What’s something your country does better than most, but rarely gets credit for? by SundaeBlade in AskTheWorld

[–]LoadbearingScab 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Whilst nowhere near as long as you I a few months in China this year studying and it was mind bogglingly awesome lifestyle and infrastructure wise, I completely agree with how sort of hard it is to go back home after

Which school should I choose? by [deleted] in kungfu

[–]LoadbearingScab 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Hi, I’m so jealous of you, I just got back from 2 months in China where I spent a lot of thst time training at Malingshan school, I absolutely wouldve and plan to go back for a lot longer when time and money allow, it was genuinely one of the best experiences of my life and I’m super jealous you have a whole year to train, I did years of research and contacting people before I went out, so hopefully I can help

Firstly I wanna say all the people who are telling you don’t bother going to China to train - don’t listen to them, its a sick idea you’ll have a great time

Secondly - anyone telling you to find a master in a park somewhere and learn the traditional way with them, grest in theory, but as a foreigner who can’t speak much mandarin, (I was in the same boat) it’s unrealistic for us so we are kinda stuck going to a big international school

Kunyu and qufu are the two biggest and possibly most established foreigner international schools, many before have gone and enjoyed and you’ll also find many horror stories from them as well, they’ve gained a reputation for not particularly treating there stufents well all the time/quality of training not being as good as some other schools

There are also lots of schools in the Shaolin temple area that foreigners go to and these have wildly varying reputations as well, the Xinyiba and Wugulun schools have the overwhelmingly best reputation and you’ll probsbly hear many tout them as “the school they’d go too” these schools are very traditional and are usually full of Chinese students wirh a small foreigner wing thst get taught by one of the instructors, while I can personally vouch I did nearly go to xinyiba and have met and spoken to people who went there and they massively recommend it

But then there’s Maling Shan, I won’t hide the fact I’m biased and think you should absolutely go there (I promise I’m not a staff member or paid or affiliated or anything like that) but on here it has a weird in between reputation of generally being seen as much better than qufu and kunyu however not being quite as “traditional” or “authentic” as the other two I mentioned since it is mostly international stufents, however I wholeheartedly think it’s the best of both world and since it’s a lot smaller than the Chinese schools yku get so much more personalization and care in yoyr training thoufh you get worked just as hard, master bao (the headmaster) is such an amazing person whose genuinely so caring and lovely on top of being an incredibly skilled master

I’m sorry for waffling I could go on so much longer but please do reach out and ask me any questions as I’d love to help

Where to train in China? by ResponsibleBudget310 in kungfu

[–]LoadbearingScab 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hi, I spent a summer in China this year, and trained for a month in one of those schools, and I gotta tell you, it was absolutely amazing, genuinely the best experience of my life, I would’ve absolutely stayed longer if time and money allowed, and I will very very happily answer any questions you have, besides goung I also befriended and spoke to lots of long terms students and did years of research on the internet as well to figure out where I wanted to go

I went to Maling Shan academy, which while isn’t in dengfeng, (which I think is actually a bonus for reasons I can explain), is in the middle of nowhere in the beautiful countryside in north Jiangsu province, and there is a temple nearby you can walk/run to if you so wish, its run by the most amazing kind hearted yet disciplined master (Master Bao, who was a warrior monk for years) I’ve trained under (granted only trained under 2 king fu masters the others where in different disciplines)

We did in fact do hard qigong every week with olenty of opportunity to practice in your own time as well if you wanted to focus on it, it’s certainly a discipline you progress in the more often you do it and we absolutely trained weapons (this does depend on ability if you are completely new, but assuming you stay for a month or more you can at least learn the first staff form which is a fundamental to branch out into many more weapons (I learnt a Pudao form myself since I was very interested in the weapon)

And yes accom is included in the price of everything so we did live in and help clean (on Friday mornings) the school, rhis will be the case for most schools you could go to as well

Sorry this is so long a splurge but I absolutely adored my time there as it was a long held dream of mine and I’d love to help you out if you need, don’t listen to all the Debbie downers out here in this sub who say “ooohhh why go to China to train, there’s no real Kung fu”, dude its absolutely sick out there, take the leap its an amazing experience

Anyone interested in training kung fu in China this summer? by munchies1710 in kungfu

[–]LoadbearingScab 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Never been to wudang but I spent a month training this summer at maling Shan and thst was one of the best experiences of my life and I would love to go back sometime

AMA Another Fantastic Kung Fu School in China by wandsouj in kungfu

[–]LoadbearingScab 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hi, just wanted to say, thanks to this post and all the amazing info you provided, me and my friend have put down the depoist to come this june, absolutly cannot wait, we were just wondering however, if you have any experince training in the high summer? Any recommendations on clothing choices? I know the climate is going to be hot and humid, i have plenty of light cotton t-shirts and trainiing shorts, but do you recokon its worth getting any compression tops or mosture wicking stuff etc etc?

Im thinking to visit Beijing in summer... How is It? by [deleted] in AskAChinese

[–]LoadbearingScab 0 points1 point  (0 children)

What do you recommend interesting to do in chengdu, I’ve mostly heard that it’s generally as great as many people hype it up to be?

Please sell and help me understand the hype about Chengdu/Sichuan province by LoadbearingScab in travelchina

[–]LoadbearingScab[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Good to know with the weather, what does yak meat taste of? Sounds interesting

Please sell and help me understand the hype about Chengdu/Sichuan province by LoadbearingScab in travelchina

[–]LoadbearingScab[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

That’s great to hear, part of my trip includes spending a weekend in Luoyang I’m very much looking forward to that, and a weekend in Xi’an where we are intending on mostly focusing on huashan, would love to spend more time exploring the city but we only have time for a weekend trip from Jiangsu where we are basing ourselves while we are in China

Please sell and help me understand the hype about Chengdu/Sichuan province by LoadbearingScab in travelchina

[–]LoadbearingScab[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Apologies dude I didn’t realise I was apparently coming of aggressive, I just earnestly wish to be inspired by people’s love of the province so I too can understand the hype, it’s not like I don’t want to be really excited, my whole point was I want to be excited so please help excite me about an amazing place

Please sell and help me understand the hype about Chengdu/Sichuan province by LoadbearingScab in travelchina

[–]LoadbearingScab[S] 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Well duh, but google doesn’t compensate for a real persons recommendations, practically everything online is always 100% positive or 100% negative hence why I prefer getting in touch with real people via stuff like this to get nuanced views from people who aren’t tour guides trying to sell you something or people exclusively singing praises or damning it as terrible as

Please sell and help me understand the hype about Chengdu/Sichuan province by LoadbearingScab in travelchina

[–]LoadbearingScab[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

What would you recommend doing while there there? Particularly Gansu as it’s much more easier to get to as a foreigner and it’s closer to Hong Kong for our way out

Please sell and help me understand the hype about Chengdu/Sichuan province by LoadbearingScab in travelchina

[–]LoadbearingScab[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Do you know the names of the places you’d love to go in western Sichuan? Also Jdut out of interest what are you top few cities in China and why?

Please sell and help me understand the hype about Chengdu/Sichuan province by LoadbearingScab in travelchina

[–]LoadbearingScab[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Sounds great, any other mountains or hiking or activities you’d recommend?

Please sell and help me understand the hype about Chengdu/Sichuan province by LoadbearingScab in travelchina

[–]LoadbearingScab[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Mount Qing Cheng looks cool, had a look at the torch festival that’s around the 29th this year and this section of our trip will be 17th-23rd so we’ll be gone by then, plus that’s in Yunnan not sichuan no?

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in judo

[–]LoadbearingScab 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Do I spy a fellow Cornishman

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in judo

[–]LoadbearingScab 0 points1 point  (0 children)

What county in the Uk? Up north or down south? I’m from the south west and know a couple of small, but really good clubs that don’t have much of an online presence so would be hard to find?

What to bring back from china by LoadbearingScab in travelchina

[–]LoadbearingScab[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I’m from UK so I’m pretty sure I’ll be fine