3. The Mystery of Pan Gai Noon (C)

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By Graham Noble

Despite the problems with the Chou Tzu prostitute/Tiger boxing identification and the complete failure to find the Uechi kata or anything like them in China, when you look at all the various bits of footage of Fujian forms you do often get the feeling that Uechi Ryu could have links with Southern Chinese boxing . . . somewhere back along the line. But the exact nature of those links is impossible to determine, and as Lawrence Tan may have suspected years ago, there may well have been Okinawan influences in Uechi Ryu, as well as additions or changes made by Kanbum Uechi himself.

Okinawan karate’s Sanchin kata almost certainly has roots back in Fujian, but except for a general family resemblance, the Uechi Ryu Sanchin is different from the Sanchin forms practised in the Fujian styles that we now see. The Uechi Sanchin does, however, closely resemble the Goju Ryu form. The stance is the same, and the embusen – moving forward, turning and moving back, then turning again to go forward before finishing with mawashi uke – is very similar. The position of the arms and the thrusting movements are similar too, as is the occurrence of the distinctive double hand thrusting (Uechi Ryu) or pressing (Goju Ryu) motions repeated three times towards the close of the kata. Both the Uechi and Goju forms also include mawashi uke, a circular blocking movement ending with a double open-hand push, one hand held at middle level with the other at lower level. That closing position of the hands is found at the end of several Fujian style forms, but the preceding circular blocking movement is absent: the full mawashi uke technique seems to be distinctive to Okinawan karate. And the Sanchin testing that is such an important part of Goju Ryu and Uechi Ryu practice doesn’t feature in Fujian styles either – it seems to be an Okinawan training method too. There are, of course, differences between the Goju and Uechi Sanchin - the Goju movements are done slowly with tension and loud, forceful breathing, while the Uechi Sanchin is done at normal speed without any special breathing method; and in Goju the thrusts are done with closed fists rather than the open hands of Uechi Ryu - but Okinawan karate historians seem to be in general agreement that the closed fists, slow speed and forced breathing of Goju were introduced by Kanryo Higaonna, probably in the later part of the 1800s. Interestingly, Shinpan Shiroma, writing about the nukite (spearhand) technique in the 1938 “Karate Do Taikan,” noted that “Yoko nukite (with the back of the hand facing up) can be seen in the kata San Chin. In San Chin kata both hands are held at mid-level and simultaneously strike using yoko nukite.” Since Shiroma was writing at a time when Kanbum Uechi was in Wakayama it’s unlikely he was talking about the Uechi Sanchin, and this suggests that the use of the open hands in Sanchin lingered into the 1930s in Okinawa, at least among some teachers. Interestingly, in a 1993 interview (“Australasian Fighting Arts” July 1993) Shorin Ryu master Shosin Nagamine told Mike Clarke: “I remember about seventy years ago how teachers from that style (Goju Ryu) changed the position of the hands (from the open hand to the fist).” Such references suggest that the practice of an open hand Sanchin was a well-established tradition in the old days, and if that actually was the case then the Goju and Uechi Sanchins look almost the same and suggest a common origin.

This inkling that there might be a common origin for Uechi Ryu and Goju Ryu is reinforced by a look at Seisan kata, a form which appears in each of the mainstream Okinawan styles: Goju Ryu, Uechi Ryu, and some Shorin Ryu systems as well as Ryuei Ryu and Okinawa Kempo. The number of variations of the kata suggest that it is an old form, and in fact a Seisan (Thirteen Steps) was performed in Okinawa way back in 1867 as part of the demonstration of various arts at the Manorial Tea House at Sakiyama. That Seisan was performed by Aragaki, and moreover there was a demonstration of a Suparimpei by Chiku Tomimura Peichin at the same event. The participants in the demonstrations must have been recognised experts in the Okinawan bujutsu of the time, but whether the Seisan and Suparimpei were old forms of the kata that we now have we simply cannot know. The demonstration programme does show, though, that both a Seisan and a Suparimpei were practised in Okinawa well before either Kanryo Higaonna or Kanbum Uechi made their journeys to Southern China.

Again, the Seisan kata of Goju Ryu and Uechi Ryu bear striking similarities. For more than the first half of the kata the embusen is the same, and there are similarities too in the techniques themselves. In the opening moves of both kata there is a technique where the two open hands are brought together in front of the face before a sequence of three open hand rising strikes (or blocks) are performed. That is followed by a defensive move with the hands and a counter kick with the right leg, (knee or front kick in Uechi Ryu, kansetsu geri in Goju Ryu), before there is a 180 degree turn and the practitioner moves forward whilst doing a series of movements in which the two open hands move in opposite directions: backwards and forwards in Uechi and rising and falling in Goju. Around this point in the kata the Uechi form has a couple of additional moves, but if we allow for that, then in both styles there are turns to right and then left, and another turn 90 degrees to the right before a 180 degree turn to bring the performer back to face the original forward direction. The first turn to the right in Goju consists of a kind of grasping movement with the right hand followed by a double punch while the corresponding Uechi kata sequence consists of a rising elbow with the right arm and then two open handed strikes: the techniques are different but the direction, and sequence of hand movements is the same. For the turn to the left the Goju version has a block followed by three punches and interestingly, in the Uechi version, although the technical sequence is different, (you turn into a block and left front kick) there is also a set of three punches, though performed with the characteristic Uechi Ryu one knuckle fist rather than the forefist. The correspondences break down after the final 180 degree turn as the Goju kata concludes after a couple more techniques while the Uechi version continues with a series of open hand blocks and spearhand thrusts, but the similarities of the first two thirds or so of the kata seem undeniable. Interestingly, Juhatsu Kyoda’s To-on Ryu Seisan also has more movements in its final part than the Goju kata.

Historically, these similarities are hard to explain, except on the basis that they have a common origin back in old 19th Century Okinawa. One speculation to explain the absence of any Uechi kata in modern Chinese systems is that the Uechi forms are a transmission of an old Chinese style, now lost on the mainland – and lost in all other centres of chuan-fa practice too: Taiwan, Hong Kong and Malaysia. We have no way of knowing if that is true, but if you accept it you then have to extend that argument to the origins of Goju Ryu and Ryuei Ryu too. It has also been suggested that the similarities of Uechi’s style to Goju comes from a common old Naha-te origin arising from Uechi’s training at the Kojo dojo in Fuzhou. That may make some sense as a theory – but it has the effect of almost eliminating Shushiwa from Uechi Ryu history and leads to the odd conclusion that Uechi travelled from Okinawa to China to learn karate from - an Okinawan, and then brought that style back to Okinawa. And if Uechi only stayed at the Kojo dojo for three years, what about the other ten years or so of his supposed training in China?

Looking again at the various versions of Seisan, it seems to me that, from as far back as we can trace, this was an Okinawan form. The origin of the Shorin Ryu forms of Seisan are problematic, but if they developed separately from Goju Ryu, Uechi Ryu and Ryuei Ryu, then on the basis of the accepted histories, we have to believe that Kanryo Higaonna, Kanbum Uechi, Kenri Nakaima (Ryuei Ryu), and some Shorin Ryu ancestor(s) were in China at different locations and different times, studying different systems - and yet they all brought back the same kata, albeit in slightly different versions. Considering the size of China, the number and variety of styles practised there, and the fact that we cannot identify a single Seisan kata in any of the extant Chinese styles, this is pushing the bounds of probability. Although we have no idea what the form may have looked like, that reference to a Seisan in 1867 may be telling, and a more reasonable explanation is that the Seisans we know now are Okinawan kata, albeit with possible Chinese influence somewhere back in the past . . . and that causes real problems for the history of Uechi Ryu: it implies that Kanbum Uechi learned this kata, and probably Sanchin too, not in China, but in Okinawa. We can’t speculate any more than this because, although we have the names of quite a few experts around that time, we are almost totally unfamiliar with the landscape of 19th century Okinawan karate.

This idea of an Okinawan origin for Uechi Ryu is reinforced by a study of the third kata in the style, Sanseiru. This used to be rather a secret kata and although Kanei Uechi and other seniors showed it in demonstrations from quite early on, it was regarded as a kata only for black belts and it wasn’t shown in any of George Mattson’s pioneering books on Uechi Ryu; even though all the other kata were shown in his 1974 “Uechi Ryu Karate Do.”, Sanseiru wasn’t included. I haven’t done an exhaustive check of the literature on this, but Sanseiru’s first appearance in an English language publication may have been as late as 1996 in Alan Dollar’s “Secrets of Uechi Ryu.”

It is a rather unusual, distinctive kata, with the main techniques used being the one knuckle punch, finger and elbow strikes, and a kind of hooking and rolling forward movement with both arms, generally interpreted as a defence against a kick, though it could be something else. One notable feature of the kata is that almost all of the striking movements – the one knuckle punches, finger strikes and elbows - are performed on the right side: there is very little concession to symmetrical development of technique. When three one-knuckle thrusts are performed, rather than, as in other kata, being done with alternate hands, all three thrusts are made with the right hand.

The kata is quite different from the Goju Ryu kata of the same name or any known Chinese form - but strangely, it does show surprising similarities with another kata of Okinawan karate, Niseishi. We know this kata from Kenwa Mabuni’s Shito Ryu, and it is one of three kata that Mabuni said he had learned from a teacher called Aragaki, (the other two kata were Sochin and Unssu). Despite various attempts to link this Aragaki with the Aragaki who demonstrated Seisan at the 1867 demonstration at the Manorial Tea House demonstration, or Seisho Aragaki, who is said to have been the original Okinawan teacher of Kanryo Higaonna, I don’t think we know anything about Mabuni’s teacher, except that he taught those three kata. Mabuni showed the Aragaki Sochin in the 1938 “Karate Do Taikan” but all he wrote of Aragaki himself was that there are various versions of the kata Sochin and that the one he was showing was “from the teachings of Aragaki Sensei.” In 1980 Hiroshi Kinjo commented in “Gekkan Karate Do” magazine that “It is difficult to prove that Sensei Aragaki even existed in Naha.” Kinjo did note that an Aragaki had appeared on the 1867 Ochayagoten demonstration programme but added that “I am not certain that this was the Aragaki that Mabuni Sensei referred to. This matter needs further research.”

In any case - although the individual techniques within the kata often differ, the embusen of Niseishi and the Uechi Sanseiru correspond in a striking way. The opening technique in both forms is a left hand parry and right counter punch, followed by a 180 degree turn. At this point, although there are occasional similarities of technique, with an elbow strike, and a block and kick-punch counter, the techniques and foot movements lose their correspondence. About half way through the forms, however, the embusen of the two kata again begin to coincide. In both forms there is a double hand movement, a leg grab kind of technique, at 45 degrees to the original starting point, and then the body does a 180 degree turn to move in the opposite direction. There follows a 45 degree turn to the left into an elbow strike and then another 45 degree left turn into another elbow strike. Finally there is a full turn (225 degrees) to bring you back to the starting point. There are also some interesting correspondences of technique, the double hand movements to the opponent’s leg, for example. Also, in both kata the penultimate elbow strike is to the middle level (chudan), with the final elbow being done as a rising strike.

The embusen in both forms is distinctive, particularly in that second half of both kata where the foot movements describe a triangle. It is a pattern that does not appear in any other kata and it’s highly improbable that such a correspondence could happen by chance. This suggests that these two kata also share a common origin . . . again, somewhere back in 19th century Okinawa.

The similarities between the Goju and Uechi Sanchin and Seisan had probably been recognised for a long time, but the correspondences between Niseishi and Uechi’s Sanseru were a surprise to me. In fact, checking through the internet forums I found that it had been recognised before by others. The explanation for this on the forums seemed to be – once again - that the original kata had been brought back to China independently by Aragaki and Uechi and then modified - but, again, we cannot find Niseishi, or anything remotely like it, in China. Niseishi, however, is also found in other Okinawan styles such as Ryuei Ryu and Okinawa Kempo, so it’s reasonable to assume it’s an Okinawan form, and this then suggests that all Uechi’s three kata – Sanchin, and particularly Seisan and Sanseirui – were Okinawan forms. Initially I was a little reluctant to follow the full implications of this analysis, but gradually the conclusion was forced upon me that Kanbum Uechi had actually learned his kata in Okinawa, and not China.

This contradicts all the accepted history of Uechi Ryu, but it’s hard to get round the lack of any verifiable material on Uechi’s time in China or the complete failure, after years of research, to find any of the kata he taught in Chinese styles – and yet we can find similar, related forms in traditional Okinawan systems. Years ago Kanei Uechi told Harry Cook that his father had no karate training in Okinawan before he left for China, and there is an interesting passage in Mark Bishop’s “Zen Odyssey” where Bishop writes of his meeting with Kanei Uechi: “During the very first interview Kanei Uechi was insistent that I got on record the facts about his father, who, he insisted had travelled to Fuchou in China at the age of twenty, with no previous training in Chinese boxing.” Why would Kanei Uechi feel the need to make that point about “no previous training” so strongly? I don’t know, but maybe in the past there had been rumours that Kanbum Uechi had actually learned his karate in Okinawa, and not China. But this, again, is just speculation.

Maybe I’m making too much of all this, but I have often wondered just how long Kanbum Uechi spent in China, or even if he had been to China at all. But then, several people, apparently, noted his fluency in Chinese, and so the mystery remains.

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