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Yim Wing Tsun

Miss Yim Wing Tsun, a native of Kwangtung Province, stayed, after her mother’s death, with her father Yim Yee, a disciple of the Siu Lam Monastery. At a very early age she was bethrothed to Mr. Leung Bok Chau, a salt merchant of Fukien Province. Yim Yee, having learnt a certain techniques of the Siu Lam System, managed to uphold justice if the opportunity arose, and so was eventually involved in a court case. Rather than be arrested, he escaped, taking with him his daughter Wing Tsun, to the border of Szechwan and Yunnan Provinces, settling down at the foot of Tai Leung Mountain, and made a living by keeping a bean-curd stall.

As time went on, Wing Tsun grew into a quick-witted, active and pretty young teenager. Her attractive personality soon brought her problems.

Ther was a local bully, by the surname of Wong, who was notorious for his bad behaviour. However, due to the fact that he was skilled in the art of fighting and that the power of the court was too weak at this remote frontier area, the local natives there could do nothing about him. Being attracted by Wing Tsun’s beauty, he sent a go-between to Wing Tsun to ask for her hand in marriage, with a threat that if she refused, he would force her to marry him on a fixed dare. Wing Tsun’s father was now old, and herself weak. So they were much troubled. Day after day they worried about this and did not know what to do.

Meanwhile, the Buddhist Mistress Ng Mui, who was at that time staying at the White Crane Temple on the slopes of Tai Leung Mountain, used to come down to the market place of the village several times a month to do some shopping for her daily necessities. Every time she passed by the stall of Yim Yee, she would buy some of the bean-curd from him. In this way they became acquainted. One day she came as usual to the bean-curd stall of Yim Yee. But at once she noticed that there was something strange in the look of the father and daughter. At Ng Mui’s request, they told her all their troubles. Their confession re-kindled the feeling of justice in the mind of Ng Mui. She determined to help Wing Tsun, not by beating the local bully herself (as she surely would have done before her retirement) for the reasons that did not want to disclose her own identity and that it would be unfair for a famous Mistess of a famous kung-fu system to fight an unknown boxer of a remote village. She thought of a way to solve Wing Tsun’s problem, that was, to bring her to her own convent and to teach her the art of fighting. The art fighting was not a strange thing to Wing Tsun, as her father was a pugilist himself. It was only that Wing Tsun, as her father was a pugilist himself. It was only that Wing Tsun hat found no need to learn the art before. Ow, under the personal guidance of this skilful mistress and with her own wisdom and hard word, she quickly attained competence withing three years of learning from Ng Mui.

One day, Ng Mui told Wing Tsun that she hat mastered the skill of her kung-fu system and that she might go back to her father and deal with the local bully by defeating him. As soon as Wing Tsun came down from Tai Leung Mountain, the local bully at once bothered her again. This time Wing Tsun challenged him to a fight, instead of running away from him. The bully, though surprised, welcomed this fight, as he was convinced of his own physicel power and that he would eventually defeat Wing Tsun and win a wife. However things did not turn out as he expected. He was helplessly knocked down by Wing Tsun and would never dare to give her any more trouble.

Wing Tsun, after defeating the local bully, continued to practise the art of fighting. On the other hand Ng Mui, finding her life on Tai Leung Mountain too monotonous, decided to travel about the country for sightseeing purposes, having first reminded Wing Tsun to keep the commandments of the Siu Lam System, and to be careful in finding a suitable successor to avoid passing the art to unworthy persons.

Wing Tsun eventually married her fiance Leung Bok Chau and managed to pass to him the art of the new system which she had learned from Ng Mui. It was said that her husband, Leung Bok Chau, was himself a pugilist before their marriage, who liked practising the art of fighting in his leisure time. After their marriage Wing Tsun talked much about theories of martial arts to her husband. At the beginning her husband paid little attention to what Wing Tsun told him, thinking that he himself knew the art of fighting and that Wing Tsun was, to him, only a feeble woman. But then Wing Tsun strove to find opportunities to practise fighting with her husband and managed to defeat him time after time. It was only then that Leung Bok Chau realised that his wife was not a weak young woman, but a skilful mistress of the art of fighting. From then on he admired his wife’s techniques and would very often practise the art of fighting with her. He also called his wife’s kung-fu system the “Wing Tsun Kuen”, in honour of his wife.

Later Leung Bok Chau passed the techniques of Wing Tsun Kuen to Leung Lan Kwai, a herbal physician of osteology, who never mentioned to anyone of his knowledge of kung-fu skills. That was why even his relatives and close associates were ignorant of his skills in Wing Tsun Kuen. This secret was revealed to people only when, once, he assisted in driving back a group of fighters who attacked a single unaided pugilist. Anyway, he always refrained from boasting of his skills, bearing in mind the forerunner’s commandment of “not to make public the skills of Wing Tsun Kuen”.