New Stuff Old Stuff
/Okay, now that the wood goat year has started I've got a lot to say. But first let me get some of this stuff I've piled up for you out of the way.
1.) This is a martial art dance form from East India. It has material that I know from Indian Dance and from Chinese martial arts. China and India have a lot in common culturally, but they may be a few hundred years out of sinc. Indian is much more comfortable with its religious localism than China is, that might be the biggest difference in the current era.
2.) Here is some footage from the Chinese demonstration at the 1936 Olympics. Awesome, some choreography, some games, Guan Gong wielding a halberd? what else?
3.) Okay, everyone has already seen and commented on this video. My only addition is that it is cool and was meant to turn teens on to archery!
4.) Good news, the brain heals! Maybe we can get head-attacks back in the NFL (American Football).
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5.) A useful discourse on the meanings of xing and ming in Daoist internal alchemy, Neidan. I don't think this is a great place to start although it is a good exploration of vocabulary. Think of these two terms as categories of discourse, a sort of short-hand for teaching.
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6.) Check out this awesome collection of old-time martial arts videos! Vintage baby! Epic Old Rare.
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7.) Here is the oldest Jujitsu footage ever taken. Notice how the pre-Fascism era stuff integrated theatricality effortlessly.
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8.) I thought I would write a whole piece on Prince Nassem, but I never got around to it. Everybody hates him because he was too much of a "show-off" and a case of "wildman beats the master." But, by breaking conventions he got great results. Okay, he eventually lost. Nearly everyone does. Does it matter that he lost to someone with more orthodox skills? Watch this highlights video if you haven't seen him before. I think people should study these outliers, he was obviously doing something RIGHT that no one else was doing.
