The Challenge of the Different

Supple Dragon

A particular feature of Bushi No Te Isshinryu, is I’ve tried to preserve some of the forms from friends outside Isshinryu, This is to have the students become aware of other systems of study, to provide techniques to practice against, and to try to learn different movement flows found in other systems. In the case of Supple Dragon, or Lung Le Kuen from the Pai Lum system, it also jokingly gives my students a reason to hate me forever.

I had chosen Supple Dragon from my studies with Ernest Rothrock, out of his many systems of study, as a challenge for my students to learn an entirely different movement flow from Isshinryu, especially as they hadn’t studied the basics of the system. Then in 1990 Rothrock Laoshi visited us and helped correct the movements in better form.

This performance by Young Lee represents the form performance we are moving towards. Perhaps not exactly the one of a Pai Lum stylist but always a work in progress.

And something that gives my students a reason to dislike where they are pushed.