Hofan is home

October, the in-between month

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 23:46:00 +0000

October has been a strange month; a sort of in-between aimless month. It took me a good couple of weeks for me to settle down with the new routine of teaching and rehearsals.

Tai chi wise things have been rather good. I finally feel as if I am back on the edge of my learning curve, though it really took me a while to get back on the bus.

Victor has been pushing me to work internally. So I’m doing a lot of meditative stances and qigong... which is actually precisely what I need. Currently I’m working on the “tree-hug” stance, one of the most basic stances where it is a deep wide open stance with your arms encircled. The trick is to get one’s spine straight.. I have been working on this one for ages.

Today, Victor introduced me to bat-gua (八掛), which refers to a style of martial art where one walks in a circle. It’s been something I have been wanting to learn for ages, because basically my instinct in combat is to avoid getting hit. However, I keep getting yelled at by Victor for shrinking away from the fight. “That’s the best way to get hurt. Go in, rather than shrinking away – if you shy, you give your opponent the opportunity to press forward and more room for attack. But if you move in, then he will have no room to manuveure…”

Well, if a huge fist is coming my way, my instinct is still to get out of its path. So finally, Victor is teaching me a way to “run away without running away” … oof! It’s very demanding on the thighs, but the idea is that you basically circle around your opponent and attack from behind. Very sneaky!

I have also begun assistant teaching. For some reason Victor is very big on me learning how to teach tai chi. “That’s the best way to learn – by teaching you find out what it is you don’t’ know.” So, every Friday evening I am helping him teaching two students on Victor’s rooftop. I kind of wish it wasn’t Friday… Friday tai chi is sandwiched between 3.5 hours of tutoring that afternoon and another 6 hours on Saturday, so I’d much rather be in “student-mode” and in touch with my body than “teaching mode”… but… well. In any case it’s supposed to be good for me. If anything, teaching beginners require a lot of patience… and it’s a humble reminder of how much patience my sifus must have had for me.

Here is a photo of my other sifu, Li sifu that I took. (more photos here on Facebook). My cousin, Jacky, lent me his digital SLR camera and I was practicing with it before the big day of his elder brother’s wedding – where I was the unofficial photographer. I confess that despite its weight and obtrusiveness, the difference in the quality make me very very tempted to buy a digital single lens reflex for myself.

Yes, so I was the unofficial photographer for my cousin Newton’s wedding. With ’08 being an auspicious year (the number eight sounds like “wealth”) everyone seems to be getting married. Newton’s was the third occasion this year.

The difference, of course, that this was close family, and so Homei and I were much more intimately involved. Furthermore, this is the aunt and uncle who is pretty well off, and – even amidst the financial crisis – they had the full shebang – complete with hair stylists and make-up artists in the living room for family and friends, to a mirror-occasion in Guangzhou for the bride’s extended family. It was also incredibly well-organised, classy and had really nice personal touches. The wedding took place in the park, the weather was perfect, and as weddings go, it was really well done.

This photo is of Newton signing the wedding contract. I think it’s a classic. Both Newton and Sue are accountants, and so the vicar talked about the importance of cool-headness before committing oneself to a lifelong act; and then, the importance of throwing out the math when one is in a relationship. It was a nice speech, and Newton added to it by saying, “Well, the more you do figures, the more you realize how much really can’t be properly quantified, and at the end of the day, you simply have to make a decision with whatever you have.”

* * *

Meanwhile, this has sort of been a month of non-decision. Although Burnt Mango has an ongoing production I am playing a pretty supporting role this time. Actually, a rather challenging role, in the sense that I am assistant directing to a director who is incredibly busy and whose vision I am not entirely clear about. The truth is, Adrian and I just think so differently that it is hard for me to contribute. My instinct is to sort out the space, use music, minimize the text. His instinct is to start from the text, write the script; delve into the meaning of the text. And so it’s been rather.. well, I would be more frustrated if I let myself be; and I am getting rather impatient. But I also sense that Adrian does have a idea of what he wants – it’s a matter of him being able to articulate it to all of us.

Actually, for a while it was really draining on me: being sort of stuck in a position where I didn’t have control, and yet the production was just not moving… until finally, the other day I realized that I actually had a choice. On the minibus home, I suddenly had this image that there were all these things bleeding energy out of me – things which were outside my control; and I could either let them sap my energy, or I could (and visually I imagined myself closing off the circle, so that the blood stayed in and collected itself rather than seeping out) stop it from doing so.

Since then I have felt much better; much more empowered.

* * *

Family relations have gotten better and better over the past few weeks. Two new family members joined us, Gum-gum and Ein – much to the gruff exasperation of Duck-Duck, who has graduated to alpha-male status over the two young ones. Over Chung Yeung festival (the annual holiday where people remember their ancestors and go sweep the graves) the three of them had a field day. Someone had offered a roast chicken to their ancestors and the dogs prompted gorged themselves off it. I took it away from them and ended throwing it up a tree – just to get it out of their reach.

The family also had a (somewhat impromptu) holiday, which we haven’t done for a while. We went to a half-finished theme park over the border where dad was thinking of leading a meditation camp (huge huge place.. including this great hill) but in the fall and winter they don’t allow people to camp there… so instead of staying overnight, we puddle around cable cars, had lunch, took the mini train, had afternoon tea, sat on the beach, had dinner… and went home. It was great to have the leisure to do not too much and hang out as a family… and particulary good for my parents, I think.

It was also interesting to see my father extended himself for the family. For example, the restaurant on the hilltop had freshly pressed juices, and as wanted to get a jug. I suggested grape juice, which dad was not so hot because of the high risk of pesticides. I said, “Let’s not get something like carrot that we can juice at home…” and dad gracefully acceded.

Where was it that I read.. “Love is about making exceptions” (The Fountainhead?) It’s these small moments where it’s clear that dad has principles, and that also he cares enough about having fun as a family to put those aside. (The grape juice, incidentally, was pretty crap. They just dumped all the grapes, skin, seeds and all into the juicer. We could have done that at home, too).
I also saw dad helping mum off the bus… yes… this trip has rekindled something in them too. And the good news is, this feeling seems to have carried over back into our everyday lives. For the past few days, dad has bothered to come down the stairs and give me a hug before I leave the house… small details like this that are nourishing the family.

-- from letter to Christine

berzerk redux

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 12:34:00 +0000

As an intellectual exercise:

For some odd reason, tonight I am toying with images of Berzerk again.

If I ever go back to work on it, I would take out the narrative, the characters; I would loop the madness around until it .. well, really berzerk...

We had two “colours” that feel right; two colours that feel juste.

The busy concrete, and the silent solitude.
And yet I am looking for a third colour. I feel like there is a third colour that comes out of this.
A violence? A warmth? I’m not sure.

.

Uncle Jo's last trip at sea

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 23:31:00 +0000

Five mornings of tai chi practice

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 13:40:00 +0000

These few months I have been trying to write up some insights about tai chi; especially tai chi in connection to theatre and teaching (the other two practices in my life). It's harder than I expected; there are some days where the ink flows freely, and there are other days where it just doesn't. Hopefully if I persist at it I will eventually be able to battle out something more complete.

It's the same with tai chi. Some mornings I wake up, and everything seems to fall into place; other mornings it’s a struggle to even get to the park. And depending on where I am today, what I get out of tai chi practice will be different.

Here are five mornings of tai chi practice (2008年7月10-14日), which I think kind of gives an idea of the range of different types of mornings I have...

Day One: Grace

It's been raining non-stop for weeks now. But today, out of the blue, the sky has suddenly cleared up. So, for the first time in weeks, I walked over to my park at洞梓.It's great to be out again. Doing tai chi inside the house just isn’t the same, and there’s something about this park that makes it easy to settle into the practice.

Today I went slow. 點點滴滴的慢. A slow unfolding, the way a droplet discovers its path down a windowpane. The odd thing was, I don't think my body was particularly en forme. In fact, I could feel the creakiness of my 四平on my first 單鞭. But in that state of grace, how could my body not settle into place?

Oof. It's only until afterwards that I notice how well-used my muscles are. I think this is one of the slowest times I've ever done the 108.

The oddest thing was that while I was doing it, this guy in his forties, on crutches, came over while I was practising. He had been stretching when I walked in, so I said good morning, and went over to the concrete side of the park, leaving him on the playground side with the nice absorbent floor.

「你啲掌好有美感，你耍咗幾來呀?」

I never quite know how to answer that question. Two years? Five years? Usually, I just say, 「認真耍，有两年啦」

「两年!?」he exclaimed in disbelief.

All this while, I continue my 108. I discover that I'm able to navigate this conversation while keeping my kuen at the same, steady pace. I breathe into my 雲手, even as the man expresses incredulity at how young and healthy I am. It's a bit like wading in water, both through my kuen, and the swirling nuances of our dialogue.

I ask him how he hurt his leg. He tells me that he hurt it in work related accident, and that's why he has the leisure to be in the park in the morning. Because he was smart enough to ask if I did this for the health or martial art aspect, I ask him if he has learnt any kungfu. He has.

This exchange takes about ten minutes. Even though speaking with him is effortless, I have sped up ever so slightly. I notice too, how once he leaves, my awareness can slide back easily into the kuen. I finish the last third of my 108 and 收勢.

李師傅 is in 鄭洲for the week, which means a lot of quiet mornings by myself studying. When we parted, I said "一帆風順" to her; and as I said this I had this sudden thought, what if something does happen to her?
What if people close to me died this moment? Would I feel that I have lived in a way that made the most of our time together? And in the case of 我两位師傅, am I making the most of our time together?
The edge of morality gives a particular keenness to my practice.

Day Two - After-grace

Another bright and beautiful sunny day…
..but the flow wasn't there. Not in the same way. What to do?

In the absence of this grace, I try to find my way home by recreating the sensations. The trick is, while in the state of grace, to 'anchor' the sensations – the way Hansel and Gretel threw pebbles or breadcrumbs along the path, so they could find their way home by moonlight.

I trace the pathways in my memory. It's there, faintly, but it's not the same. My friend Jo once told me how she is able to recall the sensation of when she took ecstasy. “If I really concentrate… like for example, of my fingertips on this stair banister, I can get a small patch of the heightened sensation.” What I am doing today is what I imagine you does – attempting to retrace the pathway of an intense experience.

In the absence of this grace, I am besieged with questions -- how much to push? Today I kept as much as the chi wanted to run. So I didn't particularly運勁 to my fingers – instead, I just followed the flow of where the chi wanted to take me. 李師傅, of course, would have berated me for not properly filling out the energy and expanding out (掤) into space. But she is not here and this is a sort of experiment to "be moved", rather than to move.

In my slowness, I'm encountering the same resistence as I used to have in sitting meditation. i.e., moments where when I want to stop and call it a day. The difference is, however, with the 108 I have a sense of the beginning middle and end, whereas if I do vispassana with the clock I set an alarm and don't look at it. When I got to 野馬分鬃I knew, "god, I still have halfway to go."

But oddly enough, I had an undercurrent that kept my movement slow. And all the detail -- the weight shifts, 開合 – it was all there if I listened.

I am reminded about what Osho said about enlightenment – he call enlightenment an accident. You cannot ask for accidents, but you can make yourself more "accident-prone" through meditation… and that's what you have to do. You prepare, prepare and prepare, and gradually, these peak experiences happen more frequently and consistently, and hopefully, eventually, one moves from peak to plateau.

~

Day Three - Study

Today I am at 阿婆's. When I am here, the important thing is to go into the living room and do tai chi practice as soon as the impulse strikes. If I go check my e-mail or putter around, soon the breakfast will be ready, the TV will be on, people will wake up and want to be social, and the opportunity will have passed. Ergo: wake up, do.

So I stretched. It feel good to stretch after the rigor of yesterday's lesson. There are certain sets of muscles which seem particularly tired – e.g. the core muscles that control a slow descent, seem to be temporarily on strike, making my descents (e.g., into 玉女穿梭) thump heavy-footed. But that's ok. That particular set of muscles just needs to be trained.

If on Thursday my tai chi was in a state of grace, and yesterday's practice was trying to retrace that state of grace; then today's practice was in study mode. Instead of being in, or trying to recreate the flow, today I took the time to wok on the details. Yes: pay attention here – it's the knee that leads after the 上下走手. Yes. feel the connection from center to shoulder to arm to the release of the right wrist in the transition into 雲手. Make sure the fists have no gaps. When necessary, re-run sections of the sequence to check, and clarify, clarify, clarify until the pathway is very clear.

Today in particular I am sensing the difference with a slight tuck-in of the chin. This tendency for me to stick my chin out was first spotted by Soto, corrected again by 阿熊師弟, and I was reminded again last night by Victor, when we were doing the 運喉背吐. This small correction has a significant effect to my alignment, and my spine becomes taut, energised. As I test it out today, I realise that it leads also to a tightening of the center, and relaxation of the shoulders.

Details that felt particulary good today: the return from the 下勢. I could really sense the crouching tiger energy, springing from the earth. Details, details: turn the right foot after the 攻前in the 攬雀尾/單鞭transition, not before. All these small corrections that have yet to be reintegrated into my execution.

Slow detailed work on the 劈掌. Thos 2-8馬things I do little and often throughout the day. It's trying, but then I think about how difficult it was to open up my 胯 in parallel 四平大馬, and now, after all that work, I can more or less drop into that stance on demand. I look forward to the day when the 2-8馬will finally be like that.

Day Four- Muscle

Head muggy – got home late last night. Woke up, as usual, and the weather seemed so perfect, that I thought, Carpe Diem! and headed off to 洞梓park.

At 洞梓 my thoughts were mulling over the Anderson Project (the show I'd seen last night), so I sat down on a park bench and wrote. Head was still muggy. I warmed up, I tried to work on my 拳 but I couldn't focus. So I focused on very very simple 基本功: 拉筋, 摟膝拗涉, 雲手, 站樁 (in particular the 太極 / 2-8馬)

I thought, even if my thoughts are all over the place, at least I'm working on basic, basic stuff on a muscular level. I was hoping, actually, that the sheer physicality of the 站樁 would be able to cut a swathe thought my mugginess, as it is sometimes able to do. But it didn't today.

My right knee is throbbing again; and it's not the 108 起式 this time that seems to be stressing it. It could be a misalignment in a 樁?

I work myself to physical exhaustion, and then I head home and collapse back into bed. So much for the perfect weather.

The other day someone at Club O (thinking that I had some secret energy source) asked me what I do when I was feel tired.
"I sleep," I said.

Day Five - Stability

Morning. 洞梓park again. Clear blue sky.
Stable practice. Clear mind. I was with my 拳 80-90% of the time. No peak experience, but it felt steady. The first half of the sequence, I was still trying to find my way back to the flow, but the second half, I had found the 勁路. The 勁was more clearly etched, more expansive.

My 胯wasn't particularly loose – I could tell from my 玉女穿梭. So, I pushed myself to the lower, more expansive stance. My speed today was average. I didn't have a watch on me, but I would guess I'm clocking at 25 or 30 minutes for my 108 sequence. (As a reference, I was probably doing around 45, 50 minutes or more of super-slow practice for Thursday and Friday).

I was pleasantly surprised to find that after 阿孔's dancing there were no major aches, as there used to be after a crazy three hour dancing session. And then I was surprised to realise that my muscles were tired, not aching-tired, but they definitely weren't as fresh as usual. Still – it's a young, strong body.

The 炒飯 felt oddly unfamiliar. Which is odd, because炒飯felt so intuitive when I first learnt it. Maybe I have different standards now?
Who knows. I remind myself: the下盤 should be the same as the 野馬分鬃 (so I do a few of these to feel it, and then try to transfer the sensation). I keep wanting to do it like the 攬雀尾, but Victor suggests that I want to end up with the pelvis at a slight angle when the palm is forward, as opposed to directly forward.

The 2-8 迫步seemed okay today. The 劈掌, as usual, is an ongoing project, and now I'm supposed also to add the 彈腿 to my 上步and 退步. I did several, until my muscles were tired, and then I did ten more. That's what I learnt from sitting meditation. You pick a target time, and then set ten more minutes than what you thought you could do. And those ten more minutes are where the real learning takes place.

RWDNY - Pearl Sea Project (3)

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 13:59:00 +0000

I have about two minutes on stage that I really like:

I kneel, holding the space. Then, slowly, the weight of my head takes over, and I bow to the floor. From kneeling, I unfold the right knee, and caress the air with my arms in a circle, and roll the air out – the way does with a carpet. I contract into what I think of as “sheltering under the rain” gesture, which my head hidden under my hands. But I peek out: and look. It’s like a bird looking. I take care to take in the space with my looking.

Then, cautiously, I step forth. The space expands before me, and I venture into this new space. My hands part the mists before me. I look down, my hand falls, like a pebble down a deep well, and my weight sinks with it; until suddenly, I find my weight supported by my right hand. Weight shift – I flip: over to left hand, up on left leg, and I’m flying. My body is suspended, parallel to the floor, my arms supported by the air beneath.

I shift back to vertical on my left leg; it’s a tiny lift up, and then off-balance, I scuttle back. My pelvis twists: left, right, and I push the space backwards, extending my left hand behind me. Cautiously, I come en point, fragile steps into the space – and then, with an undulation, my head gets thrown up and down: I see a spot. I reach for it, sinking down. I touch the earth, and remain there in this point of contact until the lights go out.

Ling Fen taught me and Katie in the first class, and by the second class, I’d figured enough of it to make it mine. I keep thinking that Robert will develop it (and he even said he wanted to outright), but he never does. Instead, he makes us do it every other rehearsal.

It’s good practice to be able to consistently deliver; and it’s a matter of staying present, and receiving feedback from the sensation. And of course, it felt different again on the stage. I was so near the front, all the suspensions in the air feel more risky.

Isabel said, “It felt like your stuff.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Well,” she said, “It was meditative… slow, and detailed.”

I always find it amusing when people are able to tell me what “my stuff” is. I suppose it’s good to develop a recognizable aesthetic.

RWDNY - Pearl Sea Project (2)

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 13:58:00 +0000

12th July, 2008

A little further on into the project.
I’ve discovered that I hate learning movement from video.

Movement is a transmission of energy – not a series of arms and legs in certain positions.
That choreography was created in a certain moment in time; it had meaning then.
Now if one of those dancers came to teach me (the way Ling Fen does), then it makes sense. It is a transmission of meaning. I receive the quality of movement from what I am able to sense from the human being in front of me.

But video tape is a moment frozen in time. Meaning is not mediated by live, organic energy.
So we are learning dead structures; okay, sure, why not. It’s a matter of going in the front door or back. If the choreography is strong enough then as we do, we will discover (create) the meaning that arising from it. But there’s part of me that resists this Frankenstein work. Why do this when there are throbbing, living dancers in front of you? Why not create something that’s relevant to here and now and this particular group of movers?

Ok, I’m just tired, and this particular sequence makes no sense to me. What is this “Cambodian trio” – why are we being Cambodian sculptures?

19 July, 2008

One of those long RWDNY rehearsals where I seem to be waiting around, just soaking things in. I’m exhausted today – mainly from my morning tai chi with Victor. Did we really do so much? Or is it the accumulated weariness of the week? Seriously – this afternoon I was wiped out. I took a nap and when I woke up, my body felt so heavy, I just wanted to roll over and sleep again.

Working with big groups is tricky. It’s taxing to be hanging around. I feel a bit out of it. I like watching the dancers; but at the same time, I wonder: what am I doing here?

當一位演員覺得來與不來，確時與遲到都好像沒有大分別那麼，我會問:為什麼要花時間縯?我走有什麼意思? And so there exists an unspoken contract between actor and director: I’ll respect your rehearsal time if you respect the mine…

Still, it’s always valuable to watch. I particularly enjoy watching their main dancer, Ling Fen. I could watch her all day. Her movement is like clear water, so effortless and transparent. And the quality of attention, so lightly held; even when she is tired, even when she has a hurt back. She’s always present. They say in tai chi that your grasp should be like holding a bird: too tightly, and you’ll squash the bird; too loose, and the bird will fly away. Ling Fen’s movement etches the air, leaving an afterglow. Seriously, I could watch her all day.

RWDNY - Pearl Sea Project (1)

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 13:54:00 +0000

5 July, 2008

On top of my summer teaching load, this month I’ve taken on a dance project with New York choreographer Robert Wood (who used to be in Merce Cunningham’s dance company.) It’s a nice change for me to be performing instead of directing. and for the first time in three years, be dancing in performance (instead of acting in physical theatre)!

And it feels good! We are rehearing in this huge, beautiful gym in the Australian International School. The floor is a warm wooden colour, and the ceiling is really high. Higher even than Troy Dance Lab. The height and breadth of the whole place inspires huge expansive movement. It’s truly gorgeous to work in such a space.

Having been away from technique class for 2 years, I am pleasantly surprised to find that my technique has not only not rusted away, but I actually seem to have improved in my absence. Hard core tai chi has given me a strong center, and relaxed many of those shoulder and neck muscles that I used to tense up to compensate. Robert also teaches a softer version of the Cunningham technique – which, like tai chi, seems to aim for energy and extension with minimal muscular strength. It’s still as tiring as hell, as Robert likes to push the young bodies he has in front of him, but there seem to be many places where I can transfer my existing knowledge of the body over.

It’s odd though, to be surrounded by young, freshly graduated APA dancers. I discovered that I learn movement in a different way. After we were taught a fairly long sequence and retired to a corner of the hall to work through it ourselves, the first thing the APA dancers wanted to do was to chunk it down mentally. “Ok, so it’s three of these foot-things, sashay-turn on right foot…” As they did they would sketch through the movement minimally.

Meanwhile, what I wanted to do was to actually do the sequence a couple of times really slowly to understand the mechanics and anchor the sensation. By doing it full-out, I taste the continuity, and begin to understand “what this movement is about.” I mean, it’s not about “three foot-things” .. the third foot-thing should feel different from the first one, by virtue of repetition.

Here I’m beginning to sense how my understanding of movement is being shaped by the structure of my tai chi practice. Because that’s how things are done in tai chi. The 帥傅 gives you a single phrase a week to mull over like a koan, and when you learn the sequence – well, guess what? That’s a sequence that you’ll probably do every day for the rest of your life. The emphasis is on the quality of the movement, rather than the ability to memorise sequences.

Having directed a show recently, it’s interesting for me to experience the trajectory of a project from the performer’s side. I’m realizing how, as a performer, what I’m really asking for is for some to guide me. I want to be a tool in someone’s creation; I want to be well-used. And so my interest in the project , and how much time and effort I’m willing to plunge in is directly related to how much I believe in the choreographer’s overarching vision, and how much I feel that I am able to give in this structure.

I sense that Robert and I are quite similar in terms of spirit and intention. The way we might go about it may be a bit different, but as I am still very much trying to figure out my path, it is extremely useful to have someone with a wealth of experience as a reference point. There are still several choices being made in this project that I haven’t quite figured out yet, and I’m trusting that I might come to understand them better in the coming 2 weeks.

Death: What ifs

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 06:23:00 +0000

Recently - and perhaps this comes from reading so much Ken Wilber, or simply from watching my dog Joseph getting old in front of me, I have been struck with the question:"What if" my loved ones suddenly died?

Yesterday morning as I said "一路順風" (Bon voyage) to 李師傅, who was going on a trip to the mainland to see her 師傅, that image flashed through my mind: What if she never came back? 我對得着她嗎? Could I say with a clear conscience that I had made me most of our time together while she was still alive?

It's a morbid question, but at the same time, it's really forcing me to practice tai chi with a different kind of commitment. Who knows when death may come to any of us, earthquakes, car accidents, cancer... and I now want to practice in a way that if and when the time comes, I can look back and say, "I made every single one of our encounters count." I practiced in a way that when I came to the lesson I was learning as much as I could. I keep in mind that it is a gift, not a given, to have a living, breathing 師傅 teach me.

With my family too, I'm practicing interacting in a way that makes the most of our time on this earth together. My father, I'd like to spend more time with. My mother, I need to remember to approach her with more humour; I get so impatient with her sometimes. And Homei - my God, I think out of all the people in the world, I would be most devastated if he was gone. I can't get enough of his company. We'd swapped rooms the other day on the fly: now I have the quieter, smaller room. It was such a construction lugging his bed over that we scratched the sandalwood floor. Yes - hang out with HM even more...

Clear sky, quiet joy

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 03:45:00 +0000

It was 2.08am when I last checked, but I feel very alert, very awake. For the past few weeks I have been waking up very naturally at 4am, and as long as I don’t have anything pressing in the day, I wake up and read or write. Then I go back to sleep when my body gets tired. It feels great to follow exactly what the body wants, though I must admit, it is rather a curious cycle of sleep / wake. In any case, since my wake is so awake, I might as well be productive with it. Perhaps I will start meditating.

Since the theatre production has ended my life has become a lot more spacious, my schedule a lot more flexible. This quiet joy is very good for my tai chi. Theatre is my yang; my doing. And now.. it feels wonderful to be doing “not-too-much”. Just some teaching, some writing, some reading…
It feels good to come home.

i.
Among other things, I have been re-reading Ken Wilber. First I re-read Grace & Grit: Spirituality and Healing in the Life and Death of Treya Killiam Wilber. It’s an autobiographical account, spanning five years. The author, a perennial philosopher, falls in love with his wife, they marry, they discover that she has breast cancer, and it’s an account of how they fought with, lived with, and grew with Treya’s cancer. It’s a very strong book, and raises many questions for me about life, healing and death.¹

This time around I was particularly struck by the practice of tonglen, the act of breathing in the world’s suffering, holding/purifying it, and breathing out. I am reminded of Hin-yan and I sitting in a park in Kowloon Tong a few months ago. We’d just finished an interview with RTHK about the show, and Hin yan pulled out the Apply Daily and showed me all the pictures released by the Tibetian Center of Human Rights and Democracy after the riots. It was difficult to look. Hin yan talked about how helpless he felt, and how he wanted to do something but he didn’t know what; that in this case there didn’t seem very much we could do.

Up until now I have remained rather conservative about the issue of Tibet; in the sense that I’m not very clear about what happened historically or currently, and in the news it seems that there are two propaganda machines: the West use this issue to bash China, and China, of course has its own stance about Tibet. And all this has really put me off confronting this whole issue altogether. I am sure that there are many other things that I ignore because it feels like too much effort and it feels as if I cannot do anything anyway, there is too much to care about.

The practice of tonglen – which incidentally, happens to be a Tibetian spiritual practice – involves breathing in suffering, and releasing love, healing and joy to the out-breath. I think my earliest encounter of “sitting in the fire” of conflict happened in Poland; being with and listening to people in a community that somehow had got themselves tied in a knot, and in the end, feeling that there was nothing practically I could do to help but somehow, trusting that my listening and my caring was of some use. It was one of the hardest things to do, to be empathetic and hold this suffering. To (using an expression from Arthur Mindell) “sit in the fire” of conflict.

Now that I am in a strong rooted place in my life, there is space for this. To open myself to the world and its tangles.

ii.
Now I am on to another of Wilber’s book, One Taste. It’s a journal of a year in his life, and compared to Grace and Grit, which is transcendental, this book feels banal. I confess that the first couple of times I read (skimmed) through it I wasn’t particularly impressed.

But this time around things are a bit different; partly because I am in the process of understanding the quiet, wonderful state I am in; and Ken talks a lot in this book about “One Taste” ; witnessing and awareness of the world. I don’t think my quiet joy right now is an experience of One Taste, in the sense that One Taste is a timeless state; the original state; so it cannot be caused or uncaused, it has no beginning or end. But what I have clearly has a beginning and end, and currently I am also trying to understnad the conditions that cause me to drop in and out of this peace. The other day (Thurs), for example, I drank a rather strong 奶茶 (milk tea) at a 茶餐廳 and for two days, I was completely out of whack from the caffeine. It completely fried my nervous system, I drank lots of water, I ran to get rid of excess adrenaline, but inside my center was going at 300 mph. My tai chi sucked.
Then last night (Sunday), I suddenly dropped back in. I think it had something to do with having the busy weekend behind me. No more classes and social engagements. The freedom to sleep in. And so I dropped back in.

In this state I am generally very aware. I notice my breathing more than usual, and the gentle circulation of chi up and down my spine. It is not One Taste, but it does seem like a type of witnessing, a very simple kind. Not a peak experience, nothing sharp and transcendental, but simply there; like clear sky.

When people ask me what plans I have, I’m really enjoying having no plans. This state is remarkably productive without aiming to be productive, and I suspect that it is also very important for my growth. Certainly good for my tai chi. And it feels important to consolidate, to go in and stabilize things; so that I am rooted when finally, it feels like time to do again.

The APA library

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Tue, 20 May 2008 21:04:00 +0000

On Tuesday I often leave the house a bit earlier than I need to for work, and go to the APA (Academy for Performing Arts) library. It is a small, florescent lit affair on the ground floor of the APA building, but it contains a concentration of books on – surprise surprise – the performing arts.

If you are not a current student of faculty member, you need to apply for a card to use their library. For non-graduates, a reading card per year costs ($1000) and the privilege to take books out cost an additional. Which means that in the coming year I am doing to drink down as many books as I can.

With only the reader card, each visit becomes a little like a pilgrimage. I go there, armed with fountain-pen and notebook, find the book I want, and spend an hour or two there drinking it down. It is actually a bit like taking a shower – I read through the book, taking notes, and writing questions down. Yesterday I was reading a book of interviews by Peter Brook, about how he came to do the Mahabharata (in an epic nine hour show). The interviewer was asking how he chose this Indian epic, and he talked about how, you know, you have many ideas and then eventually they filter down into the one seems infinitely more important than the rest. He talked about the responsibility for choosing a play, in that it involves a lot of people's time (especially his plays.. the Mahabharata took ten years in making!)

What purpose does this scholarship serve? I'm not sure, but it feels great to be reading these books. And I really want to take the time and care before launching into the next production. If there was a place that went slightly wonky with Berzerk!, it was that the premise of the whole production was ill-defined (I mean, what do you mean, you're going to do "city-life"?)

Making the trip to the APA reminds me a bit of all those times in Paris where I would walk down to the Pompidou library. Sometimes you had to cue up to get in, and once you were in, again, you couldn't borrow any books. But I went there because it had a beautiful collection of English books, and I was hungry for English books. I copied down Ted Hughes' poems, I devoured Virginia Woolf and Michael Cunningham, and I was hungry.

There's something wonderfully clandestine about books that you can only touch in situ; books you can never own, not even for a day or a week, but can only touch and read and copy on the spot. Or to feel the hunger for books, and be quenched. Those times in Poland where an English bookstore was a gold mine, never mind that they had only classics and books that I might not have read in another context. I was hungry, and when you are hungry, the loaf of bread tastes like manna from the gods.

What's left? -- The acid test

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Sat, 10 May 2008 03:02:00 +0000

"This is an acid test: ten years later, do we carry with us a trace in which we can reconstruct the play? This trace is an acid burn, it forms itself in a silhouette – not just a picture, an image with an emotional and intellectual charge. From this hard kernel the meanings of this whole work can be found again. Examples: Mother Courage drawing her cart, two tramps under a tree, a sergeant dancing."
-- Peter Brook, The Shifting Point

The other day I watched a production of Hamletmaxhine. I watched it only a week after our show, while I was still trying to make sense of what had happened. Watching Hamletmaxhine clarified a few things for me.

It was a pleasure for me to watch the production, to watch something well executed, and that had a coherence, or perhaps more precisely, has something to say.

It was fun for me to watch the ebb and flow of energy between the audience and the performers. To recognise how there are scenes in which draw the audience in. Bright, happy (I might be tempted to say, comic) scenes. The audience like these scenes, and to some extent, these scenes are necessary, really necessary, to open the audience up.

And yet what really haunts me is a single image: a woman in black, with a long semi transparent cloak, crosses a bridge. The slowness, the silence.
Why does this image haunt me? It doesn’t actually even make sense in the play. I don't know what it is trying to say. And perhaps, there lies the mystery – this is an image which makes no sense, and yet, as Peter Brook might say, it burns.

That's what I look for really, those moments, when energetically something leaps across the gap from stage to audience. A spark that leaps across a trench, to ignite a blazing forest.

If you ask me what I remember out of the Berzerk! project, and perhaps, what I will remember after all this – they are those magical moments in rehearsal, when something leapt out. The first time we ran through, when Haruka's energy burst all seams and floored us. Those early days of improvising in the studio to late morning light. The feeling of sudden coherence in the Aphex dress run for the work in progress showing. It is those moments of magic that I would want to bring on to stage as a director… which somehow got muffled in the Fringe. (I have come to realise that the Fringe Theatre is spatially not helpful in establishing the rapport between audience and actor. The seats are too sloped – most of the audience literally, looks down, on the actors and even though it is a tiny theatre, gives the unfortunate feeling of distance)

If anything, I think the project gave me, as a director, an understanding of what Jacek was trying to tell me with his electrical circuit diagrams… the different types of rapport that one can have with the audience. Scenes which open up the audience: playfulness, joy, humour. Scenes which demand something of the audience: patience, reflection… even ones where you push their limits. Especially ones where you push their limits. That is the problem with proscenium arch theatres – the audience feels safe. Even when the huge 3, 4 metre high flats came crashing down in the final act of Hamletmaxhine, it was not as impressive as I imagine it must have been, on stage. We are safe in our seats from what is happening on stage.

Yes – when I watch a play, things affect me on different levels. What feels engaging to me initially is not necessarily what lingers afterwards. I sensed this most clearly when I watched Theatre du Pif's production of Blackbird. During the show, I was hooked by the dialogue; but weeks later, my strongest memory is that of Bonni's monologue.

For me then, the test of theatre is what lingers afterwards. What I am interested in creating is that which lingers afterwards. In a way, I want to talk to the audience not right after the show, but a few months later. Did anything stay? Did anything last?

Why do I ask for that which lasts? I tend to keep many other things – most notably, my relationships - in present tense. The bright, giddy present. What will last, will last, and what lingers in the memory is not necessarily a reflection of what was beautiful or important.

I suspect that it is the educator in me that asks for long term effect.
Or perhaps, a desire for immortality.

基本功: Fresh magic

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Wed, 07 May 2008 22:23:00 +0000

With the production over and some more time on my hands, I have taken up one more class at Capstone. Tuesday afternoons, just before my tai chi.

I really enjoy teaching this class. There is a freshness in our encounter; I lay down the ground-rules: I am strict with them, pushing them in ways that my other students, being overfamilar with me, won't let me. And in turn, I give more of myself. I find myself really taking time with their marking, murmuring to myself the uniqueness of each person. Sarah, your writing is clear, but can you see how Janice or Aaron have all this detail that you can learn from? I am rigorous with them, and I think we all come out better for it.

And I think: what if I put the same dedication, love and attention I am doing with this class as in my others… perhaps it would be infectious. The thing is, over time, we have begun to take each other for granted. We have begun to take the work for granted. Homework gets handed in last minute. Marking happens last minute. We "get by", we have begun to expect less of each other, and more importantly, less of ourselves.

With this new class I am going back to the fundamentals. What makes good writing. In the end, it call comes down to 基本功. 只有不同層次的基本功. Whether in writing, or in tai chi, it all comes down to the basics. There is only the basic practices.

The truth is, my happiest times in tai chi these days is when 師傅takes time, really takes time to show me the 套路. Never mind that I've done this a squillion times before. When done with attentiveness and dedication, tai chi takes on a different quality. Very often, when we 縶拳, there is a lot of assumption. That's why it's really helpful for me to hear things explained to a beginner again.

Teaching, like learning; like directing, is a practice. The practice of staying alive and attentive. There is no magic.

In between

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Tue, 06 May 2008 04:38:00 +0000

I woke to the sound of the sea this morning.
It was been a long time since I have listened to the sound of the sea. How can this be? I live by the sea. But it is like so: we are so busy; so focused with other things, we forget what is there right next to us.

It is difficult for me to write anything sustained. My thoughts appear in fragments; some bright and shiny, like pebbles underwater; others misty, like the omnipresent rainclouds these days. But I have accepted this as part of the process. Sometimes things do not need to be so clear.

I accept this period of in-betweeness. Allow myself to drift, like a unmoored boat.
Sometimes it is necessary to drift too.

I sleep. I sleep a lot. I read some, I watch some movies. Sometimes I think about the construction of the plot; or consider how I might turn a short story into an animation (outline, storyboards). But never too seriously. Like trailing my hand through the water: more for the sensation than to actually catch anything. I play chess with my brother; I puddle with the website. I teach class. Actually, I've taken on a new class on Tuesdays. It's nice to have a fresh batch of students. I get to be strict and push them in ways that my older students, who know me too well, won't be intimidated by.

Tai chi and theatre

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 04:26:00 +0000

For the longest time my tai chi practice and my theatre practice seemed to be at odds: basically, whenever I had a theatre job, my tai chi suffered from lack of practice, and/or my body would be thrown out of whack from the busyness and stress. Being and doing. In theory, they should have complemented each other. In practice.. well, for the longest time they seemed to tug me in different directions.

Recently, however, I'm reaching a point where the two practices are sustaining each other. Or, to be more precise, I'm beginning to figure out a theatre practice that makes sense for me.

Actually, its really all about the quality of attention, and whether I can surrender to the moment (on cue). And I am gradually getting better at this in my tai chi, in part because that is what I need to do as a director. Finally, my theatre and tai chi practice are following the same principles.

Anne Bogart, director of the SITI company, writes: "As a director, my biggest contribution to a production and the only real gift I can offer to my actor is my attention. What counts most is the quality of my attention. From what part of myself am I attending? Am I attending with the desire for success, or am I attending with interest in the present moment? .. a good actor can instantly discern the quality of my attention, my interest."

Ditto tai chi.

亞林一 comes to HK

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 23:28:00 +0000

Ah lin yi (亞林一), one of my students from Linnan (粵北連南瑤族自治縣南崗村), is here in HK.

He is graduating this year from university (industrial design), and has decided to return to the village to help develop the community of Nangong. Like the rest of China. Nangong has changed a lot since I was there ten years ago, and Ah lin yi and his friends want to address the various environmental and social issues that have arisen as a result of that development.

Has it really been ten years? So much has happened since then, and yet it is very clear how influential the experience has been for both my students, and myself. It is very touching to see my students so purposeful, caring and creative... and with the intention to use the knowledge they have learnt to improve their own community.

This time around they are here to learn some stuff on organic farming. They wanted to talk to my father of course, but dad is off on a meditation camp. In many ways, they too, are facing a very similar learning curve I am in starting a small organisation - how to be able to develop the support you need from the community, and be financially as well as ideologically self-sustaining.

The questions they face -- deforestation/falling water tables; the desire to preserve and renew their own Yao heritage in a globalising commercial world; the need to address the growing disparity between the rich and the poor, and to make sure that everyone has enough to eat.. all very important questions, and I am very excited that my students are taking the initiative to address them.

Peter's Brook letter

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 10:47:00 +0000

from "I Try to Answer a Letter" , The Shifting Point (1987)

"Dear Mr Howe,

Your letter comes out of the blue and puts me on the spot.

You ask how to become a director.

Directors in theatre are self-appointed. An unemployed director is a contradiction in terms, like an unemployed painter – unlike an unemployed actor, who is a victim of circumstances. You become a director by calling yourself a director and you then persuade other people that this is true. So, in a way getting work is a problem that has to be solved with the same skills and resources that you need in rehearsal. I don't know any other way other than convincing people to work with you and getting some work under way – even unpaid – and presenting it to the public – in a cellar, in the back room of a pub, in a hospital ward, in a prison. The energy produced by working is more important than anything else.

So don't let anything stop you from being active., even in the most primitive conditions., rather than wasting time looking for something in better conditions that might not come off. In the end, work attracts work.

Yours sincerely,

Yeah... that's just about what I'm doing.

My dog in the press

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Fri, 19 Oct 2007 01:55:00 +0000

Sing Tao Daily:
Firemen climb mountains to save 70 pound Golden Retriever:
Heatstroke on Pat Sing Leung Hike -- Owner Simon Chau powerless to save dog"

(Um, well. The most publicised disaster of family outings...
Click on pictures to enlarge for full articles...)

Apple Daily: "Four firemen carry Simon Chau's beloved dog down the mountain"

Oriental Daily: Environmentalist's beloved dog's legs give way on hike

Day Twenty two, the Draffin workshop

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 13:49:00 +0000

As a cumulative step our learning, the workshop ended with three nights of “open rehearsals.” The first night was fine, if a bit tense. The second night was challenging for the group, and the third night, the group coagulated into a chorus. And as for my part with the text, it really matured in its own jo-ha-kyu over the three nights. On the final night, I reached a place where I felt- yes, it all comes together:

It began well. The chorus lay still, a field of corpses at my feet as I recounted the devastation of Thebes-

I saw a heifer slaughtered.....her body was a
sackful of filthy tar.....filthy bubbling tar

As I spoke, the air became thick and turgid. You could feel the swollen gaps between my words -

everywhere cattle are dead in the fields.....dead in
their stalls..... in silent farms there are bones in
cloaks.....skulls on pillows.....every gutter stinks
death.....the heat stinks.....the silence stinks

As I walked forward into the aching space, I walked with knowledge of my second night inside me, a knowledge of raw anger that had me clambering across the chorus, up a pole and swinging from rafters.

where are the gods.....the gods hate us.....the gods
have run away.....the gods have hidden in holes
the gods are dead of plague.....they rot and stink
too

How did I get up there? I thought, walking into the studio the next morning. It’s really high. Dust had rained down as I clambered hand by hand, blinding the chorus, who scattered ready to catch me in case I fell-
I now took this strength and put it in my voice. I took that intensity and compressed the space in my walk forward.

“Please don’t side-coach me,” I said to Draf. “I want to take responsibility for monitoring my own voice.”
“No. If you go under I’ll remind you.”

Our eyes locked in confrontation.

“I know when I’m backing away- I want to figure out myself how to recover. I want to take that responsibility on myself.”
“Okay, but if it goes on for too long I will say something-” he threatened…
............................

................................... limbs suddenly go numb
Head begins to pound.....your face flushes puffs
and swells.....you go into a stupor.....eyes come
bulging out

Because of its four syllable units, the Cantonese rendition actually pounds even more relentlessly than English. I love how the rhythm is set up and then broken-

你四肢麻木.....頭昏腦脹... 面紅耳赤 ...又腫又脹
你失去知覺 ....腹部滾火... 眼突耳嗚... 鼻流黑血
你向四壁亂撞 .....被咳声震碎
為咗心涼乜都燒毀 ....尖叫 ...攬石頭 ...飛身投河

The chorus clung to my legs as I waded forward. I strained onwards, trying to drag free of their collective weight. They grasped my hands. I fought tooth and claw. My voice ripped from earth through center as I flung the words across space in primal rage towards the heavens at the gods until my voice cracked and sundered.

God, it was exhilarating.

And now… in the aftermath of the workshop…. lines still hum in my head as I sprawl on the sofa, with my cat warm on my belly. Already my head is planning logistics for the new piece, “Concrete Jungle.” Actually, it’s all logistics right now... I look forward to actually spending time thinking about the piece itself. But I feel good about it. I press forward with the visceral knowledge of an immense capacity for strength and love-

And the knowledge that there are people with immense creative energy, who even as I write, are figuring out ways to build on our shared experience….

Day Twenty, the Draffin Workshop

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Sat, 06 Oct 2007 03:57:00 +0000

As the workshop draws to a close, I am taking this time to reflect upon what I have learnt this month. It's been an intense month. The first two weeks were pure fun, movement, contact, space… very good for me in terms of基本功, a return to the fundamentals.

Then, in the third week, we entered the world of text. It was a introspective week – we spent a lot of time spent "dropping in" with our own monologues, plastique (authentic movement), contact guide (where someone tries to free you vocally and break your habits…
It was a challenging week in many ways, as working with text is still a relatively new thing for me. I like the journey from body to voice to text – this makes sense to me – and I think it gave me a much clearer idea of how to stay authentic to the moment in both body and voice.

One question that I have been mulling over quite a bit is about the balance of in : out
There seems to be a number of steps to this process.

First you create the world in sensory detail. I can still remember Paola (my teacher in Lecoq) holding my hand and walking through my imaginary childhood bedroom. You have pots of paint? Feel its weight. What is the lid made of? Feel the coolness of the metal. Open the pot – smell the paint…

And then, if you breathe in these sensations, certain feelings arise.
For example, in my monologue my opening lines have a huge sense of space for me.

田野佈滿死牛牛掤塞滿死牛
Everywhere cattle are dead in the fields dead in the stalls

This sense of space aches in me.

This feeling, therefore is a by-product. Now it is very important to stay with this feeling, and just let it be what it is. Neither to push it (when the actor expresses more than he or she feels, the emotion will feel forced, because you are "telling" the audience what you feel), nor to hold on to it past what it is.

In some ways, it is not unlike the chi (氣感) in tai chi. At first it is very exciting to feel the chi, this new dimension of yourself. You feel like you are doing something right. (好有"feel"). But chi and emotions are by-products, they can give you feedback, but are not things you should seek for or hold on to.

Now the question, the crucial question that I am currently trying to figure out is: having created this inner world, how do I become transparent, so that this world can be accessible to the audience?

This is something I need to work on, I know. A few months ago I was doing some authentic movement with Adrian and Tuen. It was a really rich exploration for me, but I suspect this world was largely opaque to the two witnesses. I was closing them off.

I suspect in life too, I hold a certain reserve.

連死神都病咗....喺自己哩埋喺房喊.....同啲牆自言自語

My monologue is very well suited to me for many reasons.

Days Six to Ten, the Draffin Workshop

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Sat, 22 Sep 2007 21:52:00 +0000

Draffin's work is philosophically so similar to what I am and what I do, it is like swimming in my own colour. The way he works with movement, Contact improv, tai chi, chorus work, voice, meditation… all stuff that I naturally gravitate across in both movement and performance.

The past week has felt like one long meditation; swimming laps back and forth in cool water.
Where are the boundaries of myself? It is not so easy, sometimes to tell.
70% water swimming in cool water. My sense of self come from my motion.

The first real friction came, oddly enough, from the Chinese text.

望落城下街道
人群忙係何事

I have been swimming in 土瓜灣 recently. Upstream many mornings, up 太子道西.
And then downstream, rapidly, by minibus after class.

黑色隊伍
走向墳墓走向火焱
迪比斯係一個葬禮
迪比斯比一堆堆嘅死屍嗆着喉嚨

The words taste unfamiliar in my mouth. 迪比斯. 隊伍.
The Oedipus script is an odd mix of Cantonese and more formal Chinese. Later, when I get my hands on the English original (by Ted Hughes, who did his own adaptation from Senaca's Latin) I find the rendering too literal, too long. So I spent Friday night re-rendering the original in Cantonese, trying to get the conciseness and rhythm of the text. Heifer. 小母牛. Too many syllables. So I sacrifice the 小 and keep the 母牛.
I truncate 就好似一個載滿汚油嘅袋 to 似袋污油.
The best way to learn lines is to write your own translation!

讀到關于死屍腐爛，先臭覺腐爛的臭味, 然後想起一行禪師 (Thich Nhat Hanh) 的 Flowers and garbage:

Defiled or immaculate. Dirty or pure. These are concepts we form in our mind. A beautiful rose we have just cut and placed in our vase is pure. It smells so good and fresh. A garbage can is the opposite. It smells horrible, and is full of rotten things. But that is only when we look on the surface. If we look more deeply we shall see that in five or six days, the rose will become part of the garbage. We do not need to wait five days to see it. If we just look at the rose, and we look deeply, we can see it now. And if we look into the garbage can, we can see that in a few months its contents will be transformed into lovely vegetables, and even a rose… Roses and garbage inter-are. Without a rose we cannot have garbage; and without garbage, we cannot have a rose. They need each other very much.
-- from Peace is Every Step, Thich Nhat Hanh

Wednesday I was chi-empty. We had been singing, and I had been projecting 自己內氣。This sort of work circulates a lot of chi – I can tell by the cool sweat the springs to my palms and feet . And from hands-on healing, I knew that I had been projecting my own chi, inside of tapping into the universal source. I felt so depleted, I didn't want to talk to anyone. "Let's not talk today," I mummured mentally to Victor. "I just want to do. I can do tai chi, but not talk." 太極、上課、太極。一天走三場都算多。

Thursday I was emotionally tired. We'd finished with storytelling; and the final image was the retelling "the death of a child." My vocal cords were a bit raw after that. I am not used to living such strong emotions, it's going to take some practice before I can turn them on and off more easily.

Today, Sunday, I take some rest.
I need to rest my body – I pulled my groin muscle lightly. Of all things!
Meanwhile, I enjoy the huge winds. Mid-autumn is just around the corner.

Day Five, the Draffin workshop

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Thu, 13 Sep 2007 21:48:00 +0000

One thing that I am realising – something that is being highlighted by the Draffin workshop – is the extent at which I am terrified of having nothing to show for my (our) work in January. That’s why I push so much, I think. I want to be certain. I want to be safe. I want it to work.

To yet, the responsibility of a director involves clear decisions – actors neither want nor respect a director who doesn’t know what they are doing. And so I find myself in somewhat of a contradiction – feeling the imperative to be in a certain place by a certain time; and terrified by the prospect that I will not be.

We have been working a lot with “trusting the moment”.. trusting something will emerge… because life naturally has a rhythm – we only have to listen. And this rhythm is naturally dramatic – mind is naturally polar; if we stay at one place for a while, it gets restless, and something else is born. So the trick is not so much creating new material, but to follow the shifts in the unfolding.

“Do less, experience more…”

Part of the trap is when I think I have a certain degree of competence, and I want to prove it to the world. “Look how good I am! Look! Look!” I want so much to prove my worth, that I stray from what is authentic.

And so, ironically, I get particularly tense at places where I know I can create something good. Contact improv being one of them.

Let go… and listen…

Yes, I’m finding it difficult to need to pitch the piece to actors, when I don’t really have anything in my hands. Before I can get them to trust me, I need to trust myself. I need to trust that something interesting can come out of the Concrete Jungle. There is something, I know…

Well, basically I need to trust. I think that’s pretty much the bottom line. Trust… to trust my creativity…

Day One, the Draffin workshop

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 21:50:00 +0000

Wow. I'm physically exhausted.
Not so much actually from the workshop itself, but from the Contact improv performance plus the six hour workshop, plus tai chi in the evening. So it's been a full day of moving.

On the bus to Cattle Depot I was thinking: it's pretty incredible to think that for the next month I will be back at school, 7 hours a day. I am really not in that space yet. And then I feel asleep on the 75X.

What was meant to be a transition week between all that intensive summer teaching and the month long physical theatre intensive turned out to be a busy week. A week where I managed somehow to sleep less than my busy summer. I was on creative juice; brainstorming, leaping, flinging e-mails back and forth cyberspace with Dan Finkel in preparation for our January performance... tentatively entitled Concrete Jungle... a name that took us all week to brainstorm. A two paragraph blurb that took us a couple of days to write:

Concrete Jungle is a piece for seven people on the absurdity of city life. It chorus – whose role in ancient Greek theatre was to witness, forewarn, and give voice to the populace - somehow manage to endure the rush hour crowds, hazy office hours, cut-throat deadlines to let their imaginations run berserk in the city.

Devastatingly observant, comically insane, and rampant with emotion, Concrete Jungle is a dance-theatre piece that celebrates our ability to be creative and courageous in an efficient world.

* * *

It's been a tough week. One of those weeks where I think, Why on earth am I even in the performing arts? Does it really make me a better person?

It's just been a week of let downs:
(a) Despite all that proposal writing with the slender hope that Jacqueline could persuade her boss at the Fringe, it came to no avail. The Fringe is still reserving the place for its festival, and we are still venue-less for the show.

(b) Having the five person section I was responsible for turn out to be somewhat disastrous... partly yes, it is my fault, for not making clear that I really wanted to be facilitator, not director; but also just hurt by the lack of respect performers have for a piece of work... that people feel that it's ok to cancel without warning or show up half an hour late without apology.

(c) A dissatisfaction with my own performance on Sunday
Overarticulated. Too adrenaline-pumped by an audience. I can sense how tense my neck was during the video. Was seduced by the camera clicking away. The scary thing is, it felt ok during the performance; I felt that there was a clear connection between me and 文偉. So the connection and feelings were real, but the form that came out was a bit elaborated.

(Incidentally, the rehearsal period with 文偉 was lovely. Just felt like we worked hard and I couldn't deliver in the 尾聲.)

* * *

On the bus to Cattle Depot I think.. I am tired of fighting.
I have been pushing too hard this week. I need to step back and listen. To take in the space. To take in the reactions of my partner.
I know how to do it... but sometimes, I don't. So I have to check it, and re-connect.

So it was with these feelings and aching muscles that I went into the Draffin workshop. And the first thing we did as a group was to clean the studio. What a lovely ritual.

There is not yet anything devastatingly new in what we have been doing in the workshop, but what is important, I think, is actually a return for me to the grounding basics or theatre presence and listening. We did a lot of stamping, some walking meditation, some 聽勁...

Draffin didn't let me get away with my mopeyness and weariness either. He gave everyone in the workshop individual feedback on the listening/following judo 聽勁.. where he asked me, "Are you strong?"
"Um," I said, unready for this question.
"Are you strong?"
"Um. It's relative, I guess."
No, he wouldn't let me get away with that. In fact, near the end of the day he picked on me.
It's nice to know that there is someone who doesn't let you get away with stuff like that. But god, I am tired. Physically today. Mentally, emotionally I am ok now. But physically - wow. I am knackered.

This workshop is very good for me, in the sense that it directly addresses my work, not as a director, not as an arts administrator, but as a performer. "Theatre is about human beings" says Draffin... and yes, the performer is the line of contact. The director is only a guide. And that's why I got into theatre - because I do believe there is something very powerful about live performance, and is not reproducible in other mediums. And so it's good that I get back in touch with my capacity for this.

Well, here we are. It's 6:32am... and it's another brand new day ahead of me. Back to work. Time to get on the minibus... clean the studio...

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links: Robert Draffin workshop with On and On Theatre

Renewal (ii)

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Sun, 22 Jul 2007 00:03:00 +0000

In my busyness, food has taken on a new importance. I want an orange juice, I think on the bus to work. And how wonderful… to want an orange juice, and know that this craving can be satisfied.

Before rehearsal, and somewhat dazed from all that teaching, I go to a restaurant in the basement of Times Square and order some vegetable buns. Perhaps you remember the last time we were here, I write to Jacek, It was quiet here today. I ordered a蒸籠 of three buns and the portion was exactly the size I wanted. You know that feeling when you finish eating and it feels “just-right”… neither too much nor too little? So satisfying!

Under the florescent lighting of my classroom, greenery ahs taken on a new significance. I brought two plants in the office to keep me company. The kids are delighted by the cactus rose, but I find the leafy green one bubbling with energy. It has a very clear life-force, and when I look at it I am reminded of mine.

Grotowski used to used to schedule the work-sessions at night, so that his actors would be really tired, so tired that they would have to find a way to reach past all of that, and find a new source of energy. In my busyness, I too am needing to find new sources of energy. This week has been about meeting three classes of new students, and building a rapport with them. Next week my focus will shift to the show, it opens on Friday night.

I find myself very focused; in the sense of dropping extravenous things. I gp to hands-on healing, I don’t care about being social – I have been social all day with my students. I just sit down and connect to the source. And so it is a matter of connecting, regulating and being gentle with oneself. Work with me, I murmur to my body. Yes, I hear that your knees hurt. What I can do for you?

Renewal

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 23:00:00 +0000

The sky is very clear today, with just a smudge of cloud on the peak of the Pat Sin Leung range. Being here, with the sea and banana green nourishes me. I can tell, because these days I often go to my aunt's/grandma's to stay over for the night (it's closer to the city center). And yet I find that when I am there for too long, or when I am at the point of making a decision of whether to go home or stay, I realise how much being here renews me. Like a source of water. Well, literally too, a visual feast of water.

I am in much need of renewal these days.

So.. I didn't get the grant, but things seem to be as busy as ever. I got invited (actually, by one of the curators) to join a dance production called Air & Breath II. Rehearsals are consuming my evenings, to the extent that tai chi is feeling the squeeze. As a result, I haven't had the time to spend with my own piece, Crow, even thought Theatre du Pif have loaned me their studio to play in while they are in Toronto. Seriously though, my schedule for July is mad. I'm teaching every day, and rehearsing tai chi every night. Sundays I have 8 hour rehearsals, and whenever I don't have class, all the miscellaneous stuff – meetings, film editing, pad out the gaps. It's becoming a test of my stamina, as well as a challenge to keep myself soft inside.

The past week has been a lot of film editing. My brother and I have been relay editing, each plugging in two, four, five hours at a stretch whenever we have time in order to get the 《笑‧像差利》 music-documentary out for the premiere on Sunday. Oof. By Sunday at 6:15pm I was dragging the computer over the hill from my aunt's to Club O. Because of the heavy external hard drive I had put it all in a carry-on suitcase, and when I dragged the case the vibrations from the concrete would travel up my arm. When one arm got numb and tingling I would swap.

Film editing is fine, but not too much. I didn't want to talk to anyone right after – but of course, I had to host the premiere (and face the music). So I did, and everyone enjoyed it. I think. I dunno. I went home and cried, and I'm not even sure what for.

Part of that exhaustion is physical. The role I have in the new piece is very yang… the director is capitalising on my explosive-bounce of the walls energy; so I have a sequence where I am sprinting around in circles, my right hand cycling while bellowing a song on the top of my voice; another where I am telling a story with typhoons while recreating one with a industrial-sized plastic bag. Teaching too, can be very yang, and my summer schedules has just ramped up from three intensives classes to five. Mind you, the past couple of classes I have been able to tap into good in-class writing alongside the students. My writing had a strong sense of place, atmosphere or character intention. It's quite magic, really, to have a class quietly scribbling away. Even the can't-sit-still students, when they see me so concentrated, they too, quieten down and put pen to paper.

I was reading a conversation with David Lynch (the movie director) in bed last night, and he talks about the importance of staying true to the original kernel of your idea. It's really important I think, to recognise the original inspiration, and then to use it as a reference point for every new idea.

I think part of the difficulty about the grant was that I was pushed to articulate the dance in words too soon, when a lot of the processing actually needed to be done with the body first. Sure, you have the poems as a starting point, but there should be a very clear first image or sensation that is the essence of this particular piece.

I did an authentic movement session with Adrian and Tuen at the end of June. A lot of things happened, but one thing I am convinced more than ever is that there is a bird in me that wants to take flight. It's made cameo appearances in my early pieces: Aftermath, Diamond Baby, and both times I've felt that there is a something here that is worth devoting more time to. What is this movement, this sensation, really about? I don't know.

So here I am. The sun has come up, and is glinting off the banana leaves below me. My left thumb hurts as I type. I managed to jam it in rehearsals.. I was going full out in childish abandon, throwing a plastic bag high up to fill it with air, and then hugging it to trap the air when it came down. Only this time I trapped my fingers as well as air. Ah well. This slight point of pain keeps me aware, very aware, that I am alive.

Crow: pitching my dance

noreply@blogger.com (Hofan Chau 周可凡) — Wed, 30 May 2007 06:35:00 +0000

I'm pacing up and down the balcony practising what I am going to say for the interview tomorrow. I have ten minutes, so I have to get everything down into sound bytes. In Chinese.

I have been very very lucky in the past week.
I bumped into Melinda Lee on Skype, and began articulating my dance to her. It was good to talk with someone from a dance background, who has to do very similar things. (She has to pitch her dances too). We spent about 3 hours chatting, at the end of which I realise how important it is that I give the panel a sense of what the dance looks like, and how I intend to achieve this.

I bumped into Ray yesterday. As a film director, he has to pitch ideas too… and I really got the sense of the importance of knowing the material and being able to articulate one's ideas really clearly.

And so today I am pacing up and down the balcony trying to figure out how to say what I want to say in the most succinct way possible.

I'm feeling good. Terrified, but good. Good in the sense that I understand what it is about now, and the ball is in my court.
I'm terrified because there is, as always, the possibility of failure. But now the ball is in my hands and all I can do is pitch it as swift and accurate as I can.
10 minutes.

My dad teaches me a trick. Prepare the material, and take the questions in a way that bring you back into what you want to say. Yeah.

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