Yip Bo Ching
No-one mentions the legacy that is Yip Bo Ching, he was one of the First batch if Ip Man's students and was aprently very skilled in Wing Chun with a knack of picking things up quickly.
The following information was collected from interviews with Wong Shun Leung (deceased), Choy Shung Tin, Wong Chock (deceased), and Yip Bo Ching's nephew Wong Ping Kwan.- - - - - - -
The following information was collected from interviews with Wong Shun Leung (deceased), Choy Shung Tin, Wong Chock (deceased), and Yip Bo Ching's nephew Wong Ping Kwan.- - - - - - -
Yip Bo Ching was a well to do businessman with a decent education. He made much of his wealth in the construction industry in Hong Kong and Taiwan. Yip Bo Ching was among the first group of Hong Kong students under Yip Man. Yip Bo Ching had many advantages - money, connections, a strong martial arts mind, and was a physically big and strong man.
Most important, Yip Bo Ching admired the useful combative mechanics found within the Wing Chun Gung-fu system. He became Yip Man's favored student....some would say "most favored" student. Yip Bo Ching's had the means to pay for long term private lessons. He often sent his car (or drove himself) to transport Yip Man to and from the many private practice sessions lasting a handful of years.
It was Yip Bo Ching who rough up the young (non-WC) Wong Shun Leung. In 1997, master Wong Shun Leung recounted that "Although I do not believe that I lost that fight, I do believe most people there would say that he (Yip Bo Ching) won." Wong himself soon joined the group and became Yip Man's most famous fighter and longest follower.Yip Bo Ching was reputed to be the first to learn all three open hand sets, the Dummy, and the Kwan.
He was also one of only two people to learn the twelve section version of Yip Man's "Eight Chop Broadswords" and was among the selected few allowed to copy the three Dr. Leung Jon medicine books held by Yip Man. There is some belief that Yip Bo Ching was well on his way to become Yip Man's most cherished protege.
Fate, however, would not be kind to Yip Bo Ching and he contracted what was believed to be hepatitis and quickly died while still in his early 30's (his true age is unknown). Today is name is faded and few of the old timers remember much of the man who might well have been the keeper of Yip Man's WC art.
Interesting story. I wonder who was Yip Bo Ching's main student? Maybe this side of the legacy lives on.
ReplyDeleteIf anyone got it all, it would be this guy! He posed no threat and seemed like the right vehicle at the right time of Yip Man's life. It would have been rightfully his son's but they came back to his life a little too late. At the time he taught Yip Bo Ching, Yip Man was physically very fit to teach and very capable of physically transmitting his Art, he did not know if he would ever be reunited with his sons again, it would only only be logical for YM to maintain his WC to a high standard in case there were any challenges so he trained diligently but was not very completely open even with his top students tHat would become later become his competition.
ReplyDeleteJust to let you know that the picture you got there is Ng Chan, who is also a student of Yip Man.
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