Blog Tour: Interview today at A Journey of Books where I say a couple things about the thought process that went into Butterfly Swords. Hopefully some are interesting.
Also at Book Junkies with an intervew and except for The Taming of Mei Lin.
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I met Mandy while studying Wing Chun under Sifu Eric Oram and Sifu Joe Sayah in Los Angeles. Mandy was a senior student then, while I was a white-sashed noob. I was always impressed with Mandy’s agility and precision during the training and sparring exercises, so I searched her out for Warrior Women month.
Sifu Mandy Sayah teaches wing chun kung fu in Mornington and Rosebud academies in Victoria, Australia, contact (03) 5975-9219, or www.wingchununiverse.com. Traditional Wing Chun Kung Fu academies located in Mornington, Rosebud, Dandeong, and East Bentley, Victoria, Australia.
She graciously provided this interview along a few videos demonstrating the Butterfly Swords form and self defense techniques. Welcome Mandy! Jeannie: What made you decide to start studying Wing Chun? Mandy: I was a fan of martial arts films including Akira Kurosawa’s films, Sonny Chiba, and Bruce Lee. I always wanted to study an art for self defense and then I learned that Bruce Lee’s core art that he’d trained for 10 years before he left China was Wing Chun. Serendipitously Master Joe Sayah who’d learned from Grandmaster Cheung (the man who’d taught Bruce Lee along with his Sifu Yip Man) had moved from Australia to Los Angeles and opened up a Wing Chun academy ten minutes from my home. I did a class and was hooked at first pak sao punch!
Jeannie: It’s often said that Wing Chun is an ideal style for a woman. Can you expand on that? Mandy: Wing Chun does not rely on force or strength to overpower an opponent instead using deflection, positioning, and pressure point striking to win a fight. Wing Chun is ideal for men, women, and children who may have to defend themselves against a bigger and stronger adversary. It’s easier to fight someone smaller than you but what if you are faced with someone twice your size or 2 or 3 attackers? Wing Chun gives you a fighting chance with it’s use of pressure point strikes to disable opponents and economical movement making it very effective and deceptive. It’s deceptive how powerful it is and because of the economical movements it’s hard to see what’s happening– it’s very fast!
Jeannie: Have you ever been in a situation where you’ve had to use your training? Mandy: Only once in 2000 when I was on an overnight train in Europe did I have to pak sao (slap) a man’s wrist away who was attempting to harass and touch a woman I was traveling with. I told him to leave her the f*&k alone and gave him the look that said he was gonna cop it if he came next to us again and he left us alone. Prevention is the best medicine and with heightened awareness I’ve probably prevented myself being a victim of crime by not placing myself in a dangerous position. Otherwise, I’ve just applied my skills during sparring sessions or tournaments I’ve competed in. On 31st July, 2010, I took 1st place in the women’s division of a Loong Fu Pai Tournament in Victoria, Australia. And I’ve competed in full contact kickboxing tournaments over the last 2 years as well.
Jeannie: What would you say are the main ways kung fu has changed your life or your way of thinking? Mandy: Practicing Wing Chun Kung Fu empowered me physically first which made me feel mentally stronger, safer, and more confident which carried over spiritually to give me greater peace and respect for myself and others. It really united the mind, body, and spirit in a positive way. When I want to master a kung fu technique first I have awareness of what I want then I try to master the technique through repetition which is hard work I have to do consistently in order to get the results I want. This is the same approach I use to achieve any goals in life see my book co-authored with Master Joe Sayah for more on this subject “Chi, Energy, & Prosperity”.
Jeannie: So….could a little gal actually take on a big strong guy like they show in the movies? Mandy: If she knows Wing Chun or some martial arts then ‘yes, absolutely.’ If she doesn’t know how to fight at all then she’s got to ‘Stun and Run’ – attack the eyes and groin and get out of there. Watch for yourself in this short clip, groin kick, eye gouge, palm strike.
Fun Questions:
Jeannie: What would you say is your favorite fight scene from any movie? How realistic is it? Mandy: Film ‘Return of the Dragon’ Bruce Lee vs. Chuck Norris in the coliseum in Rome, very realistic. The Bourne Identity – Bourne (Matt Damon) wakes up on park bench in Switzerland, disarms police of their weapons and puts them down – realistic if the person is a well-trained martial artist.
Jeannie: Who’s your favorite Warrior Woman? Mandy: Well, if you think outside the film box you’ve got the Virgin Mary stepping on the devil (symbolized by snake, good defeating evil), and amazing saints like Joan of Arc, and also Mother Teresa and St. Mary Mackillop who were super strong women who cared for less fortunate people with love and compassion winning the battle over their own selfish wants or desires and putting others first in a materialistic world that tries to get you to ‘spoil’ yourself. In movies, I love JeeJa Yanin the star of Chocolate (2008 action film) and I’ve been a fan of Wonder Woman since I was a kid, she’s beautiful, strong, fearless, and she deflects bullets off her wrist bangles while wearing the best costume ever!
Thank you Mandy!
If you have any questions for Mandy, go ahead and fire away. I’ll let her know to stop by and answer.
I leave you with a clip of Sifu Joe Sayah demonstrating the butterfly swords form. The fluidity and speed of the techniques is what inspired me to use the swords in my debut book:
I’m kicking off Warrior Women month with a quick tutorial on butterfly swords. Also tomorrow, I have an interview with Mandy Sayah, Wing Chun instructor.
Blog Tour:
Blogging about how I came to write historical romance at The Minding Spot. The blog is doing their own giveaway of a copy of the Taming of Mei Lin.
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The Taming of Mei Lin and Butterfly Swords both feature sword fights involving butterfly swords. I’ve received many curious inquiries about both the weapons and the fighting style, so I thought I’d showcase them today.
I chose butterfly swords for my heroine because:
1) I had some experience with them
2) They could be hidden easily and carried around with her various outfits
3) The techniques are fast and exciting to describe
4) The swords were distinctive and feminine, in contrast to the swords used by the hero and the villain
In this video, Grandmaster William Cheung demonstrates the butterfly swords form. The narration is Sifu Eric Oram.
This demonstration shows several techniques for butterfly swords against a broadsword. The key techniques are redirecting and controlling the opponent’s blade with the butterfly swords, and counterattacking immediately after a block.
And finally, the swords featured in the grand prize giveaway aren’t technically butterfly swords as they don’t have the handguard. They’re steel and sharpened and STILL pretty cool.
Join the Launch Celebration by tweeting, blogging, and getting the word out and you’ll be eligible to win. Details here.
I know that title sounds so comic book and outlandish, but this is a serious article, really.
Given that the legendary founder of Wing Chun is supposed to be a nun, I was immediately fascinated about the practice of teaching martial arts to sects of modern nuns and also the reasons behind it. I found this article really empowering.
The cover for THE TAMING OF MEI LIN (excerpt), my September Undone release is here! First of all it’s gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous. The colors are beautiful and the backdrop is sweeping.
Let the cover kibitz begin:
I think the hero looks a bit like Daniel Dae Kim from Lost, don’t you? I do love a nice strong jawline.
Time period: the clothing and hair isn’t Tang Dynasty. They had to take some liberties with that. The Undones are digitally published and so they create the covers from the Harlequin art bank, which leads me to the best part of the cover…
The heroine and hero may look very familiar because they also graced the cover of my favorite Harlequin Blaze, THE CONCUBINE by Jade Lee. Perhaps her lovers had met before in a previous life hundreds of years earlier in the Tang Dynasty? They were simply fated to meet again and fall in love eternally…
Cover models get reused all the time. I’m just tickled pink that Jade’s models reappear on my cover. I’ll always associate them with THE CONCUBINE, which is sitting proudly on my keeper shelf.
This is a very misleading post title. I suck at titles and having to think up blog post titles would be too stressful if I didn’t just go with the first thing that came to mind.
It’s very commonly known that George Lucas was influenced by Akira Kurosawa’s samurai films when creating the original Star Wars trilogy. In particular, The Hidden Fortress, which has a sword wielding general escorting a defeated princess through enemy territory. So my title is misleading because I’m not going to add to this discussion too much.
I’m writing this historical novella which opens at a noodle stand in a little town. By the way, if you’ve ever been to any country in Asia, you know the food stand/restaurant/tavern is everywhere. I’m loving how fun it is to write this story, but then I got worried. Butterfly Swords has an early scene set at a dusty roadside tavern. Am I being too cliche?
Then I started daydreaming of a space story that I drift to off and on in my head. Where do I open that story? A space tavern.
Which takes me back to the Mos Eisley Cantina in Star Wars.
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon – Soup stand, tea stand, and then a spectacular tavern battle.
Serenity – The Maidenhead tavern where River gets triggered.
By now I’m feeling better. I think back to my trips backpacking through Europe. The only places we knew to go that weren’t in the tour book were bars and cafes. All you had to do was order a drink and no one could say you didn’t belong there. That’s where stuff has to happen in an adventure story.
So I’m going to relax and embrace the cliche. I’ll ask for forgiveness once the story is finished.
I just caught wind of a movie that’s supposed to coming out August 2009 called “Warrior’s Way” starring Kate Bosworth, Geoffrey Rush and Dong-Kun Jang. It’s an “East meets West” flick with martial arts sword fighting in the Wild West.
Okay, it looks a little choppy here. The effects were rough and the romance…hmmm…probably not.
I always become hopeful when a big action movie like this hits American theater. Kate Bosworth and Geoffrey Rush are big names. And it’s by the same producer as Lord of the Rings. Maybe it’ll take off and people will think there’s a market for my stories. I was very hopeful when “Forbidden Kingdom” came out with Jet Li and Jackie Chan. *sigh*
I won’t rave until I know more about it, but man do I wish I had been querying Butterfly Swords the year that “Crouching Tiger” hit the screens.
I was going to put “Asian fantasy” in the title, but then I had visions of people coming here searching for a XXX site—ugh.
I got a note from a reader who told me they’ve been searching for this sort of book forever and there’s not much out there. She had been going through search engines looking for Asian fantasy stories. It’s not the first letter I’ve gotten like that either. Each one makes me hopeful. For an unpublished writer to start getting fan mail, and not from friends who love me, that must mean something right?
It was a big boost when I found an agent who was excited to go to bat for me. We’re still on that search for the editor who believes that these stories will sell. Funny how much of an uphill battle it is to get into English language genre fiction when there’s a flood of movies, manga, anime and centuries of Asian language literature on the same themes.
Once in a while when I’m feeling blue and lonely, I do go googling for Asian fantasy fiction or wuxia. But that’s okay. I knew this was going to be hard when I started. I just have to keep improving the writing.
So if you’re out there. If you’re searching too and you’ve found me. Say hello. *waves*
I truly believe there is a market and I love these stories. I’m very stubborn and somewhat patient and there’s enough stories in this genre to last another couple centuries.
