INFORMATION - Overview
Magazines
- Qi Journal www.qi-journal.com SPRING 2006, VOL. 16, Number 1.; Bagua Bu: The Eternal Spring of Baugua's Basic Steps: (A concise overview of the stepping methods utilized in Baguazhang by Gerald A. Sharp - Art and translation by Yang Ying and featuring Jeremy Yun Sharp).
- T'ai Chi (magazine) www.tai-chi.com Oct 2004, Vol. 28, No. 5. Overcoming Harness with Softness in T'ai Chi Ch'uan: (Gerald Sharp interviews Zhou Zhan Fang of Shanghai about his training experience with Ma Yueh Liang.)
Directories
Most people that take the time to set up and manage directories have an agenda of their own. A prospective student should be aware of this and consider the motivation of the people running the website. (e.g. There is a store associated with the chiflow.com website.) One of the biggest Wu style Taijiquan teacher directories was built on a printed directory with a "pay us to include you" scheme, and a "pay us more and we'll make it worth your money:" this sort of thing is not an uncommon way to inflate one's lineage or reputation, but it is usually a poor way of finding a teacher. Our agenda for including the people and groups in the Virtual Community above is that we have some connection with them (although in some cases it is not a very close connection). Our motivation for including directories and adding link exchanges is entirely selfish: without these links actually pointing here (and associated website hits and search engine ranking) no one would ever find our website.
Tai Chi America Directory; Scheele Directory (a big one); Budoseek directory; Goode Tai Chi ; Cloud Hands Tai Chi Chuan and Chi Kung
Merchandise
Antiques & Antique Weapons; A friend of the chiflow webmaster has a background in bronze age weapons, so this site amuses me. What became known as Damascus steel is probably associated the product of a particular mine in or around Afghanistan (with a useful tendency to have impurities separate from the steel grain) subjected to a particular heat treatment and folding fabrication process. The term Damascus steel has also sometimes been used to refer to Pattern welding, which is the more general approach usually using two different metals that can lead to a sword that is soft enough to be very difficult to break and brittle enough locally to hold an excellent edge. Heat treatment can also produce different grain sizes to accomplish similar goals. Any number of other approaches alone or in combination have been used over time. Chinese Jian (straight sword) construction seems to have favored a sandwich scheme. The article linked at this site on Chinese sword making is particularly informative. For information on Pattern Welding, see Salamander Armory.
One of the memories I have of visiting Xinxang in western China was walking through the large number of street knife venders, who would demonstrate the virtue of their knife by cutting into the back of the last knife purchased with the cutting edge of their knife. Because good knife design dictates a soft and ductile body with a sharp and brittle edge, this demonstration would work on two identical knives of good quality.
Language Software
Kneelsit Chairs (bad back friendly chairs)
North Atlantic Books This outfit publishes several books we recommend elsewhere on the site, including the Louis Swaim translation of Fu Zhongwen's Mastering Yang Style Taijiquan. They have the considerable virtue of not being "hard to find" books (so you can go directly through them, Amazon or many other places).
Tuttle Publishing. This outfit publishes several books we recommend elsewhere on the site, including Ray Grigg's The Tao of Zen . They have the considerable virtue of not being "hard to find" books (so you can go directly through them, Amazon or many other places).
