By Vicki Gamble and Martin Butler Pictures by Phillip Butler and Simon Wong

Background of Simon Wong

"The way that can be spoken of is not the constant way, the name that can be named is not the constant name"
- Tao Te Ching

All too often people in the western world merely relate to just the material aspects of their world with little regard to its spiritual dimension. Likewise, their conception of a martial art like Kung Fu or Karate is purely physical, without any thought for any underlying Chinese philosophy.

The Yellow Dragon Tai Chi Mantis style, as its name implies, combines the physical "hard" style Southern mantis Kung Fu with the Yang style Big Circle Tai Chi and seeks to teach an understanding of the centuries of underlying Chinese culture that inspired its founder - Sifu Simon Wong.

As a boy, Sifu Wong lived in Hong Kong. His health was poor and as a consequence his body always felt weak. His only interests were music and painting and he accomplished a lot in this field. Sifu Wong realised it would be beneficial to his health if he was to take up a martial art, and after the arrival of the Bruce Lee phenomenon he was keen to start martial arts.

He began training in taekwondo and later boxing and karate, but it did not take long for Sifu Wong to realise these styles were not for him; through training in these martial arts he suffered damage to his body and so decided to seek knowledge in another direction.

Sifu Wong came to England in 1978. By this time he had come to realise there was a deeper side to Chinese martial arts. He began training in southern praying mantis and was also interested in pak mei and wing chun (also popular styles of Kung Fu) thus absorbing the deeper meaning of Kung Fu and not just learning the superficial side.

Due to his business he needed to move to Peterborough and so he gave up pak mei and wing chun.