Cast your mind back. Back. Little bit further. Good. Elizabethan England. Henry VIII and his split from the church in Rome wasn't all that long ago. Catholics v Protestants in fanatical ideological struggles (you would be passionate too if your immortal soul was on the line), and the Catholics had definitely got the shitty end of the stick. They had been fiercely persecuted under Elizabeth I, though not without provocation, as a series of plots and attacks - among them the war with Spain - sought to oust her and bring Catholicism back to Britain. The declaration that Catholic Mass was illegal though, predates the Spanish Armada.

When she died in 1603, English Catholics hoped that her successor, James I, would be more forgiving. His mum, after all, was Catholic. They were wrong though (it's more complicated than that, obviously, but read this to find out more), and a group of 13 men came together under the leadership of Robert Catesby to do something about it. Their plan? Blow up the House of Lords. They'd get James I, a whole bunch of MPs who hated them, maybe even the Prince of Wales too for good measure.

Does this ring any bells? It should. Religion polarising people to such an extent that a fanatical, disaffected group comes together to make a stand - violence their final recourse. It could be modern-day London, Washington, you name it. Then they were conspirators, today they'd be terrorists. But it's hard not to have some sympathy for their cause.

The conspirators got hold of 36 barrels of gunpowder, enough to pulverise the House of Lords, and stored them in a cellar just under the building. Guy Fawkes, who had 10 years of military experience fighting in the Spanish Netherlands in suppression of the Dutch Revolt, was given charge of the explosives. But as the group worked on the plot, it became clear that innocent people would be hurt or killed in the attack, including some people who even fought for more rights for Catholics. Some of the plotters started having second thoughts. One of the group members even sent an anonymous letter warning his friend, Lord Monteagle, to stay away from the Parliament on November 5th (though this may have been a fake).

The warning letter reached the King, and the King's forces made plans to stop the conspirators. At midnight on 4 November, 1605, they stormed the cellars and caught Fawkes. Most of the conspirators fled London, trying to enlist support along the way. Several made a stand against the pursuing Sheriff of Worcester and his men at Holbeche House; in the ensuing battle Catesby was one of those shot and killed. At their trial on 27 January 1606, eight of the survivors, including Fawkes, were convicted and sentenced to be hanged, drawn and quartered.

The Gunpowder Plot struck a very profound chord for the people of England. In fact, even today, the reigning monarch only enters the Parliament once a year, on what is called "the State Opening of Parliament". Prior to the Opening, and according to custom, the Yeomen of the Guard search the cellars of the Palace of Westminster. Nowadays, the Queen and Parliament still observe this tradition. On the very night that the plot was foiled, bonfires were set alight to celebrate the safety of the King. The thwarting of the event was for years commemorated with church services, bell ringing and burning effigies of Guy Fawkes on a bonfire - hence today's Guy Fawkes Night.

Are we partying in support of Fawkes' execution or honoring his attempt to do away with the government? Perhaps it doesn't really matter any more - politics have always been best sanitised by masquerading as a celebration.

In Lewes, fireworks night is a bit darker than at other paces. Bonfire societies parade down the streets in costumes, lighting fireworks, burning crosses and effigies as they go, all under the "no popery" standard. The event's roots commemorate the burning of 17 Protestant martyrs by Catholics in the 16th century. Now, as well as the Pope and Guy Fawkes, you'll see tableux and effigies of modern day baddies being burnt - George Bush, Saddam, even John Prescott. It's an annual day of misrule, the costumes were originally to stop participants being recognised. Of course, while it's not exactly politically correct, it's hugely popular. If it does get shut down, it'll probably because so many people go that Lewes can't cope, not because we don't want to see Iranian presidents being chucked on bonfires.

Now watch this, it's worth it:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wIF63jhRQcw]

Goolies Cancer - Jack and Mark's stories - NHS Choices.

Aristotle. In short: the man. The brainy man. Greek philosopher, student of Plato, teacher of Alexander the Great, and one of Western thought's most important figures. His writings were the first to create a comprehensive system of Western philosophy - morality and aesthetics, logic and science, politics and metaphysics - and yet only a third of them survived. He covered physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology. His understanding of physical sciences lasted until Isaac Newton's apple dropped, and we still talk about his philosophy today. There's an excellent Wikipedia on him here, but below are some of my favourite sayings of his.

Love is one soul in two bodies.

A tyrant must put on the appearance of uncommon devotion to religion. Subjects are less apprehensive of illegal treatment from a ruler whom they consider god-fearing and pious. On the other hand, they do less easily move against him, believing that he has the gods on his side. All human actions have one or more of these seven causes: chance, nature, compulsions, habit, reason, passion, desire.

All men by nature desire knowledge. All paid jobs absorb and degrade the mind.

All virtue is summed up in dealing justly.

Anybody can become angry - that is easy, but to be angry with the right person and to the right degree and at the right time and for the right purpose, and in the right way - that is not within everybody's power and is not easy.

Character may almost be called the most effective means of persuasion.

Courage is a mean with regard to fear and confidence.

In nine cases out of ten, a woman had better show more affection than she feels.

It is best to rise from life as from a banquet, neither thirsty nor drunken.

+

[[ps - please check out some of my other quote collections here - The Guy Quote]]

THE INGREDIENTS: 4 large courgettes (not enormous though - if you're American you won't call them courgettes either, you'll probably call them zucchini or something) 1 big-ass egg 1 fresh red chilli (deseeded and finely chopped) 1 heaped tablespoon of flour a handful of fresh mint 1 lemon, zested and quartered a good handful of freshly grated parmesan cheese sea salt (Maldon of course) and some pepper olive oil half a tsp of cumin

Optional extras: maybe a bit of tinned sweetcorn or some bacon bits that are nice and crispy but not too big

THE METHOD: Thick-grate the courgettes (scoop out the middles if you are up to it). Then put them into a clean tea towel and wrap them up and wring them out - loads of water will come out. You want this to happen. The more you can squeeze out the better. Plus it's really satisfying.

Separate the egg and put the white in one bowl and the yolk in another. Add the courgette, pepper, flour, chilli, mint, lemon zest and parmesan to the yolk and mix it up with your hands. Don't be shy. Get really stuck in. Whip the egg white up with a pinch of salt until stiff. Carefully that add to courgette mix (for fluffiness, you see, otherwise it gets dense).

Put a good couple of glugs of olive oil in the pan and put 5 or 6 fritters into your favourite big frying pan. They'll be about a serving-spoon size each. The heat should be sizzly but not burny. They should need about 2.5 min on each side to go golden. Pop them on a bit of kitchen paper to degrease. Eat them up with maybe some creme fraiche or something. Bit of nice crisp salad.

AND FOR THE MUSIC: [audio http://dysonology.files.wordpress.com/2010/10/bergensere_0.mp3] Norway’s nu disco king Bjørn Torske. Low slung disco vibes with percussive change up and and bubbling bass lines give us a window into the type of tunes his new album has in store. Out on Smalltown Supersound on November 15th you can find out more here.

I've been surrounded by blue and white china my whole life. Mum is a massive fan - the kitchen has always been packed with jugs, tureens, plates, dishes, and more, sometimes chipped but always loved. Thinking on it, it has been a massive influence on me, the idea that something utilitarian (a plate) can also have aesthetic value. This was drilled into me at an early age when I used to have to eat my food to see which Peter Rabbit plate I had. Then there's The Dining Room Shop - Mum's shop - which has always had gorgeous stuff - some really quite rare and beautiful (I've always liked the old Wedgwood, personally, especially the quite plain Jacobean (?) stuff). Nowadays it's a sort of collective term for knock-offs - usually transfers - of various other patterns. But Willow Pattern is named after an original Chinese design, first engraved by Thomas Minton in 1780. He was then followed by Royal Worcester, Spode, Adams, Wedgwood, the whole gang (Burgess and Leigh's modern Willow has been in continuous production since 1922).

There's a story behind the original pattern, and it's quite beautiful. Look at the plate first. It might look like a single image, but there's a whole narrative happening inside it.

Once upon a time, there was a very grand Mandarin (that's his palace under the big tree) who had a stunning daughter, Koong-se. She was so beautiful that he had knew he could do very well out of marrying her to the right person.

He also had a secretary, Chang. A personable young man who, while doing the Mandarin's acccounts, full head over heels with Koong-se, and she with him. It was proper love too. Not an infatuation but an all-consuming need. When he found out, the Mandarin was livid. How could this lowly secretary ever dream he was suitable for his daughter? Something had to be done.

Poor Chang was banished, and a huge fence was build around the gardens of the Mandarin's palace - you can see it at the bottom of the dish - so that Chang could not get in, and Koong-se was trapped inside, a bird in a gilded cage.

One day she was standing at the water's edge when she saw something in the water - a shell, with tiny little sails on it. She picked it out of the water and found inside a poem, and bead that she had given her lover. Chang was outside, and he still loved her.

But then - terrible news - the Mandarin came in to tell her that he had found a suitable match. Ta-jin, a powerful warrior Duke. Not only that, but he was on his way to meet his betrothed, with loads of jewels for her (that's him on the boat on the left hand side, making his way to the palace).

Chang had a plan though. Disguised as a servant, he snuck in to that night's banquet, and up to Koong-se's room. They kissed and decided to make a break for it. The Mandarin and Ta-Jin had drunk themselves into a stupor, and the two lovers quietly crept out. But just as they were leaving, the Mandarin woke up and tore after them (that's him chasing them over the bridge - she's holding jewels and I think the Mandarin has a whip).

They just managed to escape, and hid with a maid who the Magistrate had already fired for conspiring with the lovers. Koong-se had given the casket of jewels to Chang, so the Mandarin, who was also a magistrate, swore that he would use the jewels as a pretext to execute Chang as a thief when he caught him.

One night the Mandarin's spies reported that a man was hiding in a house by the river (on the plate it's just behind the boat) and the Mandarin's guards raided the house. But Chang had jumped into the ragging torrent and Koong-se thought that he had drowned.

Some days later the guards returned to search the house again. While Koong-se's maid talked to them, Chang came by boat to the window and took Koong-se away to safety.

They settled on a distant island, and over the years Chang became famous for his writings. This was to prove his undoing. The Mandarin heard about him and sent guards to destroy him. Chang was put to the sword and Koong-se set fire to the house while she was still inside.

The two birds on that plate? The gods, touched by their love, immortalised them as two beautiful doves.

.

There's another story to the plate - a secret Shaolin legend.The Shaolin Monastery is burned by the Imperial troops of the Manchu rulers, called invaders by Chinese nationalist and later communist factions. Souls of the dead monks take a boat to the isle of the Blest. On the bridge are three Buddha awaiting the dead souls: Sakyamuni, the Buddha of the Past; Maitreya, the Buddha of the Future; and, Amitabha, the Ruler of the Western Paradise. Beyond them is the City of Willows – Buddhist Heaven. The doves are the monks' souls on the journey from human to immortal life.

[I might get Mum to check this ;) - oh, and with all fables and legends, there's always another version, so apologies if this isn't the one you know]

Altai mountains, eagle hunters wait while their friends (and me) scramble around gullies trying to flush out prey

I shouldn't even feel the need to say it, but: Clint Eastwood is the sort of man we should aspire to emulate. Courteous, unflappable, no-BS, self-contained but not self-centred. And check the CV - Clinton "Clint" Eastwood (born May 31, 1930) is a film actor, director, producer and composer. He has received five Academy Awards, five Golden Globe Awards, a Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award, two Cannes Film Festival awards, and five People's Choice Awards — including one for Favorite All-Time Motion Picture Star.

In real life, he has come through a few scrapes without using stuntmen - in 1951, while on army leave, Eastwood rode in a Douglas AD bomber that ran out of fuel and crashed in the ocean near Point Reyes. After escaping from the sinking fuselage, he and the pilot swam three miles to the shore.

Although sympathetic towards her bid for the presidency, Eastwood expressed disappointment with Hillary Clinton for engaging in a duck-hunting photo op, saying, "I was thinking: 'The poor duck, what the hell did she do that for?' I don't go for hunting. I just don't like killing creatures. Unless they're trying to kill me. Then that would be fine."

My old drama coach used to say, 'Don't just do something, stand there.' Gary Cooper wasn't afraid to do nothing.

If you want a guarantee, buy a toaster.

They say marriages are made in Heaven. But so is thunder and lightning.

I don't believe in pessimism. If something doesn't come up the way you want, forge ahead. If you think it's going to rain, it will.

I'm interested in the fact that the less secure a man is, the more likely he is to have extreme prejudice. Clint Eastwood

I've never met a genius. A genius to me is someone who does well at something he hates. Anybody can do well at something he loves - it's just a question of finding the subject.

Respect your efforts, respect yourself. Self-respect leads to self-discipline. When you have both firmly under your belt, that's real power.

In school, I could hear the leaves rustle and go on a journey.

It takes tremendous discipline to control the influence, the power you have over other people's lives.

We boil at different degrees.

and Clint can sing too:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzVM6Q4YwAA]

https://docs.google.com/present/embed?id=df7rw7vz_338cz6ngnd6&size=m Warning: this will make you procrastinate

Hunting in Mongolia.

"My very worst injury ever, the one that almost killed me, actually occurred on a very routine stunt. I was shooting Armour of God in Yugoslavia, and was still recovering from the jet lag of flying twenty hours to get there. The stunt was simple-just jumping down from a castle wall to a tree below. The first time I tried it, the stunt went perfectly, but I wasn't satisfied with the take. I tried it again, and the second time, I somehow missed the branch I was trying to grab. Whish! I fell past the tree and onto the ground below. Actually, there was a cameraman down there trying to capture a low angle, and if he hadn't scrambled out of the way, I would have probably landed on him. We would both have been hurt, but not badly. Instead, I hit the rocky ground head first. A piece of my skull cracked and shot up into my brain, and blood poured from my ears. The production team quickly got on the phones to try to find the nearest hospital that could do emergency brain surgery, and eight hours later, I was going under the knife. The operation was successful, and I recovered quickly-even though there's a permanent hole in my head now, with a plastic plug there to keep my brains in"

"While I was shooting a fight scene in Snake in the Eagle's Shadow, my arm was accidentally slashed by a sword that should have had a blunted edge. Blood went everywhere, and I fell down screaming ... and the camera kept rolling! That's real pain you see in the movie!"

"I broke my ankle while jumping onto a hovercraft in Rumble in the Bronx. After the bone was set and a cast was put on, I was told to stay off my feet until it healed. But I had a movie to finish! I went back to the set and put a sock on my broken foot, painted to look like a sneaker."

Outtakes from one of my favourite Jackie Chan fights, from Young Master: [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1pLhcsgLEM8&w=700]

Plus the last fight from Drunken Master: [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWpQi3_v7Zc&w=700]

And the running commentary...genius. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0wOe5taSiR0&w=700]

ps - Quotes came from HERE.

“I sit with Shakespeare and he winces not. Across the color line I move arm in arm with Balzac and Dumas, where smiling men and welcoming women glide in gilded halls. From out the caves of evening that swing between the strong-limbed earth and the tracery of the stars, I summon Aristotle and Aurelius and what soul I will, and they come all graciously with no scorn nor condescension. So, wed with Truth, I dwell above the Veil. Is this the life you grudge us, O knightly America? Is this the life you long to change into the dull red hideousness of Georgia? Are you so afraid lest peering from this high Pisgah, between Philistine and Amalekite, we sight the Promised Land?” W.E.B. Dubois, The Soul of Black Folk (1903)

I came across the above while reading the comments to THIS fantastic article in prospect. Dr W.E.B. DuBois was a contemporary of my great-great-grandmother (Mattie Lawrence, one of the first Fisk Jubilee Singers) and, as well as graduating from both Fisk and Harvard, wrote some incredible, prophetic treatises on civil rights for black Americans, was an activist, sociologist, journalist and much more. The Wikipedia piece on him goes into loads of detail and is well worth reading.

He had a mammoth falling-out with Marcus Garvey. As far as I can make out, the ideological disagreement was over DuBois believing that African Americans could live equally with white people. DuBois said blacks have a "Double-Conscious" mind in which they have to know when to act "white" and when to act "black". Garvey took issue with the idea that anyone should have to assimilate or "fit-in" in the first place.

It wasn't that gentlemanly a disagreement. DuBois, fearing Garvey would undermine is efforts towards black rights, said: “Marcus Garvey is, without doubt, the most dangerous enemy of the Negro race in America and in the world. He is either a lunatic or a traitor.” Garvey suspected DuBois was prejudiced against him because he was a Caribbean native with darker skin. DuBois once described Marcus Garvey as "a little, fat black man; ugly, but with intelligent eyes and a big head." Garvey, in return, called DuBois “purely and simply a white man's nigger" and "a little Dutch, a little French, a little Negro … a mulatto … a monstrosity.”

Unsurprisingly, they didn't talk much afterwards.

It's astonishing, writing this in London, watching people of all races walking around in the street outside - and making up the small team I work and play with here - that the fathers of civil rights, lionised by poets and politicians alike, should talk about one another that way. Astonishing and a little sad. Perhaps it was just symptomatic of the times, and their language is out of context in my modern, politically-corrected lexicon. Most conversations I have about civil rights and race are exactly that - conversations. I wouldn't be able to do that had it not been for the likes of Garvey and DuBois. Given the scale of the fight for equality before them, and the - to my mind at least - utterly unimaginable unfairness of daily life and the basic rights they were fighting for, the fire and passion, the sardonic anger of that first quote, are more than understandable.

And, as promised, some words from W.E.B. DuBois (1868 - 1963):

It is a peculiar sensation, this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one's self through the eyes of others, of measuring one's soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity.

To stimulate wildly weak and untrained minds is to play with mighty fires.

When you have mastered numbers, you will in fact no longer be reading numbers, any more than you read words when reading books You will be reading meanings.

If there is anybody in this land who thoroughly believes that the meek shall inherit the earth they have not often let their presence be known.

The cost of liberty is less than the price of repression.

.

.

.

RIP

Some British, Scottish, Irish, Welsh Gods & Goddesses: Amaethon (Welsh) - God of Agriculture, Master of Magic

Arawn (Welsh) - God of the Hunt and the Underworld

Arianrhod (Welsh) - Star and Sky Goddess, Goddess of Beauty, Full Moon and Magical Spells

Badb (Irish) - Goddess of War, Death and Rebirth

Caillech (Scottish, Irish, Welsh) - Goddess of Weather, Earth, Sky, Seasons, Moon and Sun

Cliodna (Irish, Scottish) - Goddess of Beauty and of Other Realms

Creide (Irish, Scottish) - Goddess of Women and Fairies

The Green Man (Welsh) - God of the Woodlands, of Life Energy and Fertility

Morgan LeFay (Welsh) - Goddess of Death, Fate, the Sea and of Curses

Oghma (Scottish, Irish) - God of Communication and Writing, and of Poets

Rhiannon (Welsh) - Goddess of Birds, Horses, Enchantments, Fertility and the Underworld

Skatha (Welsh) - Goddess of the Underworld, Darkness, Magic, Prophecy and Martial Arts

I've done various types of kung-fu and general scrapping on and off for most of my life. Never to any level of real expertise - enthusiastic amateur probably sums it up best, as it's my lack of control over my gangly limbs and pointy elbows that is genuinely dangerous - but always with genuine interest in provenance as well as technique. For anyone who's ever been even half interested in it, there are certain characters we all hold dear: Jackie Chan is the don, genuinely tough and a serious badass but with genius comic timing; as well as being a big ol' hairy bear, Chuck Norris is hard as nails and not someone to mess with (originally Korean-taught, he invented his own system, Chun Kuk Do); and (one, two skip a few) Bruce Lee is the progenitor of it all - he brought it to the silver screen in the West, but he was also a tireless innovator of martial arts.

We're told the Chinese didn't want Westerners to learn their martial arts, that Bruce Lee - who learnt his own Wing Chun from the legendary Ip Man - was challenged by a shady cabal of Kung Fu masters in a fight to the death over the matter, and that he won, winning for us the right to open the doors and teach whoever he wanted.

At least that's what I always thought.

I stumbled across this amazing article today, originally printed in "Official Karate" in 1980, which is food for thought and then some. Not just about the circumstances surrounding the fight, but also about general perceptions of internal/external martial arts. I've put a few highlights below, but thoroughly recommend you read the whole thing (click HERE to do so) and get it in context.

What you're about to read is a fascinating alternative to that Hollywood legend. A clash between Bruce Lee's aggressive new style and Wong Jack-Man's traditional Chinese methods (below). But, crucially, not necessarily the version from the movie.

"Considering the skill of the opponents and the complete absence of referees, rules, and safety equipment, it was one hell of a fight that took place that day in December.

It may have been the most savagely elegant exhibition of unarmed combat of the century. Yet, at a time when top fighters tend to display their skills only in huge closed-circuited arenas, this battle was fought in virtual secrecy behind locked doors. And at a time when millions of dollars can ride on the outcome of a championship fight, these champions of another sort competed not for money, but for more personal and passionate reasons.

The time was late winter, 1964; the setting was a small Kung Fu school in Oakland, California. Poised at the center of the room, with approximately 140 pounds packed tightly on his 5'7" frame, was the operator of the school, a 24-year old martial artist of Chinese ancestry but American birth who, within a few years, would skyrocket to international attention as a combination fighter/film star. A few years after that, at age 32, he would die under mysterious circumstances. His name, of course, was Bruce Lee.

Also poised in the center of the room was another martial artist. Taller but lighter, with his 135 pounds stretched thinly over 5'10", this fighter was also of Chinese descent. Born in Hong Kong and reared in the south of mainland China, he had only recently arrived in San Francisco's teeming Chinatown, just across the bay from Oakland. Though over the next 15 years he would become widely known in martial arts circles and would train some of America's top martial artists, he would retain a near disdain for publicity and the commercialization of his art, and consequently would remain unknown to the general public. His name: Wong Jack Man (below).

...From the few available firsthand accounts and other evidence, it is possible to piece together a reasonably reliable picture that reveals two overriding truths. First, considering the skill of the opponents and the complete absence of referees, rules, and safety equipment, it was one hell of a fight that took place that day in December. And second, Bruce Lee, who was soon to rival Mao Tse Tung as the world's most famous Chinese personality, was dramatically affected by the fight, perhaps fatally so.

Linda Lee, in her book Bruce Lee: The Man Only I Knew, initially dismisses the fight as follows:

"The two came out, bowed formally and then began to fight. Wong adopted a classic stance whereas Bruce, who at the time was still using his Wing Chun style, produced a series of straight punches. Within a minute, Wong's men were trying to stop the fight as Bruce began to warm to his task. James Lee warned them to let the fight continue. A minute later, with Bruce continuing the attack in earnest, Wong began to backpedal as fast as he could. For an instant, indeed, the scrap threatened to degenerate into a farce as Wong actually turned and ran. But Bruce pounced on him like a springing leopard and brought him to the floor where he began pounding him into a state of demoralization."

"Is that enough?" shouted Bruce. "That's enough!" pleaded Wong in desperation.

So the entire matter was just another quick triumph for the man who frequently boasted he could whip any man in the world. Or was it?

That the fight with Wong was the reason Lee quit, and then later repudiated the Wing Chun style, was confirmed by Lee himself in an interview with Black Belt. "I'd gotten into a fight in San Francisco (a reference, no doubt, to the Bay Area rather than the city) with a Kung-Fu cat, and after a brief encounter the son-of-a-bitch started to run. I chased him and, like a fool, kept punching him behind his head and back. Soon my fists began to swell from hitting his hard head. Right then I realized Wing Chun was not too practical and began to alter my way of fighting."

For those who have difficulty believing that a quick if clumsy victory over a worthy opponent was sufficient reason for Lee to abandon a fighting style that had seen him through dozens of vicious street fights as a youth in Hong Kong, where his family had moved shortly after his birth in San Francisco, a more substantial reason for Lee to change styles can be found in the account of the fight given by Wong Jack Man.

According to Wong, the battle began with him bowing and offering his hand to Lee in the traditional manner of opening a match. Lee, he say, responded by pretending to extend a friendly hand only to suddenly transform the hand into a four-pronged spear aimed at Wong's eyes.

"That opening move," says Wong, "set the tone for Lee'�s fight." Wing Chun has but three sets, the solo exercises which contain the full body of technique of any style, and one of those sets is devoted to deadly jabbing and gouging attacks directed primarily at the eyes and throat. "It was those techniques," say Wong, "which Lee used most."

There were flurries of straight punches and repeated kicks at his groin, adds Wong, but mostly, relentlessly, there were those darting deadly finger tips trying to poke out his eyes or puncture his throat. And what he say he anticipated as serious but sportsmanly comparison of skill suddenly became an exercise in defending his life.

Wong says that before the fight began Lee remarked, in reference to a mutual acquaintance who had helped instigate the match, "You've been killed by your friend." Shortly after the bout commenced, he adds, he realized Lee's words had been said in earnest.

"He really wanted to kill me," says Wong.

In contrast to Lee's three Wing Chun sets, Wong, as the grand master of the Northern Shaolin style, knew dozens. But most of what he used against Lee, says Wong, was defensive. Wong says he parried Lee's kicks with his legs while using his hand and arms to protect his head and torso, only occasionally delivering a stinging blow to Lee's head or body.

He fought defensively, explains Wong, in part because of Lee's relentless aggressive strategy, and in part because he feared the consequences of responding in kind to Lee's attempt to kill him. In pre-revolutionary China, fights to the finish were often allowed by law, but Wong knew that in modern-day America, a crippling or killing blow, while winning a victory, might also win him a jail sentence.

That, says Wong, is why he failed to deliver a devastating right-hand blow on any of the three occasions he had Lee's head locked under his left arm. Instead, he says, he released his opponent each time, only to have an even more enraged Bruce Lee press on with his furious attack.

"He would never say he lost until you killed him," says Wong. And despite his concern with the legal consequences, Wong says that killing Lee is something he began to consider. "I remember thinking, 'If he injures me, if he really hurts me, I'll have to kill him."

But according to Wong, before that need arose, the fight had ended, due more to what Linda Lee described as Lee's "unusually winded" condition than to a decisive blow by either opponent. "It had lasted," says Wong, "at least 20 minutes, maybe 25."

Though William Chen's recollections of the fight are more vague than the other two accounts, they are more in alignment with Wong's than Lee's. On the question of duration, for example, Chen, like Wong, remembers the fight continuing for "20 or 25 minutes." Also, he cannot recall either man being knocked down. "Certainly," he says, "Wong was not brought to the floor and pounded into a 'state of demoralization.'"

Regarding Wong's claim that three times he had Lee's head locked under his arm, Chen says he can neither confirm or deny it. He remembers the fighters joining on several occasions, but he could not see very clearly what was happening at those moments.

Chen describes the outcome of the battle as "a tie." He adds, however, that whereas an enraged Bruce Lee had charged Wong "like a mad bull," obviously intent upon doing him serious injury. Wong had displayed extraordinary restraint by never employing what were perhaps his most dangerous weapons - his devastating kicks.

A principal difference between northern and southern Chinese fighting styles is that the northern styles give much more emphasis to kicking, and Northern Shaolin had armed Wong with kicks of blinding speeds and crushing power. But before the fight, recalls Chen, "Sifu Wong said he would not use his kicks; he thought they were too dangerous." And despite the dangerous developments that followed that pledge, Chen adds that Wong "kept his word." Though Chen's recollections exhaust the firsthand accounts, there are further fragments of evidence to indicate how the fight ended.

Ming Lum, who was then a San Francisco martial arts promoter, says he did not attend the fight because he was a friend of both Lee and Wong, and feared that a battle between them would end in serious injury, maybe even death. "Who," he asks, "would have stopped them?" But Lum did see Wong the very next day at the Jackson Cafe, where the young grand master earned his living as a waiter (he had, in fact, worked a full shift at the busy Chinatown restaurant the previous day before fighting Lee). And Lum says the only evidence he saw of the fight was a scratch above one eye, a scratch Wong says was inflicted when Lee went for his eyes as he extended his arm for the opening handshake.

"Some people say Bruce Lee beat up Jack Man bad," note Lum. "But if he had, the man would not have been to work the next day." By Lum's assessment, the fact that neither man suffered serious injury in a no-holds-barred battle indicates that both were "very, very good."

Both men were no doubt, very, very, good. But Wong, after the fight, felt compelled to assert, boldly and publicly, that he was the better of the two. He did so, he says, only because Lee violated their agreement to not discuss the fight.

According to Wong, immediately following the match Lee had asked that neither man discuss it. Discussion would lead to more argument over who had won, a matter which could never be resolved as there had been no judges. Wong said he agreed.

But within a couple of weeks, he says, Lee violated the agreement by claiming in an interview that he had defeated an unnamed challenger. Though Lee had not identified Wong as the loser, Wong says it was obvious to all of Chinatown that Lee was speaking of Wong. It had already become common knowledge within the Chinese community that the two had fought.

In response to Lee's interview, Wong wrote a detailed description of the fight which concluded with an open invitation to Lee to meet him for a public bout if Lee was not satisfied with Wong's account. Wong's version of the fight, along with the challenge, was run as the top story on the front page of San Francisco's Chinese language Chinese Pacific Weekly. But Bruce Lee, despite his reputation for responding with fists of fury to the slightest provocation, remained silent."

Please read the whole thing here: http://www.lakungfu.com/sifujackmanwong.html , it's worth it.

Mountain fortress. It's cold in them thar hills.

The gang's all there.