Shown in the photo are Reza and Ray who are two of the main instructors for the University wing Chun club and also the Global Wing Chun Academy of Wing Chun. Ray teaches the classical art while Reza is the chief combat instructor for the street and military and police version of the art.
Shown here is some technique which looks like it is the Tai Chi movements called “Brush the Right Knee.” except the movement just came unexpectedly from some Wing Chun technique. The two arts actually have a lot in common anyway.
A weak point of classical Wing Chun are ground techniques because for the most part these were not considered useful for real street combat. However we have Wing Chun instructors who are also very experienced with ground techniques.
Shown here is Reza, who has extensive military combat experience. He is from Iran where wrestling is the national sport. When kids have a hobby over in Ian, it often is wrestling. Russia and Iran are always on the top in Olympic wrestling.
This was a Wing Chun demonstration we gave in the 1980’s to show our Wing Chun spear fighting techniques. One of our students also went to Japan and tried her skills against the black belt Naginata ladies there and found the Wing Chun techniques worked pretty good. Several of our member were fencing teachers with very fast footwork. One of our member was an Escrima expert. So naturally we tried Wing Chun Butterfly knife against Escrima sticks. I got whacked in the head real good because my footwork was too slow but when the fencing teacher tried the knives against the Escrima sticks, it looked like mutual annihilation. we had only trained the knife for a few months. So it’s all in the footwork.
One of the best traditional Karate clubs in Victoria, run by Sensei Richard Mark. He is very skilled and open minded towards all traditional martial arts.
UBC Wing Chun Club 1982
Dr. G.K. KhOe in the middle with Master Wang Kiu on his right. Ray Van Raamsdonk in the back row on the far left.
This was a 1985 seminar run by Master Wang Kiu, the teacher of Dr. Khoe who was my main teacher of Wing Chun. Wang Kiu was a very early private student of Ip Man. The seminar brought various people from other parts of Canada and the USA together.
Floating around the Internet is this photo which we produced in 1987 for an international newsletter called “Wing Chun Viewpoint”, to show the basic 18 Wing Chun hands. The hands are from Anna Lui and Ray Van Raamsdonk. In one place this photo has 45,000 views. Master Wong Shun Leung told me that not all hand positions or actions actually had names. The names are in Cantonese. We use mostly the English names since we are not in China.
A private lesson for Camila Kuljis - a super talented student, Marathon runner, Yoga teacher, and so many things.
This was one of the students of the ladies Wing Chun club that we ran in the 1990’s. Her father was good at fighting as well. His daughter was just 12 years old and when she hit me, I definitely got the wind knocked out of me.
Wing Chun’s Biu Jee or third form performed by Anna Lui
Photo1 is Khanlyn, from the ladies Wing Chun Kung Fu club doing the Chum Kiu form. Photo2: Kenneth Chung teaching Esther. Photo3: Ken teaching Ray on his rooftop penthouse. Photo4: Yvette Wong busting a board with a one inch punch, Jason Siu holding it (1985),Photo5, we visited the UBC club in Vancouver. Photo6: Dr. Khoe in Victoria on my home made wooden dummy. Photo7: Either Ray and Reza demonstrating something for the University class. Photo8: Reza, Aikido expert Mike Chin and Ray just finishing a demonstration for the Karate club.
Shown here is a 1985 picture of our Wing Chun class at the University of British Columbia. The club was run by Dr. G.K. Khoe, who was a professor of Chemical engineering. As an engineering professor, he explained everything in terms of engineering concepts. His teacher Wang Kiu on the other hand used to throw him around his kitchen , non stop and just told him to think about three things, his stance, his relaxation and being in the center. Dr. Khoe had background of Judo and TaeKwonDo. Dr. Khoe is in the back row, third person from the right. Dr. Khoe was one of the best teachers and very humble. He never used any titles such as Grandmaster this or that or even Sifu this or that. He was there to just share his knowledge. Everyone respected him without him demanding respect.
Raegan Van Raamsdonk practicing various Wing Chun maneuvers on a backyard tree which is the traditional training method when you didn’t have a wooden dummy to train on. The Thai boxers always train like that.
Wing Chun’s third form thrusting or poking hand performed by Guimei Yang
The Wing Chun third form has a lot of thrusting fingers actions, elbowing, foot sweeping and body bending. Attack now come from the side to the center. The whole supple body is used to generate power. This is different from power generation derived from the first two forms.
Some of our members sometimes decide to join an MMA gym because they like grappling. Because of MMA a lot of young people like to do that. However we also cover these ideas in Wing Chun except a street version where you don’t sit on people or do arm bars because you may be facing multiple opponents or armed opponents. MMA takes the Wing Chun art in the wrong direction. MMA is for ring competition and Wing Chun is for street combat, police combat or military combat. So we decided to prepare a program which shows Wing Chun people how to tweak there art for realistic self defense.
University is a good time to try various martial arts. Just studying all day without any exercise is never healthy. Students have to learn to not give up. Some students try three classes and then conclude a martial art is too difficult to learn. But for most arts it takes more than 10,000 hours of practice to become good. That includes any subject like piano, guitar, chess, ballet, piano etc. Martial arts teaches discipline which will translate to all aspect of a students life. If they succeed in martial art, then they will also succeed in life. I (Ray Van Raamsdonk) started Karate in first year University in 1965. Now I am age 74 and still going strong.
Anna Lui in the 1980’s performing the Biu Gee or third form, the 108 wooden dummy, sticking hands and the spear.
Teaching is an art. One can be a very good martial artist but that doesn’t mean you can teach the art. Not everyone can learn from one method of teaching, so a teacher has to sometimes adapt his or her teaching to the student’s capability and understanding. It is often a challenge to balance god fundamentals with the students desire want to be good at martial arts without any effort on their part. Too many fundamentals make the student bored but not enough fundamentals result in the student reaching an early limit such that any further progress is not possible. So we always try to balance fundamentals with interesting self defence applications.
This is section one of the live version (two people version) of Master Wang Kiu’s wooden dummy that he learned from Grandmaster Ip Man. In my BLOG section I talk about this version and there I have photos of two of my students, in 1987 who did it much better than I did. So if you are young then try their postures and if you are past 74 like me, you can try my postures. It’s only in the actual usage that the real postures or positions come out anyway.
Sifu Cliff Au Yeung Vancouver seminar our club attended in 2017.
sifu (teacher) cliff au yeung teaching the inch punch.
In 1967, I attended a Karate tournament hosted by Olaf Simon’s Karate club that I belonged to. Olaf Simon was a 7th degree black belt at the time. He would often fight multiple black belts at the same time. He also would defend himself against no pre-arranged knife and sword attacks and break large stacked blocks of ice or 14 patio blocks of cement without any spacers in between. He would always spar with every student in the class and always led the class with a rigorous military type of warm up that few of us could keep up with . Olaf Simon generated some of the best black belts in Canada in his time. I would say that he was my inspiration that resulted in my lifetime passion for martial arts.
It is impossible to judge something about a martial art without trying out that art to get beyond the basics. If you imagine taking a few years piano and are still working on the beginner song “Twinkle , Twinkle Little Star” then you can see that you will not really appreciate and understand anything written by Mozart, Beethoven and Bach. Likewise just knowing how the pieces move in Chess will not build any appreciation for the beauty of Chess. If you only know how to count, then how can you appreciate the beauty of Math? It is the same in Martial Arts, you have to give it time and not give up so easily.
In 1972 a Hong Kong magazine came and did a story on our Hung style club in Toronto’s Chinatown. The first photos is Ray teaching Hung style at BC Hydro in Vancouver in 1978. The next photos are from the Hong Kong Magazine. The student with the Butterfly knives was the best in the club, although everyone was super good since they trained 5 days a week with 5 hour classes.
Martial arts were invented for combat but most people in peaceful countries study them to learn a classical art. The learning process is good for brain and body health and many social connections can also be made. It is fun to learn martial arts in a cooperative way with others who have the same mindset. There is no room for people who cannot “empty their cup” and who must always prove their superiority to others.
When you have a large number of students, then it is best to be very organized in the teaching and have a definite curriculum with levels of achievement certificates. Our level one is everything to do with the first form and basic self defence. Level two is everything to do with sticking hands and closing the distance and club type of fighting Wing Chun vs Wing Chun. Level three is everything else including more realistic street combat, all the other forms like the dummy and the weapons and exposure to the other arts. My Hung style teacher James Lore always said it is good to understand other arts because you may have to fight them some day. In his day the Hung style people fought a lot.
Getting attacked by a Westcoast Academy of Performing Arts dancer at Costco!
Remei Van Raamsdonk and Ray Van Raamsdonk
I was just minding my own business looking for bargains at Costco when suddenly out of the blue a wild Ballet dancer tries to kick me in the head. Fortunately I have had 50 years of training to deal with that and so I was able to save myself in the nick of time.
These are a few photos from our 1987 video that covered all aspects of our Chi Sau or Sticking Hands program. Shown are Anna Lui and Ray Van Raamsdonk doing an elbow drill.
Wing Chun also has a three pole kicking dummy. We found a place outside in nature with three trees just spaced apart perfectly like the three pole kicking dummy.
Sometime like 2006
Sometime around 2006 garage club
Sometime around 2006 we had a garage Wing Chun club. Many people start to teach in this way.
Master Tsui Shan Ting, Anna Lui, Yvette Wong and Master Wong Shun Leung having some treats in Victoria, BC in 1992.
This was the largest display of Wing Chun ever. Shown here are 10,000 people in China performing the WingChun “Little Idea form - Siu Nim Tao” for the Guinness book of records.
Chinese calligraphy thanks to Guimei Yang. English calligraphy, thanks to Microsoft Word.
