall Keane

have been doing a lot of research online and most of the info seems to point towards kung fu having no competitions or grading systems as it was established by monks.

I think you're mixing it up with the 70's TV series!

Monasteries were used to avoid the law, just like cathedrals in medieval Europe, so inevitably martial artists ended up in some and continued to practice their arts.
Some places Shaolin monastery, Wudang Mountains, Emei Shan etc. became famous centres of kung fu. But these weren't like the movies, they were places people came to exchange and learn from each other, there were many masters and styles in each place, traditionally each were small groups. This continues... on Wudang you have massive wushu schools with 100's of students, mostly western! learning contrived exaggerated forms all day. But you also have Daoist Kung Fu priests on the mountain or staying in the Daoist centres and temples there; one I know has seven students and teaches them around one of the more secluded temples. He seems to know monks in loads of the temples, and brought us around to them; once he found out we were into fighting not dancing. So we all got to spar and wrestle with each other exploring technique and strategies. And we were going for it, there was a competitive element, how else can you uncover skills?
but there again look up any of the famous "style founders" you'll find them to be fighters and warriors, take Yang Lu Chan, whose demonstrations of fighting skills on competitive lei tai challenge matches earned him the name Yang the invincible! Do you think he would find anything in common with those who dance in parks "playing" tai chi?

Geezer1000

Youre probably sorted by now but chek out http://www.kungfu.ie