Interview with Sifu Cheng in Italy's Samurai Magazine
The Sign of the Times

By Daniele Bollelli

Everything constantly changes. Heraclitus and Lao Tzu knew it well. Changing is the fate of anything that is alive. The martial arts certainly are not the exception to this rule. Therefore, it shouldn't surprise us that Taijiquan, the archetypal Daoist martial art, is changing skin again. For a long time, taijiquan had been jealously kept among few people: a little treasure belonging to few Chinese families unwilling to share it with any outsider; an extremely effective art that gave rise to fighters such as Yang Lu Chan. Then, in the first half of the twentieth century, Yang Cheng Fu stepped onto the scene and taijiquan became available to the general public, first in China, and then in the rest of the world. However, the taijiquan diffused by Yang Cheng Fu had little in common with the fighting Taijiquan practiced by his famous ancestors. Gone were most of the fighting techniques, gone the hard training methodology at the root of the art. In a few years, taiji had been transformed from a fighting art into an excellent health exercise, a lethargic form of martial dance, a slow form of moving meditation. Everything constantly changes. For over half a century, little has changed in the way taiji is commonly practiced. Health, meditation and aesthetic beauty are the values of a few generations of 20th century Taiji practitioners. But if we open our eyes, it is not hard to see that Taijiquan is getting ready to change its skin again.

The man sitting in front of me at the other end of the table of a Chinese restaurant is the perfect symbol of this change. Mark Cheng does not look at all like the typical Taiji teacher. A young man in his twenties, recently graduated from UCLA, Cheng exhibits powerful muscles and a tremendous self-confidence. His confidence literally fills the room. If it was not for Cheng's impeccable manners, his self-confidence is such that it could almost appear like arrogance. There should be laws to prevent someone so young to be so perfectly self-assured. But Cheng has plenty of reasons to be happy with himself.

Recently, for example, the American magazine Inside Kung Fu declared him to be one of the most brilliant new Taiji scholars. Furthermore, when they decided to prepare a set of videotapes on the combat dimension of Taiji, rather than calling an older, more famous master, they chose him to do it. By the way, the readers may be interested to know that Cheng's Combat Tai Chi tapes are by far the best that I have seen on this topic and that Cheng is more convincing in his explanation of Taiji fighting than many "great" masters (not that this is such a great compliment considering that Cheng has almost no competition since most books and tapes of the applications of Taijiquan are downright pathetic, but....). Needless to say that seeing so many honors being bestowed on someone so young stimulated my curiosity and my desire to meet him. If this was not enough, the fact that the job of kung fu instructor at UCLA, before becoming mine, belonged to Cheng, gave the necessary push to forget my laziness and go to satisfy my curiosity. In person, Cheng does not let my expectations down. Born in Delaware from Chinese parents, Cheng is fluent in three languages, is a good practitioner of Chinese medicine and is a true model of eloquence and martial knowledge. It is not hard to understand why IKF chose to trust him. Very few are the martial artists who can explain themselves so well. I barely have the time to ask him a question that I' m served half-hour of detailed answer. Cheng is such a volcano of ideas that our conversations give me enough stimuli for a dozen of articles, but for the sake of coherence let's go back to Taiji.

At ten years of age, Cheng already had trained in several styles of kung fu, but had never understood why his father spent time training in such a seemingly weak art as Taiji. One day, his judgmental laughter pushed his father far enough that he decided to give him a demonstration. Asked to throw a punch, Cheng obeyed only to find himself flying in the air and landing several feet away. Immediately Cheng apologized and asked his father to teach him.

Although by now Cheng has trained in more styles of martial arts than I can remember, Yang style Taiji remains one of his favorites along with Shuai Jiao and a Southern Style called Fut Ga. "My main Taiji teachers- declares Cheng- are my father, who introduced me to the art, Daniel Lee, who taught me the form and some techniques, and Daniel Wang, who shared with me the logic and the principles which are the foundation of Taiji". Under the guidance of these teachers, Cheng has become one of the most prolific Taiji writers, an instructor in some of LA's most important gyms, and the author of the tapes mentioned above. But according to Cheng, the most precious gift he has received from Taiji is neither fame, nor his ability as a fighter. "Taijiquan taught me how to talk better with people. Taiji combat strategy states not to oppose force against force, but rather it recommends to find a point of contact and then get the opponent off balance with minimum effort. The same thing can be done in any discussion. My life has become a lot simpler when I realized that I didn't have to argue with someone, but rather I could apply Taiji to talking with people finding a metaphorical point of contact and moving from there. Taiji can help in every aspect of life. It can make you proud but not arrogant, humble but not weak".

The other great martial passion in Cheng's life is- besides Fut Ga, which we did not discuss much during our meeting - the Shuai Jiao that Cheng learned from David Lin and Daniel Weng (not Wang, the taiji master, but Weng...tricky Chinese names!). To follow his passion, Cheng even went to Mongolia to research the local form of Shuai Jiao. Cheng however, is not willing to teach Shuai Jiao to just anybody. In fact, according to him, the art is not for everyone's taste: too easy to hurt oneself and others in practice. In the gyms populated by Hollywood actors, few are those willing to pay the price in bruises and other injuries necessary to learn. "Shuai Jiao is a brutally effective art-says Cheng- Judo is similar but is not as hard. A complete fighter should know how to do everything, but if I have to choose a critically important area it is standing grappling, and that's exactly what Shuai Jiao is all about. If I had to choose one person to be on my side in a real fight, that's David Lin, my Shuai Jiao master. From the way Cheng talks about Lin, it is clear that even his eloquence is not enough to express the admiration that he has for him. "A Chinese saying tells that the quality of a man is reflected in his son and Lin's son is an absolutely exceptional man, so...."

Maybe it is the practice of a tough art such as Shuai Jiao that makes Cheng such an atypical Taiji teacher and turns him into the possible torchbearer for a generation of practitioners who want to give back martial dignity to an art that has almost none left. Logic and eloquence only go so far. In the end, according to Cheng, the value of an art is seen in actual fighting. In that sphere, an art either works or it doesn't and if it doesn't it is not a martial art. For this reason, effectiveness, a word long forgotten by taiji players, is the yardstick on which even Taiji needs to be measured. Considering that Cheng's Combat Taiji tapes are quickly selling out, it may be that many are those who share Cheng's desire to bring back taiji into the martial sphere. Maybe, taiji is truly changing skin again....