INTRODUCTION TO TRADITIONAL GONG FU

Shifu Alan Tinnion at a very young age, through a combination of very special factors was introduced to Grandmaster Chee Kim Thong. Initially, Master Chee found that the main nature of the relationship he had with Alan, was not that of a Master with a student, but more akin to a father-figure and Guardian: Alan was encouraged to train and develop his martial arts potential, naturally, but there was no pressure for him to prove his aptitude or excel in training.

However, nothing of significance in life is a matter of purposeless chance: Little by little he became engrossed by the world of traditional Shaolin Gong Fu.  He began to train, and was always encouraged to develop his growing interest in the arts he was privileged to be able to study at first hand.

In due course, Master Chee perceived that he had great potential aptitude for learning these arts, and learning them accurately: no less importantly he judged that Alan’s motives for learning the arts were pure and his character good/wholesome.

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Alan was encouraged to pursue the practise and understanding of the arts of his Master.  He excelled in them and in due course reached a point where his application and performance were noted fully by Master Chee.  In his early teens he had shown such a grasp of correct understanding of the core Forms of Wuzuquan that Master Chee took him under his wing as a prospective exemplary student of those Forms, and indeed potentially of many others.

Even at this early age Master Chee had become aware of Alan’s natural gift for accuracy in remembering detail both swiftly and thoroughly.  On the threshold of Manhood, Alan was already beginning to be regarded as one who was fitted to receive the full confidence, love, and trust of this famous Grandmaster: as a potential Guardian of the Arts of which he had already demonstrated such a thorough grasp of their essence and detail.

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As his mid-teens passed and he approached the age of twenty, Master Chee was already beginning to regard Alan as ‘Computer Brain,’ [his own personal name for Alan as a martial arts practitioner] in the enormous capacity he had to absorb the co-ordination of movement in the arts he taught; and no less in his grasp of the philosophy underlying them and in their application [pre-arranged and free-style fighting]. 

Alan’s commitment to learning and training had by now become total, and he was devoted to pursuit of these through the guidance and personal instruction of Master Chee: now, if possible, more cherished as his Shifu than he had been hitherto as a caring and thoughtful father-figure.

At the age of twenty, Alan was invited to become an Inner Chamber Disciple. Such an honour was not only a privilege.

It was also significant in that it entailed enormous responsibilities and commitments: responsibilities and commitments which Alan met fully and with good and very pure heart.