Ed Cruz Raw 2005
pt1

Changes

Student: There’s been a significant change in how Windy City is run now, how and why did this come about?
Sifu Ed Cruz: Any kind of change begins with yourself.  And, an attitude shift, in how we exposed ourselves to the public was the biggest realization.  Our thinking, in the past is that if you found Windy City, then you were fortunate enough, and if you didn’t so be it.   But, looking at what kind of self-defense is offered around all of Chicago and the suburbs, we felt if we didn’t do our best to get our names out to the public, we were doing a disservice to those who were looking for the highest quality in martial arts..

Student: So, now you feel Wing Chun should be learned by all?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  I'd love to expose everyone to the beauty of Wing Chun, but in the end I also do realize that as good as Wing Chun is, it will not appeal to the majority of people out there.

Student: Why do you feel that?
Sifu Ed Cruz: Wing Chun is a system based on common sense.  While on the outside, everyone talks about common sense and wanting it, if you look around, the world we live in is far from it.  I believe people rather enjoy making lives more complicated then it really needs to be.

Student: So you feel common sense is lacking in most?
Sifu Ed Cruz: Can you explain to me why O.J. Simpson still finds dates, Paris Hilton is acting, or why parents let their kids sleepover at Michael Jackson's place?

Student: So, what's the major downside of being known more?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  Being known more, means being criticized even more.

Student: Does the criticism bother you?
Sifu Ed Cruz: Actually it doesn't, regardless of how negative it is.  I've learned to listen and analyze every criticism that's ever come.  The fact is some criticism might be right, but if your ego gets to the point where it says, I don't care what other people say, you may miss on the opportunity in making yourself better.  In the end, its just another opportunity for me to work on detaching my ego.

Student: Don't you find it difficult listening to some of the criticism?
Sifu Ed Cruz: Not at all, because some may in fact be legitimate while others are purely B.S. In the end, I've never had a critic say anything was wrong with my Wing Chun to my face.

Student: Has your teaching changed much in the last several years?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  I believe you can say that.  In the beginning, my teaching was very rigid. I was very set on a strict course for both students and curriculum to follow. However, through time you could say that the evolution of my teaching has taken a leap forward.   Now, because of a deeper understanding of the art, I’ve become more personalized in teaching each individual student’s in a certain way.

Student: So does skill in teaching improve in the same way as ones Wing Chun skill?
Sifu Ed Cruz: Just like it depends on the student, the same can be said about a teacher.  In the beginning when you first start to teach, your almost like a parrot.  Simply repeating what your Sifu said to you.  Without dissecting and continuously working on your teaching skill, you can end up in that loop forever. 

Student: Is teaching Wing Chun what you expected it to be?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  In the beginning I thought knowing it and walking the talk were enough.  But being a leader, a motivator, a counselor, etc, to your students were added things that weren't in the job description.

Student: Does it upset you when you see students quit?
Sifu Ed Cruz: Initially I didn't understand why someone would quit.  But, with a deeper understanding of the art, I've also gained a deeper understanding of people. I'm not really sure how to phrase it, but I can almost feel that individual students intent the moment I meet him or her.

Student: What do you expect from your students who study?
Sifu Ed Cruz: I honestly believe there's something special about the students who join our class.  While we may advertise more, we consistently draw upon the same kind of individuals we are looking for.  I doubt that will ever change.  But my only expectations from my students is, give it a chance, listen with an open mind, and the skills and ability you develop with this art is priceless.  

Student: In a perfect world, how would you like to teach?
Sifu Ed Cruz: I sorta like the idea of being a teacher hidden from the public, only to be found by a student searching for me.  I guess in a perfect world, I'd go theYoda route.  I'm not that social.

Student: At what point during your teacher did you ,"Get it"
Sifu Ed Cruz: By that "Get it" I guess you mean when everything clicked for me.  I can't recall the specific time frame, but at the point where I no longer wanted to mimic my Sifu, and wanted to be the best of me possible.  You could say at that instance, everything changed.

Student: Do you feel you missed out by not living in Arizona and training with Sifu Fong everyday?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  In the beginning I thought that was the case.  But, in time I came to realize that my skills are better because of my particular path I took.  To me, studying long distance meant I had to know... well, my shit!  There was no Sifu Fong for me to run back to all the time.  Its sorta like being in the real world, you don't know what its like till you move out of your parents home.

Student: So how did you go about developing your skill?
Sifu Ed Cruz: Looking back, when you first start to teach your not that good, I believe it takes a couple pieces to the recipe to make it work.  1st you need a good teacher, 2nd you need students, and finally 3rd its all about you.

Student: Can you explain how all 3 play a role in development?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  Without a good teacher your limited to how much you can figure out.  A good teacher can at least show you to the door which you have to walk through.  A bad teacher can lead you astray.  As for the students, without teaching you cannot develop the eye to see mistakes and to digest the art.  There's a difference between just doing it and actually explaining it.    Finally you, it always boils down to that.  Only you can make yourself good, no such thing as being gifted, you have to make it work and make it good and that's through practice.

Student: Critiquing yourself on how you teach, what’s one thing you think you’d change?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  Hmmm, personally I think I’m to mothering when it comes to teaching. 

Student: What do you mean by mothering?
Sifu Ed Cruz: Sometimes, the mind needs to discover things for itself.  And, often students get to dependant on me for the answers all the time, instead of figuring things out on their own.  When you start doing that, they’ll begin to take things for granted.

Student: Do you think students take teachers for granted?
Sifu Ed Cruz: From my experience I think so.  But, it’s only natural to do so.  I mean take your parents for instance; you never really understood how much they did for you growing up, until your much older.  Only now do you start to appreciate it.

Student: What’s the toughest lesson you’ve had to learn from teaching?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  I’d have to say detaching from teaching.  It amazed me a couple of years ago, that Sifu said at his seminar that if he had to quit Wing Chun that it would not be a problem.  At the time I couldn’t even comprehend how that was possible.  But, eventually I also learned how to walk away from the art that I love.

Student: How do you detach from something that your so passionate about?
Sifu Ed Cruz: In life you start with nothing and you end with nothing.  Wing Chun was simply a tool for self-awareness.  Ed Cruz is not about Wing Chun, I’ve found out who I am because of it.

ABOUT YOU

Student: You mentioned a 3^rd article is coming out this year?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  As far as I know it should hit sometime this summer.  I submitted it over a year ago.

Student: Do you plan on releasing an article once a year?
Sifu Ed Cruz: I envisioned releasing 3 articles in a row, sorta like a trilogy.  After the 3^rd one I’ll probably take a break from any kind of articles.

Student: How do you decide what to write about for the articles?
Sifu Ed Cruz: I take 2 things in account, basically the topic I decide can be written so that a non Wing Chun person can understand it and can the article be visually captured on camera.

Student: Do you enjoy writing articles?
Sifu Ed Cruz: I enjoy it at the time, but reading it later, I’m not to found of the articles. In general the articles can’t go into the details that I’d like to get into.  And often by the time you’ve written it and it gets publish your understanding of the art has grown more, making what you wrote seem childish.

Student: Do you have any plans to demonstrate Wing Chun at local tournaments or events?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  We did a Wing Chun demonstration last year at a pretty big event.  However, that demonstration is not what I really want to demonstrate to the public, since its too much Wing Chun. 

Student: What do you mean too much Wing Chun?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  Take last years demonstration, the biggest applause came about from my Bruce Lee/Blade finishing move onto Ken.  Which required the least amount of skill, had the most amount of fluff, and had the least to do with Wing Chun.  I do have a demonstration that we will eventually display to the public, but it requires allot of practice, but the end result should blow away anyone who watches it.

Student: How would you like to demonstrate Wing Chun?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  I’ve got copies of demonstrations done throughout the years, other than Sifu’s demos everything else has basically look like crap. 

Student: How about a demonstration where you do chi Sao blind folded?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  Frankly, I’ve never understood doing a demo of blindfold Chi Sao, when the guy blindfolded is the one attacking.  I don’t understand the point of it.  Its sorta like handing a guy a gun in front of you, blind folding him and saying, try to shoot me.   How exactly is that suppose to be impressive?   You allow any idiot without Chi Sao ability to try to hit you blindfolded and you’ll probably get similar results.  What’s really impressive is blindfolding the guy, giving your partner the gun, and then telling him to shoot you.

Student: How come most people don’t do blind fold chi Sao defense?
Sifu Ed Cruz: 2 reason really, first and most important reason is most people in the Wing Chun community can't block.  So they cover this lack of ability by just bombarding their opponent with attacks.  Second, the audience viewing it wouldn’t care whether it was blocking or attacking.

Student: So you think most people don’t understand what they see during a demonstration of sing Chun, say for example sticky hands?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  The fact is most people couldn’t tell the difference between Rossie O’Donnell and Jessica Alba.  By that I mean, whether its good Wing Chun or bad they have no idea what they are looking at.  Most people have delusions of grandeur as to what marital arts is all about.  Whether I do Chi Sao or patty cake, people have really no idea what the heck were doing.

Student: Last year you released a 3 part series on Wing Chun on local cable show, how’d that go?
Sifu Ed Cruz: One of my student’s had a class project which resulted in our brief glimpse into TV world.  It involved a 2-day shoot of roughly 4 hours each day.  It was good experience on how things are done, and if opportunity arises again, I think our next showing will be even stronger.

Student: Do you ever plan on releasing instructional tapes on Wing Chun?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  It all depends if we have enough unique drills to show to the public.  In other words, drills that we created I’d be willing to put on tape, however drills that were shown to me by Sifu, I’d never use since they are Sifu’s drills in the first place. 

Sifu Fong

Student: You seem to enjoy talking about your Sifu?
Sifu Ed Cruz: It’s true there are very few people I feel you meet in your lifetime that you truly admire.  And, Sifu Fong is someone who I hold the deepest respect and admiration for.  Today’s society places celebrities and sports athletes in god like position.  For being able to dribble a ball or memorize lines, they believe these people to be more than just that.  But the fact is many of them are simply an image created by them or the media.  

Student: What are some of the things that amaze you about Sifu?
Sifu Ed Cruz: Sifu’s very generous with his knowledge of the art, and there are those who have tried to take advantage of his generosity.  For example you have your stroke in New York who forged his name saying he endorse him, or the joker with a huge video series saying he learned with Sifu for a long time.  Normal human reaction would be to get angry from it, but he clearly practices what he preaches, and is detached from even the bad things that have happened in the past.  As Sifu has said before, people are people, and he clearly understands the good and bad in everyone.  

Student: What separates Sifu Fong in your opinion from the other Wing Chun master's out there?
Sifu Ed Cruz: He can block.  As you know I've personally met a good majority of them, and I honestly don't know if they can block or not.  I think most of them mask their skills by constantly attacking their students.  To me you need less skill to attack, and allot of skills to actually block.

Student: What do you like seeing about his Wing Chun?
Sifu Ed Cruz: If you watch Sifu’s moves they are just effortless.  Sifu Fong is the only Wing Chun person I have ever seen who moves like an actual Kung Fu fighting movie.  Its truly amazing to watch him in action.

Student: Many have said, how is it possible these guys got so much information in such a short time, your thoughts?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  Its very obvious how this comes about.  If you’ve ever gone to one of Sifu’s seminars, and simply took good notes for a 6 hour period that 1 session has enough information at the very least to do a 5 tape video series on Wing Chun.  That is how informative Sifu’s classes or seminars are.  And, I base that from experience of attending many other lines seminars that were given in the past.

Student: You’ve said its not unusual for students to take their teacher for granted, have ever taken Sifu Fong for granted?
Sifu Ed Cruz: I know from experience how difficult it is to find a good martial arts teacher, since you could say I've suffered many divorces to get to this point.  Often I think students take teachers for granted, assuming that they will always be there forever.  But, never once have I done that with Sifu.  I guess the path I took in order to find him, made me appreciate everything he does.

Student: How much more do you have to learn from Sifu?
Sifu Ed Cruz: Hahahaha, obviously the correct answer would be a lifetime.  Seriously, I’ll continue to study with Sifu until he says he doesn’t want to teach anymore.  The man is an endless wealth of Wing Chun knowledge.  I’m not sure exactly how I’m gonna do it, but I definitely want to learn acupressure from him as well.

Student: How would you compare your teaching style to Sifu’s?
Sifu Ed Cruz: Besides the obvious fact of his knowledge compared to mine, Sifu’s got a softer and more patient approach.  Often I joke with my students, if Sifu says, “not bad, not bad” its just a nice way to say, it really needs work.  I on the other hand, have a sharper tongue, and spend little time trying to sugar coat the obvious.

Student: Give me one word to describe Sifu Fong?
Sifu Ed Cruz: He's a Rebel.

Student: Why would you describe him as a rebel?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  To me, he's taken his Wing Chun to a new level beyond what he was taught.  Often many student simply parrot what their teachers taught them.  But, Sifu evolved in his application and teaching of Wing Chun.  To do what he's done with his Wing Chun may not happen again in a lifetime.

Mok Yang Jong (Wooden Dummy)

Student: What’s the main idea behind the wooden dummy?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  There are several ideas behind the dummy, however the 2 main ones being proper release of energy and positioning.

Student: Can you explain that further?
Sifu Ed Cruz: The dummy is the first opportunity to apply your motions other than doing single-man technique or the form in the air, if they are done correctly and the release of energy is done right, then you in fact will hear it from the dummy.  Wrong release of energy, such as using muscle or incorrect position will lead to a dull whack, instead of a "Wang"

Student: But, that doesn’t mean you hit the dummy hard, correct?
Sifu Ed Cruz: The same concept I’ve talked about regarding wall bag training applies.  That means you release the right amount of force without hurting yourself.  Keep in mind, its bone VS. wood.

Student:  Have you ever seen the effects of hitting a wall bag or dummy after years of training in that fashion?
Sifu Ed Cruz: We’ll personally I’ve seen a very well known Wing Chun teacher, whose line blast the wall bag.  At one point I saw him doing SLT, doing the first section slow, and he had some severe shakes while doing it.  Unless, there was some kind of medical condition that I don’t know about, more than likely he’s suffered some form of nerve damage through the years of blasting the bag.  Remember, the results of your training aren’t felt when your young, but beat your body up today, and it’ll punish you tomorrow.

Student: You said positioning is also important?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  Well, the dummy is a fixed object.  If you enter into the dummy at the wrong distance, you either jam your motion or you end up reaching for it.  The dummy forces you to adjust properly and teaches you correct positioning.  By that I mean, always being square to its center axis.

Student: Can you define what square means again?
Sifu Ed Cruz: Square simply means that both your hands are even to your opponent’s center axis.  This plays an important role since the triangle functions of both side’s energies being even.

Student: Are there moves in the dummy that you don’t see in the 3 other forms?
Sifu Ed Cruz: Some footwork as well as kicks are in the dummy that are not in the 3 hand forms.

Student: Si-Gung Fong’s dummy form has been criticized as well, can you explain?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  If you look at Sifu’s form it deals with allot of symmetry.  In other words, looking at the original form there were parts of it that only developed one side.  Thus, when Sifu looked at the form, there was no clear or reasonable explanation to developing only one side.  Much of the criticism has stemmed from that.

Student: At what point does the student learn the dummy?
Sifu Ed Cruz: You can literally show motions on the dummy to the student at any point.  But, as far as when I was shown, normally you learn the 1^st half of the dummy after Chum Kiu.  Then the 2^nd half after you’ve learned Bue Gee form.

Student: Is there a reason for that particular break down?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  You learn it in that fashion, since it correlates with the concepts given in those particular form.

Training

Student: Allot of people, say drills are a waste of time in Wing Chun?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  Is that what they say?  Drills are the necessary homework one needs to do to prepare for the real test.  Without drills, it’d be like taking a test without ever opening a book, coming to class, or listening to the teacher.  The result of not doing that is obvious.

Student: But don’t drills become to repetitive for individuals?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  The way we have drills, they are specifically designed to develop certain abilities in Wing Chun.  Picture them as tools meant for learning, not for memorization.  In the end, once the student has developed the skill, the drill is no longer necessary.  Sorta like learning the alphabets, they are the first step to learning to create words, once you know it, you don’t have to go back and review the alphabets anymore, they served their purpose to the next level of progression.

Student: You’ve said in the past that it is possible to weight train as well as do Wing Chun aerobically?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  It is possible, but personally I don’t.  The way I see it, Wing Chun is a sufficient source of exercise in itself.  The time I could spend lifting or running, I might as well invest that into my Wing Chun training?

Student: So is it a matter of just being efficient that you avoid lifting weights or aerobics?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  Let’s look at aerobics first.  Anytime you do something aerobically, your maintaining a certain pace to burn off calories, etc, etc.  Naturally the body will get tired, and when it does often people will end up using muscle.  If you did Wing Chun aerobically, sure you can lose weight from it, but at what price?  Is it worth sacrificing the structure and motion just for a few calories?  As for lifting, it’s true you do develop new muscles.  But, no matter how much stretching one does, lifting will always make you a pinch tighter.  Personally, I plan on just developing my internal muscle.

Student: Do you feel you have to be in good shape to defend yourself?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  Not at all.  If your talking about a fight or actual self-defense scenario, your looking at using 1 to 3 hits at best.  If your opponent is still standing after that, then I’d suggest you run, and go home and practice.

Student: Regarding sparring, you don’t believe students should touch this for a while?
Sifu Ed Cruz: I know everyone wants to jump into sparring right away, but too me you want to build on skill first.  Imagine playing a game of basketball right away, without knowing how to shot, dribble or pass.  Yeah, it’ll be fun running around, but when your 1 of 20 shooting, causing several turnovers, etc, etc and you continue to build on bad habits, what have you achieved? 

Student: So why do many schools seem to toss students into sparring right away?
Sifu Ed Cruz:  If I asked the majority to wait 1 hour for a dinner or let’s just grab some fast food now, which do you think they’d pick?  We live in an impatient society that demands quick fixes.  Think of how our schooling system is setup.  You start school at about age 5 and you aren’t allowed to work till your 16 or so.  That’s almost 10 years of developing skill.  I’m not saying you have to wait 10 years before you spar, but schools don’t toss you into the work place after finishing 1^st grade.

Student:  Since your students don’t jump into sparring right away, do you feel they take a slower path to learning how to defend themselves? 
Sifu Ed Cruz: Not at all.  The way I see it, once you know how to punch you can defend yourself, even without knowing anything about sparring.

Student: Has any of your students used their Wing Chun to defend themselves?
Sifu Ed Cruz: I have 2 students who had less than 6 months use Wing Chun to defend themselves.

Student: What did you say when you found out they used their Wing Chun?
Sifu Ed Cruz: I basically said, the next time you feel like showing off, don’t.  Coz, a true gung fu man knows that there is no winning without lost.  

Student: What's the best advice you can give someone who wants to improve fast?
Sifu Ed Cruz: If you want to improve fast, know what your doing.  Just doing it, isn't enough.  1000 punches thrown incorrectly is just a waste of time, compared to 20 punches done just the right way.  Also, listen to your Wing Chun.  By that I mean, Wing Chun is not based on no pain no gain principle.  If your doing Bong Sau incorrectly it will hurt, ignoring it and not controlling your ego will only hurt your development.