Dear Si-Fu,

I have been thinking about writing this letter to you for some time. One of the reasons for finally doing so was the most recent seminar in Wülfrath, and something you said during it.
I have been your student since October 1990, and I first made your personal acquaintance in early 1991. It is one of the moments I have never forgotten (despite my poor memory), and it was certainly a key event in my martial arts career. This was a grading seminar at the school in Aachen run by my then Si-Fu. For weeks our Sihing painstakingly and diligently prepared us for this moment. Finally the day arrived, a crowded room, lots of nervous students and one could have cut the air with a knife. The atmosphere was full of tension, nervousness and plenty of curiosity. We stood in line like tin soldiers for our 1st student grade examination, and were tested by you one after the other.
You wanted to see our Pak-Sao with a simultaneous punch, and judging by your slight nod you were satisfied with my response.
Personally speaking, seminars have often disappointed or disconcerted me. At times I would come home from a seminar in utter confusion. At other times I thought I had the answers and could rule the world with my skills. I was given the opportunity to prove to you that I had worked tirelessly, but at the same time I sometimes thought that I had understood absolutely nothing.
But I was always annoyed about one thing, namely that my Sihing never held classes on Sunday evenings! After every seminar, whether I had negative or positive feelings about my capabilities, I was always keen to train more. To know more, acquire more techniques, become softer, become faster, be more convincing next time, be more noticeable....
Dear Si-fu, let’s make sure that the students who go to seminars today have the same light in their eyes, and are able to take away with them the same memories as we have over many years.

Let’s show them that grades are not awarded as a gift by the EWTO, but require hard work. Let’s reward those who have worked hard for them by testing them rigorously. In your book ”On Single Combat” you wrote that
”… they want to have the fanciful dreams of their youth confirmed to them,”
Yes, many of us came to the martial arts with such dreams, and in my opinion still do (and often only find WingTsun by chance). Many of my fellow instructors and students still have romantic ideas about the far-eastern martial arts and their philosophy. They are prepared to train in a disciplined manner and demonstrate their skills during grading. What is important for most of them is not really titles or certificates, but rather recognition and confirmation that they have done their work well. Certainly there are always a few black sheep, as you no doubt know only too well, but the clear majority of students at seminars are not really that interested in pieces of paper.
I am writing to ask you to tighten the reins again, and to increase the demands on students who are grading – including myself of course. Let us show you what we have learned, often at the cost of a great deal of time and sweat. Let even the very junior grades go back home proudly, show their relatives and friends their certificate and say: I earned this!
The students and Technicians I teach in my school are well able to cope with criticism – and especially criticism from a grandmaster – and they are also absolutely delighted to receive a word of praise (or a nod of approval) from you. But the feeling of not really having been tested lies heavily on a junior student grade.
In Wülfrath you said something to the effect that many instructors have stood still and are bogged down with sections. I absolutely agree with you on this point.
What I see many fellow-instructors doing looks choreographed to me. Like a “WingTsun ballet" that is intended to convey harmony and elegance to the public. “Do you know this variation?” is a question I hear increasingly often. Basics are no longer practiced, and a simple but effective punch is supplanted by a much more complex and inefficient attack.
Shortly before I got to know my present teacher Sifu Schrön, I really thought that this is the new direction the EWTO is taking, and I had serious doubts about this. But just a few hours of training at the Castle were enough to show me that it was not the EWTO but yours truly that was on the wrong path. I had almost reached the stage where I believed a number of fellow-instructors who told me that as a good Technician, I should have at least four different answers to any attack, rather than placing my trust in the concept and following the WT principles.
At your recent seminars in Heidelberg and Wülfrath you clearly stated and demonstrated what you expect from us in the future, and I am pleased about this clear pronouncement. Should you really have the intention of travelling through Germany in order to improve the basic techniques of instructors in the near future, I will more than welcome it and make every effort to take part with a full crew.

Yours sincerely,
Your To-dai
Oliver Hagenau

Dear Oliver,

I found your letter to be so important and inspiring that I have decided to make it the topic of this guest editorial.
It is true that during my last few seminars I really did think out loud, said what displeased me and announced my firm intention to take the rudder and reiterate certain principles.
Yes, I feel the strength and will to improve the general standard within the EWTO and raise it to a previously unprecedented level.
But even though you are right in saying that some students are able to cope with constructive criticism from their grandmaster, we must not make the mistake of starting the process with them.
We need a change in our point of view and a different attitude to work and performance. At least one that is different from that currently prevailing in Germany. Let us not rest on our laurels and trust in the long-term morale-boosting effect of the football world championships.
The world’s greatest educationalist was Confucius, and 2500 years ago he asserted that a teacher must set a good example before demanding high achievements from his students.
So we must start by working on ourselves!
Before acting on the urge to revitalise the EWTO, I subjected myself to an complete overhaul. First of all, after 36 years, I regained the academic standard expected of today’s high school leavers. I not only immersed myself in philosophy, but also in the sciences I had previously neglected, also re-reading the classics etc. At the same time I attended to my physical fitness, and this morning the scales showed only 69.80 kg. Not bad for a height of 1.86 metres less age-related shrinkage.
I am also proud of the fact that I can manage 31 chin-ups and many repetitions of parallel bar dips with weights attached.
Feeling better than I ever have before, I took a fresh approach to WT. I examined everything in detail and questioned everything. How does one make a weak person capable of self-defence in the shortest time? It was with this critical attitude of mistrust that I examined the forms, and especially Chi-Sao.
The forms,  basic exercises and Chi-Sao are important means of gaining the capability to defend oneself in any situation. They must be seen as stages on the road to free self-defence, and exercises such as Chi-Sao must not become an end in themselves.
Many of us have long ceased to see the wood for the trees. It is now time to rethink, recognise what is important and resolve to achieve it.  In my book “On Single Combat“ which you have quoted, in spite or because of (?) my limited knowledge at the time, I already saw things more clearly at the beginning of 1980 than some dreamers and wannabes do today.

For the first time in the history of WT, our WT university course has since recently provided us with the foundations and tools to research WT scientifically, and I make full use of this. I personally teach all my new findings about what is necessary for self-defence related Chi-Sao, and how to teach it, to the Masters and Technicians of the EWTO. I first have to be strict with them, before we apply the new standards to our students. We must only demand from our students what we are already capable of doing ourselves.
For TG examinations it is not sufficient to have absolved one’s “waiting time” like some civil servant, or to have memorised ”sterile” sequences.  In the higher grades it is not the ability to memorise that is to be assessed, but rather spontaneous responses in accordance with the ingenious WingTsun principles.

In 2007 I will devote much more time to the further development of our instructors and teachers, so that these can teach their students even better and, if there is a consensus, examine them more strictly.

As a note of caution I must however say that around twenty years ago, I intentionally began to move away from all-too strict examination scenarios. The ”old stagers“ will certainly remember how some grading examinations would last well into the night, as many a student was required to appear before my desk before I was satisfied. I did not tolerate any lack of precision.
The result of this approach was that some students built up such a high level of stress that this alone prevented them from “freeing themselves from their own strength“, and this highly stressed state sometimes persisted for several days afterwards.
To avoid this I later adopted the habit of assessing students without them being aware of it during the entire course of a grading seminar. Unfortunately this has caused some to gain the (wrong!) impression that ”grades are awarded for nothing”.
As I have already said, anybody who believes that his performance is measured according to gradings is lacking the right attitude.

So, dear Oliver, let us begin with ourselves!

With best summer wishes from north Germany,

Your Si-Fu

Keith R. Kernspecht