Hip Hip Hooray!

Grandmaster Ip Chun being awarded

For more than fifty years of teaching Wing Chun

(2018)

This weekend is an extended holiday in the UK, for Queen Elizabeth’s Platinum Jubilee, celebrating seventy years on the throne, a task she took on at the age of just twenty-seven (not that she had much choice I suppose) but a job she has done fantastically well, bringing hope and comfort to so many (a comment that I’m guessing many young people these days would probably not understand).

I am referring to people from a different era, a time where people would gladly fight for Queen and country, and likewise, their reigning monarch would always be there to try to give something back to the public (through moral support that is, not cash).

When any individual holds such a position in society for so long, they are always going to be faced with great highs and great lows (as we all are), but it is how we deal with these that makes who we are, and in the case of those we look up to, it is a special quality indeed, to never have the lows projected on to those who care about you, in just the same way that if your parents were sad, you would likely be sad too.

Being in a position of great power and for a very long time is one thing,

But being there because you are loved rather than feared,

That is quite a different matter.

So to those who show courage in the face of adversity, and help those who have chosen to follow them, to have the confidence to continue, I salute you.

In this blog I have of course mentioned HRH Queen Elizabeth, but I am also referring to my Sifu, Grandmaster Ip Chun, who has also had a lifetime in office (as it were) and was celebrated a number of years back, with recognition for fifty years of dedicated promotion to Wing Chun Kung Fu, a man who is even older than the Queen, and equally so, still continues to serve his loyal students.

Therefore this weekend, I will not only raise a toast with those celebrating the Platinum Jubilee, but also to my Sifu, Master Ip Chun,

Hip Hip Hooray!