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• Happy New Year!

  Wednesday, Feb 27, 2008 7:22AM / Standard Entry / Members only
  8 comments

  Thanks you everyone for welcoming me to AnD!
  
  For those of you who don't know me, my name is  Hao ZhiHua. I am a wushu athlete from the original Beijing Wushu Team, and I have a martial arts school in Berkeley, CA USA called Wushu West. You can find us at www.wushuwest.com
  
  I will try to keep a somewhat regular blog talking about wushu and travel and teaching and my experiences in the US (which has been my home for 19 years) and China, where I was born and raised.
  
  It's been a great new year with wushu demonstrations all week. The best by far was a party at the Claremont Hotel, with nice, high ceilings and even carpet, instead of the usual wooden stage. We also had a large warm-up room with a good ceiling and space to run and practice weapons beforehand. Those of you who have done wushu demos in the US know thats rare to happen. Usually you have a very small area, maybe nowhere to change or warm up either. It was an early afternoon booking so only my advanced students were able to be there for it (most of the kids were still in school at that hour). 
  
  I was so inspired by the students I came out at the end and did an improvised bagua set, something I haven't done in a long time. I am proud that I am still in good shape so I can  come out and do bagua  even without choreographing my form before the Demo . Maybe I will enter CMAT this year too!
  
  My former student Bryant Yu brought his lion dance team to do the show with us and did a great job! They got the crowd very excited before the wushu demo, and the drumming got us pumped up too!
  After the Claremont demo we had a few days rest, and the weekend shows...
  I'm very proud of the kid's beginner class, who got up and did a group set on a Saturday night in San Rafael, and then the next day in the early afternoon during an outside perforamce on Solano Ave. in Albany. The Albany festival was the first of what they hope will be an annual Chinese new year celebration rivaling San Francisco's. Performing on stage is a great way for everyone to get feedback on their practice, and show off their hard training. Most of them had never performed in front of people before, and here they are in front of over 600 people! What a great way to inspire yourself and test your self under pressure. With CMAT, the biggest chinese martial arts tournament in the US coming up, this is very important.
  
  
  
  The advanced class came up with a great demo of individual and group sets that spanned over 15 minutes of non stop action, and they did it in 2 practice sessions! Shahaub's leadership and experience was a big asset to making a solid performance and keeping a good tempo throughout the whole show.
  
  
  Here's James helping Michael stretch before the San Rafael demo
  
  Everyone stretching for the San Rafael show
  
  the kids' group handset
  
  Kenny Leu's dao set
  
  I hope you enjoy...
  Xin nian kwai le!
  
  

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