"Laoshi hao!", that was the first thing the random group of people had to learn. Fortunately I understood the words, cause they were in Chinese. This scene was the beginning of my first T'ai Chi lesson. Why did I go there? I was just curious to see what the sport is like and if it could be something for me, and hey, I'm still living the "sino-lifestyle" :-) and I thougt, why not extending it to sports. After the explanation of the proper greeting, the laoshi (teacher) immediately started with the first couple of figures. He just counted "yi, er, san, si..." and the students tried to follow his moves. Sometimes it was pretty tough, cause some of the moves were difficult for someone who has never tried T'ai Chi before! But as the time went on, it was getting easier to follow. Then suddenly the teacher interrupted the exercise and started to show some "massages" and "stand still as long as you can"-type of exercises. The massages aren't massages in a western sense, actually everyone just massages his back, face, ears, even the eyes etc. in order to stimulate the flow of energy. Sounds weird? Indeed, at first it is! But in T'ai Chi everythings has its reason, it's very important to be in harmony, balanced and in order to reach this goal there are also massages. After this phase of "relaxation" the moves continued for a while and after about two hours the course was over. I have to admit, I felt tired (okay, the last time I did sports was very long ago), but very well. The laoshi then showed us the "Beijing figure", which we're going to learn, in its whole length. The way he did was very nice, he's moves radiated total control and calm. I doubt if I'm ever capable of doing it like he did! With a friendly "Zaijian" the class was over.
That was two weeks ago. I went to T'ai Chi class again last week and I'm also planning to do so this week. Okay, to all critics: I agree, it's not a high performance sport, but still, you shouldn't underrate it. It's very good for your balance, flexibility, coordinative abilities, body control and you train muscles you didn't know you have. The more bended your knees are, the more exhausting the figures are. And actually T'ai Chi is "defensive martial arts", which our teacher loves to show us with a poor student as his "victim". :-) With the right moves you can control your opponents attacks and make use of his power. All in all, it's a very healty sport for body and soul!
