tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Tue May 28 16:48:03 1996
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RE: Klingon writing tool
- From: Chet Braun <[email protected]>
- Subject: RE: Klingon writing tool
- Date: Tue, 28 May 1996 16:46:24 -0700
- Encoding: 95 TEXT
>Hmmm, I'd say the weapons themselves more resemble Chinese martial arts
>weapons. Japanese weapons are a bit more austere. Both the betleH and the
>meqleH are much to 'busy' to resemble Japanese weapons.
As I don't know what you mean with austere in this sense, I couldn't
comment, except to say that if austere means severe then I'm completly lost.
A large curved two handed blade, not very severe, I know not of a Japanese
hand held weapon which could have the same attack probability as a betleH.
The d'k tahg resembles early Japanese sword and knife making, with the gutter.
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In this sense; austere - simple.
The traditional Japanese weapons were all very simple in form.
Traditional Chinese weapons range from the simple to the much more elaborate.
The betleH and mekleH both qualify as elaborate in comparison with the most
revered of the Japanese weapons; the katana.
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>As for the martial arts; the Klingon version of Tai Chi, mokbara (sp)
shown by Worf is, well, Yang
>Tai Chi in its appearance - Chinese, not Japanese.
Not that I'm a martial arts expert or anything, but I thought that, that
which you call Mok'bara, resembeled kata, more than Tai Chi,
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Kata is just a sequence of moves and postures, in Chinese MAs we call them
forms or sets, same thing. Tai Chi is just that; a series of postures and movements
or a set/form/kata.
----------------
but even more
so because of the fight that Worf had with that Bajoran youth, which gave
her the chance to speak out against her teacher. Don't forget why Mok'bara
is taught, that is to enhance one's agility in hand-to-hand combat, it
helped to revive the dormant warrior spirit in "Birthright I" Stardate
46578.4. In this way kata is also used to heighten the hand-eye and
hand-to-hand combat ability of the karate user.
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Kata/forms/sets, in Japanese or Chinese MAs, are used for a number of purposes
including agility, physical exercise, hand-eye coordination, and improving the
ability to move from posture to posture smoothly, quickly, and with power.
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Tai Chi is in no part a
physical fighting exercise, thus would be a useless comparison to be used in
conjuncture with Mok'bara. This naturaly means that Dan Curry [see ST:E] is
not as much of an expert as he thinks that he is, but neither are the writers.
----------------
Hold on, back up the wagon pardoner. Tai Chi, in it's original and pure form, is
*exaclty* a fighting art. There are three major 'internal' fighting arts from China;
Tai Chi, Hsing-I, and Pa Kua. Among the Tai Chi styles are; Yang, Chen, Wu, and
Sun, and others. Every one of these was developed SPECIFICALLY as a fighting
art. Trace the lineages for yourself.
Don't be fooled by Western NewAge Tai Chi, every Tai Chi posture is a block, strike,
grapple, or take down. If you can't see it in the movements then the movements aren't
being executed correctly and with the intent and focus necessary.
Don't be fooled by the lack of speed, there are Japanese karate kata that are also done
slowly as also there are Chinese 'hard' or 'external' styles that have sets that are
performed slowly.
Also understand that the religious (Taoist or Buddhist) connection to the origins of Tai
Chi is nonsense. Tai Chi was used as a training adjunct by Taoist and Buddhist monks
but it did NOT come from these religious teachings.
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>As for the fight scenes we've seen, I'd say they look just like
>Hollywood martial arts, and not very good Hollywood martial arts
>at that.
That is indeed the case, but that we can again atribute to the lack of
understanding that Dan Curry shows on the subject of martial arts on a whole.
-----------------
I can't comment on Dan Curry's MAs knowledge but then I also don't think someone who
doesn't recognize Tai Chi as martial art should either. :-)
Virtually nothing in Star Trek should be used as a basis for an 'official' Klingon MA.
Typically there would be many MA styles as there are on Earth, some developed and
refined in 'religious' settings such as monasteries and others developed with in families
and passed own from generation to generation.
That I know of there are two 'fan' styles of MA developed outside of Paramount;
Qinlat Monastery developed a style based on Kempo, I believe, in a philosophical
setting. I have developed a style called Hung family style based loosely on Chinese
Hung Gar style kung fu and Sun style Tai Chi.
Qapla'
HetaQ