Yee-Wah Chow
There are so many warm memories I have of Michael that I can share here. Let me begin with my very first fun conversation with him. At the White Tiger school, there are herbal formulas and one has been made into a pain relief balm for selling. I joked to Michael that we could make a skin moisturizing version made of olive oil. “I bet women would love to buy this,” I said to him. He immediately had a big smile. He told me my remarks reminded him of an advice from his mom some time ago: putting a bit of olive oil on your hair could attract women. Michael became my private teacher almost a year later. When we practiced Kung Fu, we’d also weave in observations about music, Chinese dialects and even sailing. He has a great mind that can absorb knowledge in just about anything and draw connections to the Kung Fu technique at hand during the lesson. It was very apparent to me how close he was with his parents. His mom was his source of inspiration in many ways. One day, after we finished training, he asked me to help him plan a trip to China. He told me his mom put this idea in him that he should seek his next milestone in China. I told him to get some foundational training in Mandarin before landing in China, which would make an exotic trip less scary. Ever so resourceful and clever, Michael taught himself the tonal pronunciation of Mandarin. I was amazed at how precisely he enunciated each tone and how he learned just by listening to audios he found on the internet without any formal training. He attributed his phonetic learning ability to his prior training in music and guitar. He also said, “No wonder there are so many accomplished string musicians in China. Chinese people deal with tonal shift in their language every day. This is natural for them.” Michael’s interest in the Chinese language went beyond learning a few conversational phrases for tourists. He practiced writing Chinese characters on his own. When I explained to him the pictorial origins of some of the words, he really enjoyed the philosophical aspect of the Chinese script and aspired to learn Classical Chinese one day. As his Kung Fu student at White Tiger, I found in Michael a rare combination of analytical and creative skills which made him a successful and inspiring teacher to many. I told him this just prior to his departure for China. He said he must have acquired the two traits as a son of an engineer and an artist. Michael’s artistic ability isn’t just limited to music. As a frugal but resourceful person, he crafted some Kung Fu training tools just using ordinary objects found in nature. As part of his fund raising prior to the China trip, he made me a forearm conditioning tool using a large bamboo stem filled with metal beads. This weighted bamboo is among my most treasured training instruments at home. I know I will feel the presence of Michael’s spirit when I gaze upon a tree bending and shaking in the wind but solidly grounded, when I listen to the flowing water of a brook whispering life, when I see a honey bee doing its part to keep flowers blooming, when I see a timid little kid overcoming anxiety at a recital, and when I see peaceful protesters giving voice to those who have been forced to suffer injustice in silence.