Good Silat

[angryclown]

The first couple minutes of this video is very similar to what I've been exposed to from really good Silat players who have used their art for fighting.

Internet Silat guys seem to gravitate towards the fast hands making lots of slappy noises, but what really makes silat work is the refined use of footwork and angles to disrupt the opponent while both protecting yourself and setting up your next attack. The fast hits are mostly just overwhelming an already compromised opponent. Basic silat is a few simple patterns applied in a variety of different ways. When I see videos like this, I can't help but think that while the mechanics are different, much of what they show tactically can be accomplished with the small jins in the first few moves of Yi Lu-- in particular jingang and the first half of lan zha yi.

 

[Marin]

The first couple minutes of this video is very similar to what I've been exposed to from really good Silat players who have used their art for fighting.

Internet Silat guys seem to gravitate towards the fast hands making lots of slappy noises, but what really makes silat work is the refined use of footwork and angles to disrupt the opponent while both protecting yourself and setting up your next attack. The fast hits are mostly just overwhelming an already compromised opponent. Basic silat is a few simple patterns applied in a variety of different ways. When I see videos like this, I can't help but think that while the mechanics are different, much of what they show tactically can be accomplished with the small jins in the first few moves of Yi Lu-- in particular jingang and the first half of lan zha yi.

Silat is an interesting case in that it very often looks similar in application to TJQ. It makes me wonder who brought whatever art from China to Indonesia. Might it actually have come from the north?
Although applications look similar at times, obviously body and power development is not particularly. It seems silat uses a kind of local "external" limb power made effective by really limiting it to basically a straight forward shot each time. That straight shot becomes a varied angle method only (based on that footwork that you refer to) and the sudden changes of body center such that it looks like a lot of different small angles. In that sense it kind of reminds of the aggressive simplification done in so-called 'practical method' of Hong Junsheng; cutting away so much of the nuance and complication in favor of just a few straight forward simple powers, but then walking and turning on the delivery platform... ALA baguazhang. BGZ would focus on a wide variety of oblique and weird powers few would expect and put them on that mobile platorm. This, it's like 3-5 really simple almost straight shots that become varied only by the positional changes.

Anyway that is what I came away with after a glimpse. I am especially partial to striped pajamas, for practice, and starched white shirts firmly tucked into slacks with striped neckties as practice attire.

 

[angryclown]

This particular style of silat was overtly influenced by Chinese martial arts-- they were called kuntao locally, but I don't know where they came from. A lot of hard smashing and bashing to complement the sneaky footwork of silat. It is very simple and somewhat mechanically crude, but those are actually good things when you're trying to keep someone from stabbing you without requiring years of practice to get functional. I think the younger brother of the family (not shown in the video) first stabbed someone who was trying to steal his food when he was in his very early teens while interred in a Japanese run camp in Indonesia during WWII. Tough times in a tough part of the world.

What I find interesting is how the crude "external" applications are embedded and available in yi lu right alongside the subtler applications that require more refined jin to work. They still require good body mechanics, but it's "normal" good body mechanics, and is only enhanced by superior root and shenfa, etc. They would still work with just the architectural shapes of the form and basic physics. If someone wanted to go the fighty route, it seems like they could start with the gross applications to get the dynamics of fighting down, and then iteratively start adding in more refined jin, similar to how we learn the form in gross "square" movements to establish the different elements before smoothing things out later on.

 

[Maou]

Are you familiar with the name "Bob Orlando" (RIP), by any chance?

I think you'll be interested in seeing his old DVD instructional on Kuntao-Silat:

These videos were uploaded by Mr. Ron Richardson, who I believe is the Head Instructor who took over after Mr. Orlando, and according to the description, this is posted with copyright permission, so it should be fine to share here.

 

[angryclown]

I met Bob a couple of times, and cannot say enough nice things about him as a martial artist, teacher, and person. His art was/is pretty unique to his school, as it was what he synthesized from his own exposure to kuntao silat and some other arts. Great dude, though, and he said some really good stuff in a conversation I had with him years ago that I still think about today.

 

[Zhuolun]

Not to divert the conversation away from Bob, but the discussion about silat reminds me of something that I would like to mention as a branch that maybe we can pursue fruitfully.

It has to do with something I never got around to figuring out, involving responding to somebody's grabbing your wrist by touching your nose of all things. Why does the nose touch work? Is it something to do with the centerline? I'm sure we train the same principle in taijiquan. Can maybe someone who can see what's going on comment or mention a parallel move in our form that has a similar jin?

See here, anchored by timestamp, for first a brief preliminary pinch that maybe people will like followed immediately by the wrist grab and nose.

 

[Marin]

Not to divert the conversation away from Bob, but the discussion about silat reminds me of something that I would like to mention as a branch that maybe we can pursue fruitfully.

It has to do with something I never got around to figuring out, involving responding to somebody's grabbing your wrist by touching your nose of all things. Why does the nose touch work? Is it something to do with the centerline? I'm sure we train the same principle in taijiquan. Can maybe someone who can see what's going on comment or mention a parallel move in our form that has a similar jin?

See here, anchored by timestamp, for first a brief preliminary pinch that maybe people will like followed immediately by the wrist grab and nose.

This is a rather basic joint lock entry in our art. The simplest way to understand it is to learn from doing. If one had to explain the physics behind it, it would require ten pages of technical writing. Once you train it you understand it. The reason the guy is touching his nose is because that puts your arm in the position such that nothing technical has to be explained.

 

[Zhuolun]

I hear you. I will look for the principle in partnerwork.

 

[Edmond]

they were called kuntao locally, but I don't know where they came from.

It seems like Kuntao mainly came from Fujian due to the popular trade route. The popular styles in Fujian are the "Southern Shaolin" (some say this temple didn't actually exist) styles like White Crane. The Fujian styles might be the stronger influence, but other Northern styles might have made it there as well. I don't think Fujian had exclusive trading rights.

Kuntao looks a lot like Wing Chun to me. Probably because of the straight line shots with footwork changing the angles. There's a lot of discussion tracing Wing Chun to White Crane as the ancestor art. In my Wing Chun eyes, I do see a lot of similarities in terms of the shape. I could believe all these arts (including Okiniwan Karate) are related.

Unfortunately, after seeing more traditional White Crane with the body mechanics intact, Wing Chun looks like the watered-down commercial version, especially the Hong Kong versions.

 

[Marin]

Unfortunately, after seeing more traditional White Crane with the body mechanics intact, Wing Chun looks like the watered-down commercial version, especially the Hong Kong versions.

Interesting perspective. Some of the white crane is pretty deep.

 

[angryclown]

See here, anchored by timestamp, for first a brief preliminary pinch that maybe people will like followed immediately by the wrist grab and nose.

Before watching the video, I thought you meant the qinna was preceded by grabbing the opponent's nose, and I was like "if you can do that, why even bother?"

Kuntao looks a lot like Wing Chun to me. Probably because of the straight line shots with footwork changing the angles. There's a lot of discussion tracing Wing Chun to White Crane as the ancestor art. In my Wing Chun eyes, I do see a lot of similarities in terms of the shape. I could believe all these arts (including Okiniwan Karate) are related.

The flavor of what I've seen locally (via Willem de Thouars) is more akin to southern Luohan than white crane, I think. I think Willem's older brothers practiced a more orthodox form of Silat, whereas Willem learned all he could from everywhere and kept whatever worked.

Here's some southern Luohan, aka Incense Shop Boxing:

 

[Marin]

Before watching the video, I thought you meant the qinna was preceded by grabbing the opponent's nose, and I was like "if you can do that, why even bother?"



The flavor of what I've seen locally (via Willem de Thouars) is more akin to southern Luohan than white crane, I think. I think Willem's older brothers practiced a more orthodox form of Silat, whereas Willem learned all he could from everywhere and kept whatever worked.

Here's some southern Luohan, aka Incense Shop Boxing:

This guy is a bit excited eh?
I am not really convinced this group is locating the best representatives. When they freak out this hard over getting some visibility it's kind of showing they've never had any and may be a bit of a nobody, according to themselves. That is the impression I got. The good part is the guy really wants to scrap though. That is a good quality. I thought it was overly focused on long range, excessive extension of arms without a whole lot of compelling power in them. It appears very loose, which may be nice in theory but kind of limp noodle at the point of contact.
Besides that, this is a bit similar to one of the reasons why my old teacher, Gene Chen stopped teaching Southern Mantis; that method of rounding the upper back is just hell on postural health over even the medium term. It hurts me to watch it. Southern mantis may have been a bit worse with even some forward hunching, but it was also more powerful and nasty that how this one appears. Still, I don't want to train it.

 

[angryclown]

Will finds some decent guys, but a lot of the others are kind of shit and just wanting some exposure, like you said. The feeding crane one they did was uninspiring, especially considering how public Liu Chang I is. I actually like watching the taiji mantis system he practices, and wish he would have just gotten fully obsessed with that and practiced the hell out of it, instead of doing the travelogue thing.

As for the Incense Shop guy, I was more looking at the sudden, agile footwork and explosive striking than his body method or techniques. That and the aggression. The flavor is in the right general direction, whether or not his specific execution is compelling.