told his son to seek out a Shaolin monk named Yen Chi-wen, who was at that time living in Shantung Province. Two years later, at the age of sixteen, Ku Ju-chang left home to begin his studies with Yen Chi-wen. By most accounts, Ju-chang studied with Yen Chi-wen for eleven years, mastering various Shaolin temple styles. Whether the ten primary forms of Pek Sil Lum were passed on to Ku Ju-chang directly from Yen Chi-wen is impossible to say. It does seem likely, however, that Yen Chi-wen taught Ku Ju-chang the iron palm and ch’i kung techniques that later made him famous throughout China.
Ku Ju-chang had already attained some fame by the late 1920s, when he participated in a martial arts competition sponsored by the National government and the martial arts community. He is said to have finished among the top ten in this competition, which was, by most accounts, the largest and most prestigious ever witnessed in China up to that point. Around the time of this competition, the Nanking Central Kuo Shu Institute was founded, and Ku Ju-chang was invited to serve as one of its martial arts instructors. The institute succeeded in bringing together the preeminent martial artists of the day, known as the Five Tigers of Northern China. This select group included Ku Ju-chang, Wan Lai-sheng, Fu Chen-sung, and Li Hsien-wu. Aspiring martial artists flocked to the institute to take advantage of the opportunity to study with these renowned masters.
A year or so later, these five patriarchs went to Kwangtung Province to assist in the organization of a second Kuo Shu Institute in Kwangchou. There, they were joined in their endeavors by a group of famous martial artists known as the Five Southern Tigers, most notably among them a Choy Lay Fut practitioner named T’an San (Fig. 2). Ku Ju-chang opened a school not far from T’an San’s academy, and these two eventually came to openly exchange both knowledge and students. It seems likely that both T’an San and Ku Ju-chang incorporated techniques learned from the other into their respective styles, perhaps modifying them as a result.
In addition to his exchange with T’an San, Ku Ju-chang is said to have studied a variety of other styles with famous masters, including hsing-i, pa kua, and Sun style t’ai ch’i with Sun Lu T’ang, Wutang sword style with Li Ching-lin, and ch’a fist with Yu Chen-sheng. History, however, best remembers Ku Ju-chang for his iron palm and ch’i kung abilities. Examples of his skill include breaking thirteen stacked bricks with a single silent slap, allowing a car to be parked on his stomach, and so on (Figs. 3 and 4). The most famous story regarding his prowess is supposed to have occurred in 1931. As legend has it, a circus from a foreign land arrived in Kwangchou with a wild horse as its star attraction. The circus promoter (often said to be a Russian) offered a reward to anyone who could tame the horse. Apparently a number of martial artists tried to subdue the horse and were kicked or trampled. Eventually, however, Ku Ju-chang stepped up and slapped the horse once on the back. The unfortunate beast died soon after and an autopsy revealed that its internal organs had been severely damaged. This is doubtless a highly romanticized version of what actually happened.
A perhaps more accurate version of the story is that Ku Ju-chang visited the circus with some of his students and asked to see the horse. When the circus promoter realized that Ku Ju-chang was one of China’s premier martial artists, he immediately apologized for issuing the challenge and retracted it on the spot. He then took Ku Ju-chang to see the animal. Ku Ju-chang ran his hands across the horse’s back and under its belly, commented on the smoothness of its coat, and left without further incident. Several days later a rumor erupted that the horse died soon after of internal bleeding, as a direct result of Ku Ju-chang’s iron palm technique.
Ku Ju-chang survived both the Japanese invasion of China and the turmoil that was to follow. He continued to teach Pek Sil Lum until he died in his mid-sixties. He was survived by several students, one of whom was Lung Tze-hsiang. When the Chinese Communists assumed power on the mainland in 1949, Lung Tze-hsiang moved to Hong Kong, where he later taught Lai Hung.
It should be noted that many teachers nowadays use Pek Sil Lum as a general term to denote the melange of styles and techniques that emerged from the interaction of the Five Northern and Five Southern Tigers during this watershed period in the history of Chinese martial arts. In addition, there is another branch of Pek Sil Lum that was transmitted through Yen Shang-wu, who, along with Lung Tze-hsiang, studied under Ku Ju-chang; this style differs slightly from the one presented here, but, we wish to emphasize, it is by no means less valid or “traditional” (Fig. 5). As a result, there is currently some variation between the Pek Sil Lum taught from one school to the next. Suffice to say, however, if the school’s lineage extends directly back to Ku Ju-chang and features the ten core forms, it is part of the Pek Sil Lum family.
Chapter 4
Sifu Lai Hung
Lai Hung (Fig. 1) was born into troubled times in a troubled country—the year was 1938 and the place was China. At the time of Lai Hung’s birth, China had been mired in a desperate struggle against the invading Japanese army for just over thirteen months. In that brief period, the well-equipped and modernized Japanese forces had stormed Beijing, smashed through heavy resistance in Shanghai, and laid waste to Nanking, forcing the Chinese government to beat a hasty retreat to the remote province of Szechwan. The effect of these hostilities on ordinary Chinese citizens was severe—food and other necessities were scarce and violent death was an everyday occurrence.
China’s war of attrition against Japan lasted until August 14, 1945, when, in the wake of the bombing of Nagasaki and Hiroshima, the Japanese emperor ordered his nation’s forces to lay down their arms. But China’s troubles did not end along with the Sino-Japanese War. Immediately after the Japanese surrender and withdrawal from Chinese soil, a civil war broke out between the Nationalist forces under Chiang Kai-shek and the Communists under Mao Tze-tung. This internal struggle raged on for another four years, exacerbating the already intolerable conditions in China.
The hardships faced by the young Lai Hung, who until the age of ten had never known a life in which there was not war and suffering to be endured, no doubt influenced certain aspects of his character. These character traits, shared by many through history who spent their formative years in a similarly harsh environment, included persistence in the face of adversity, determination, self-discipline, and an ability to withstand pain, hunger, and discomfort. Interestingly enough, it is perhaps precisely those traits, born out of the adversity he faced early in his life, that made possible Lai Hung’s later achievements in the martial arts arena.
Lai Hung’s father worked as a bodyguard and was an avid student of the Chinese martial arts. Having lived through periods of great turmoil himself, the elder Lai believed in the necessity of knowing how to defend oneself. Soon after Lai Hung’s eighth birthday, his father arranged for him to commence his martial arts training with a famous master named Lee Nam. Sifu Lee taught a practical and powerful style not unlike Choy Lay Fut known as hung t’ou fo wei. Around this time, Lai Hung also received instruction from two other well-known teachers, one of whom was nicknamed “Master Iron Palm”
