Chinese Storytelling

After Wu Song had been appointed a constable of the police force in Yanggu District of Shandong, he was officially commissioned to travel to the Eastern Capital in Henan in order to carry out an assignment. The Eastern Capital of Henan is the same as today's Kaifeng in Henan. After he had arrived in the Eastern Capital, he went to the yamen of administrative affairs to deliver his letter, whereupon he put up in the inn waiting for the reply. He took a day off, and as he had nothing special to do, he went out into the street for a stroll.

The Eastern Capital of Henan was the centre of a great nation: broad alleys, neatly lined with shops on both sides, people coming and people going, a heavy traffic of horses and carriages, constantly flowing in an endless stream. Second Master Wu walked along looking at the spectacle. As he strolled along, the sky suddenly changed colour, the weather was changing. First there was a couple of violent gusts of wind - wu-u-u-u-u-u-u......wu-u-u-u-u-u...... - blowing so hard that the dust flew up and the stones rolled about: a murky sky over a dark earth. All one could see were black clouds rolling over the sky, slowly welling up. As the black clouds were surging up - s-s-s-s-s...... - there came a flash of lightning, and then - CRASH - a peal of thunder. It began to - hua-a-a-a......What did it begin to? It began to rain. My goodness! That was heavy rain! How heavy was it? I'm not lying to you when I tell you, that every drop of rain was twice as big as a cup of wine. When the rain dropped on people's body, it sounded like pitter-patter, but when it fell on their heads it really hurt. Where this rain was falling it was as if people were pouring water from large casks, as if they were really turning them upside down. People say: 'raining buckets of water', but that's not what we are speaking about here, no, this was 'raining casks of water'. Waves were surging from the ground, for sure, and all around the houses a vapour was rising. After this torrential downpour, it was impossible to walk, and Wu Song together with a lot of other people from the street crowded into one of the shops and was standing there and waiting in front.

Who would have imagined that they would only have to wait for a very short moment? Suddenly it didn't rain any more! Not only didn't it rain any more, but as the rain stopped, the sky became clear, and the sun appeared. It can't be true! How can it be raining one moment, and the next moment it doesn't rain? That's called a rainstorm. A rainstorm is just like that: say 'rain' and it rains, and say 'stop' and it stops. If it rains here, it doesn't rain there. In the meteorological reports of nowadays it is called: 'scattered showers in parts of the area'.

Since it didn't rain any more, one could walk again. At this moment Second Master Wu continued forwards. As he walked along, he arrived at a bridge. This bridge was called Tianhan Bridge. It was shaped in an arch, so that one had to ascend it step by step. At this moment Second Master Wu stepped on to the bridge to go up to the top. Our hero lifted the hem of his garment, and looking down at his feet, he began to climb. Why did he look down at his feet? Because it had been raining a little while ago, and all over the place there were large and small water pools. You had to walk in between them. At this moment he was climbing the bridge, and he didn't notice that from the top of the bridge somebody was descending. This gentleman was beyond the age of fifty, he was more than fifty, and standing upright he measured about eight feet. His face had a golden tan, arched brow, a pair of bright eyes, a regular head form, a square mouth, a pair of protruding ears, and under his chin there were three locks of beard, a grizzled beard. On his head he wore a sky-blue satin scarf, and he was dressed in a stately sky-blue satin coat with a silken girdle, a pair of wide black trousers without crotch and satin boots with thin soles. Under his boots he had tied a pair of clogs, that means: shoes made out of wood. That was because in those former days they did not have galoshes and neither did they have plastic sandals, so they used them as a kind of rain gear. In his left hand he held an umbrella, in his right hand he carried his jacket, while he walked down the bridge. Why? It isn't right to say that he held an umbrella, is it? Didn't you say that it had stopped raining? Quite right! Now it didn't rain any more, but a little while ago it had rained. The umbrella was dripping wet, it was dripping from water streaming down. He had better keep it up and dry it in the wind. The gentleman was walking down the bridge, and Wu Song was walking up the bridge. Who would have imagined that the two of them would keep walking and walking until they were staring each other in the face, and Wu Song's right shoulder was just opposite to the old man's right shoulder and they bumped into each other? When they bumped into each other, they actually didn't mean to do it. I have just told you that Wu Song was staring downwards at his feet. Since his head drooped as he stared at his own feet, he did not do it intentionally.

On Wu Song's part this was unintentional. Who would have imagined that the old man was quite alert. As soon as the old man caught sight of the approaching man [he thought]: ' Too bad!' He saw that the man who was coming towards him was both tall and big, a man of powerful build, full of energy and strength, and young of age. 'Dear me, I wonder if this one has come to visit me?' 'Visit', what does that mean? At that time, whenever someone became a famous master, there was a saying 'tall trees catch the wind': if you were a famous man, there would always be some people who refused to acknowledge you and wanted to fight you. If they couldn't beat you, they might try to find a pretext to catch you unaware and play a trick upon you, so that they could throw you down. Then your fame would be gone, and this was called 'to visit in secret'. The old man thought: 'One can hardly say that I am being visited by this young man. What shall I do? Well, let me try and canalise my energy.' This old man was very skilled in the technique of 'deep breath'. Energy means breath and breath means energy, and so you have the breath-and-energy technique. What kind of strength is the greatest in the world? The strength of 'air' [breath, energy, etc.] is the greatest. Why, how do you know that? Well, let's take a few examples: For example, the airplanes up there in the sky, they are jet-propelled [blowing air]. Among the boats on the sea we have the steamers, and as for the trains - well, nowadays they have a diesel locomotive, but earlier they had steam engines: - Choo-choo...... Choo-choo......! They also turned out air! And even the bicycle that we ride - if its tires are short of air, we had better pump them! And if we want to explain this by means of a few fixed expressions, we'll see that such expressions with 'air' [steam, breath, spirit, atmosphere, etc.] in them, have a strong breath of spirit: 'a spirit of great momentum', 'imbued with a spirit as lofty as the rainbow spanning the sky', 'a spectacular atmosphere', in all of these expressions we find the word 'air'. Is it then so that the strength of 'air' is the greatest? Who would have imagined that the 'deep breath' technique of this old gentleman was really very good? When he canalised his energy it was not in vain. One could see him snort faintly down his nose:

"Hem!"

The sound was even more faint than mine. With this single snort: 'Hem!' his energy came forth. Where did he canalise it? He canalised it into his right shoulder. [...]