Silat Affiliations & Buku Lima

Doc asked me the following questions:

"I was curious in regard to how people conceal or display their association with Silat in Malaysia. For instance, here in the USA, if someone joins "Smith's Tae Kwon Do", he or she may very well wear a t shirt about town with the school logo or have a bumpersticker on their car. Also , they may carry gym bags or other items around that might clue someone in that they have a martial arts background. And, as we all know, many people are quick to tell their friends and /or coworkers about their martial arts hobby. Are students over in Malaysia at all similar in this regard? Are they instructed to be more discrete? How does the government view such training? I assume that it is felt to be more than a peculiar sport over there. Do the instructors advertise in anyway or is it by word of mouth? How do prospective students find a school?

In regard to Pukulan Tujo Hari, are the Buku Lima used in pairs or solo? I guess I find it interesting that they would have "brass knuckles". Was this weapon introduced during the colonial period since the Europeans have this weapon? Structurally, is it different than what an American or European might have , aside from , perhaps , size? What degree of proficiency can be developed in 7 days? This sound like a fascinating system.

Doc"

Silat in Malaysia today has on several different approaches to publicity. There are about 1,000 systems registered with the government – about 300 or 400 “original” systems and the rest are rival and competing organizations with similar Silat syllabi (i.e. there are two major Silat Cekak groups – Silat Cekak Hanafi and Silat Cekak Malaysia). It’s thought that there are another 3,000 or so Silat groups that are “kampung” (village) systems that are too small to register.

Not many of the Silat systems have opened their systems to non-Muslims. The large systems that are “open” (e.g. Silat Lincah, Silat Gayong, Silat Gayong Fatani, etc.) do advertise, have T-Shirts, etc.

The systems that are closed don’t advertise, because they don’t want to be put in the position of turning away students based upon religion – a gray area in Malaysian civil rights law. “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” – Malaysian-style.

The funny thing is that the number one system in Malaysia – by far – is Tae Kwon Do!

Here’s a picture of the Malaysian brass-knuckles a.k.a. buku-lima (“five books”):



The buku-lima tend to be used on only one hand, with the other hand free to strip off the buku-lima quickly if needed. Buku-lima is the weapon of choice of most of the Silat systems that originate from the Bugis people (Sulawesi), since they emphasize a sideways stance and a strong lead hand role.

Please note that the buku-lima is placed on top of the second row of knuckles (like a "leopard fist"), and the fist is cocked back so that the second row of knuckles falls in line with the forearm. The following two pictures show Silat Sendeng (also from the Bugis people) - their fists are cocked as if they have the buku-lima, even though they do not in the photos:




The weapon came from Sulawesi. Whether or not it has a European predecessor is something that I can’t answer yet. I plan on meeting soon with Dato’ Shahrum bin Yub, the former Director General of the Malaysian National Museum. He wrote the definitive book on small Malaysian weapons back in 1967. I just licensed the copyright to the book and hope to have it translated into English later this year (2005). I’ll see if I can get a better answer for you soon.

Take care.

Omar

On Selecting Students...

Doc just sent me the following email message:

“What are the basic and , apparently common interview requirements for the silat systems you have applied to? I am interested in how the instructors select who they shall interview and the whole process of bringing a new student in ....or excluding people from the system. How hard do they make it to join?.....Are there common concerns and issues ?....Do all the methods place similar barriers/ hoops in front of the applicant? Do different instructors do it differently? Are some a bit lax and some extremely discerning? I am interested in their screening process. I now havea student formally apply and supply me with a background and references......something that experiences have taught me I should do.

Doc”

I can tell you about three methods that I've had first hand experience with…

The first screening method involves inviting the student to the teacher's home for dinner. A deliberate event may occur during dinner that the student may not even realize is a test. From the student's prospective, everyone enjoyed a polite dinner together. If the prospective student fails the test, the Cikgu will say that he'll consider the prospective student's request to train, and then - after a couple of days - decline to teach the student with no explanation offered… The delay is so that the student won't realize that there was a test that he failed during the dinner.

Another test is to ask a prospective student to write a formal letter explaining why he wants to study Silat and to submit the letter to the Cikgu. The Cikgu will read the letter and then do nothing. If the student approaches the Cikgu and asks for the status of his request, the Cikgu will say that he is still considering the request and will decline to give a time as to when his decision will be made. The Cikgu will then wait again to see if and when the student will contact him again. He will observe the student's demeanor and “akhlak” (manners) during the second conversation. The Cikgu will repeat that he is still considering the application (which is a true statement) and he will decline again to say when the review will be complete. The Cikgu will then wait to see if and when there will be a third contact. If the student remains polite, respectful, patient and persistent during the third contact, the Cikgu will say on the spot that the decision is yes.

The third test that I've observed involves how the student conducts himself during the first meeting. What gifts (if any) did he bring? What questions is he asking? The Cikgu will ask a very simple question: “why do you want to study Silat?” and he will listen very carefully to the answer. A follow up question might be “well, why do you want to study Silat vs. Tae Kwon Do or Muay Thai?” Again, the answer is very carefully studied.

Hope this helps…

On Meeting Cikgu Sani and Missing the Tsunami… Part II

My Kedah Travel Companions (Camera Phone Photo):



My Silat Kuntau Tekpi Instructor - Cikgu Lan - at Kedah Roadside Cafe (Camera Phone Photo):


Omar at Kedah Roadside Cafe - Christmas Morning (camera Phone Photo):


View from Kedah Roadside Cafe (camera Phone Photo):


We left for Cikgu Sani’s house and got there shortly after breakfast. Some of his relatives were at his house and answered the door, but Cikgu Sani was not there. It ends up that he had left the day before to accompany some of his relatives to the airport. Those relatives were leaving to perform their Hajj (Pilgrimage to Mecca).

We were invited into Cikgu Sani’s house. We made ourselves comfortable in his front room and we all dozed off to sleep. Cikgu Sani arrived at his house around 10 am. He apologized for the miscommunication regarding our arrival time and for not being there to greet us when we arrived.

Cikgu Sani is a fascinating man. He is much more soft-spoken than I expected. He knew of me from my teacher Cikgu Lan, and he knew that I had come to Kedah to seek his permission to teach and to commercialize Silat Kuntau Tekpi. We quickly got down to business. I explained my overall plan and approach to him. Cikgu Sani listened and asked a few questions.

When I was done presenting my plan, Cikgu Sani went quiet. There was an awkward silence for what felt like several minutes. Finally, Cikgu Sani spoke. He approved of my plan and agreed to allow me to promote Silat Kuntau Tekpi outside of Malaysia. I was blown away by his decision. Cikgu Sani then told me that he had been waiting for someone to approach him with such a request. Apparently, the idea of promoting this Silat worldwide has been a longtime dream of his… He then said that I had his full blessing and support to pursue my plan.

As our meeting was wrapping up, Cikgu Sani asked me to change into my Silat uniform. When I asked him why, he told me that he was going to perform music at a wedding at noon, and that he wanted me to demonstrate my Silat at the wedding. I was shocked and more than a little nervous. It’s a tradition to have people perform Silat at Malay weddings, but I didn’t feel ready to show my meager stuff to a sophisticated audience of Malays at a Kedah wedding!

So I changed into my Silat uniform and we headed to the wedding. Everyone sat down to a large outdoor wedding buffet, but I couldn’t eat a bite. I was still woozy from not having slept the night before and I had huge butterflies from the thought of my impending performance. As lunch wound down, Cikgu Sani and his “band” set up their instruments and began to play. Cikgu Sani is a fantastic musician! Luckily, I captured some of their performance on videotape.

Anyway, one by one, different Silat practitioners got up and performed to the music in front of a crowd of about 80 or so wedding guests. A Sumatran system called Silat Garuda (Phoenix Silat) had a total of about six or seven students who got up and performed. I was so fascinated by their movements that I almost forgot that I was to get up soon. Then Cikgu Sani’s youngest son (16 years old) got up and did a great form with the double Tekpi. When he was done, everyone then looked at me.

I was up.

I just then realized that I was the last one to get up.

The main event…

Gulp…

So I stepped out onto the Persian rug that was thrown down on top of the gravel and grass in the groom’s front yard and waited for the music to begin.

And then - I just moved.

It was the weirdest experience. I had Silat movements come out from so many different sources: Leo Gaje, Herman Suwanda, Dan Inosanto, Lok 9, Kuntau Tekpi, Cekak, Kalimah…

I just listened to the music and moved with no plan. I still have no idea what I did. When it was over, everyone gave me an enthusiastic round of applause, but I have a feeling that it was more about seeing a foreigner doing something that vaguely resembled Silat then about the performance itself. I had someone videotape me, but that tape will never see the light of day… ☺

Cikgu Sani was very congratulatory and thanked me for participating in the wedding. Someone later told me that he was actually proud of me and pleased with my performance. I’m glad if that’s true.

After the wedding (around 3 or 4 pm), we headed back to Cikgu Sani’s house. Cikgu Sani’s son then offered to give me a tour of Baling on his motor scooter. I agreed, grabbed my video camera, and off we went.

Baling is a very cool place. Laid back. Full of coconut trees and streams and sprawling rice fields. The Thai border (a range of hills on the horizon) look close enough to touch. In Kedah, they traditionally measure time in “pots of rice”, meaning how far you can walk in the time that it takes one pot of rice to cook. They told me that the Thai border was 3 or 4 pots of rice away…

Very interesting…

After my tour, we returned to the house. I was told to relax for a while and then prepare to go out for dinner.

Among other things, Cikgu Sani is a healer who uses traditional Malay methods. He recently helped an old woman (in Baling) recover from a serious illness. The old woman’s son had invited us all over for dinner at his house to celebrate here recovery and to publicly thank Cikgu Sani.

I was beginning to feel like Alice in Wonderland.

Go here. Eat this.

Go there. Eat that.

I never knew what was going to happen next. Being almost 24 hours without sleep wasn’t helping things any…

So we went to dinner. The house was very remote. It was only 20 or so minutes away, but it was down a winding dirt road that few 4WD vehicles could have navigated, since the trees were so close to the dirt road. When we arrive at the house, it was like we had stepped back in time.

It was a long house on stilts. It was a traditional Malay house. I had seen pictures of them, but had never actually seen one up close. They are made up of only one long room that’s separated by many curtains, but no interior walls. They’re on stills to help them survive the flooding that comes with rice farming techniques.

And I saw around the house “papan sakaping” (or “one thin plank”) – wooden pathways that are put in place so that you can walk from place to place when the ground is flooded. This was eye-opening, since my Silat Kalimah training keeps emphasizing papan sakaping in its footwork. There are no sidesteps in the footwork (that would cause you to fall off of the plank) – just walking forward, stepping straight back and pivoting. Silat Kalimah is also from Kedah, so I was seeing before my very eyes one of the key forces on the development of this form of Silat. Very cool…

So we went into the long house. There were about 50 or 60 people inside. The women were on one side of the house and the men were on the other side. There was no furniture at all. We all sat on the floor along the walls and in small groups.

The evening began with the local Imam (prayer leader) reciting one of the longer chapters of the Qu’ran (from memory). After he was done, he led the group in something called Zikker (or “Remembrance”), a form of Sufi chanting where one of God’s names or attributes is rhythmically chanted over and over. I have done Zikker before, but never in such a large group. It was hypnotic. We chanted for about 20 or 30 minutes (the time just flew by).

As the Imam wrapped up, the old woman’s son stood up and gave a moving speech (in Malay) thanking Cikgu Sani for all that he had done for his mother. There wasn’t a dry eye in the room.

And then the food came. And came. And came. It was a huge feast. It took me a minute to realize that I was going to have to eat my food the traditional Malay way (with my bare hands), but I quickly got with the program.

Women Beginning to Serve Dinner in Long House (Camera Phone Photo):


The meal was delicious, with the specialty being cooked bamboo tree – a Kedah delicacy!

We wrapped up the lovely evening and arrive back at Cikgu Sani’s home about 10 or 11 pm – just as a small caravan of vehicles was pulling up.

It was Cikgu Sani’s oldest son and about 40 of his Silat students who decided - spontaneously – to drive up to Kedah from Port Dickson (on the West coast of Malaysia) for Christmas.

Alice in Wonderland…

So for about an hour or so, the place was a zoo. There were maybe 50 people or so milling around in front of Cikgu Sani’s house - talking, smoking cigarettes and drinking tea.

Cikgu Sani then came up to me and my travel partners and said that he was going to go somewhere with the Port Dickson group and that he’d be back soon.

So as suddenly as the hoard had descended on us, they were all gone. You could actually hear the crickets.

I sat down with my friends and we drank tea and told tall Silat tales for a while.

Two hours later, at about 2 am, Cikgu Sani and the band of students returned (from where I still don’t know). Cikgu Sani then asked me if I was ready for my bath. “What bath?” I said…

It was time for me to be initiated into the Silat Kuntau Tekpi family, and I was told that the initiation ceremony involves Cikgu Sani giving me a bath.

Alice in Wonderland…

So I stripped down (in front of about 40 or 50 people), put on my sarong and we headed to the back of the house. I was asked to give myself a quick bath before the ceremony so that I would be wet when the ceremony began. I was shocked at how cold the water was in Cikgu Sani’s bathroom. It comes from a deep well and is the coldest water I have ever felt.

I was shivering – from the cold – when I approached Cikgu Sani. There was a very large bucket of water in front of him. The ceremony began.

He asked me to recite Al Fatiha (the opening chapter of the Qu’ran) with him. He then said a prayer while slicing up and squeezing several limes into the bucket. He then asked me to recite another chapter of the Qu’ran three times out loud while he used his hands to stir the limes into the water. When I was done, he asked me to step outside with him and kneel on the ground. He began to recite another prayer while he slowly picked up the large bucket with both hands.

And then he began to pour the water over my head.

I tried to scream, but I couldn’t. The breath wouldn’t leave my lungs. The water was sooooooo cold!!! I have never felt water this cold in my life. It somehow felt even colder than the water that I felt in his bathroom.

When we were done, Cikgu Sani handed me a towel and hugged me. He welcomed me to the family. As I dried myself off, he explained that by bathing me, he was symbolically becoming my father, since the last time I was likely to have been bathed by a man was when I was an infant and my own father bathed me. It also symbolized a new beginning for me in Silat Kuntau Tekpi.

As I walked back in the house, I saw a small line of shivering wet guys in their sarongs waiting to see Cikgu Sani. It was an initiation assembly line. These were the new students from Port Dickson who came up to Kedah to be initiated. Things were starting to make a little sense now.

By now it was 3 am or so... No one was sleeping. There was nowhere to sleep. There were about 40 guys packed into Cikgu Sani’s front room talking loudly and smoking cigarettes.

I sat down next to Cikgu Sani’s oldest son. If there was ever going to be a Hollywood stereotype for the tough Silat instructor-type, Izhar (his son) would be it. This guy has a longshoreman’s build, a vice-like handshake and steely eyes. He also has a prominent dark birthmark over his right cheek and eye. It’s hard not to stare at it when you first meet him. We had a great and rambling conversation for a couple of hours. It was now 5 am. I was on fumes – out of gas. Izhar looked so disappointed. He wanted to keep talking but he allowed me to go to sleep.

So I found a bare patch on the crowded floor, rolled up a spare set of jeans as a pillow and laid down, covering myself with my damp sarong. The lights were on. People were talking and milling about. Cigarettes were burning. And I fell fast asleep.

At first, I kept waking up every time someone stepped over me, but after about an hour even that didn’t wake me.

The next thing I knew, it was 10:30 am. I woke up to a surreal scene. People were seated all around me eating their breakfast rice out of their bowls with their hands. I was on the floor fast asleep in the middle of a circle of people seated on the ground eating breakfast. How long had they been there? As I woke, there was a lot of laughter and jokes about my snoring, but other than that, it seemed completely normal to everyone to have someone fast asleep in the middle of their breakfast circle.

Alice in Wonderland!

After I washed up, I joined Cikgu Sani and his family at their breakfast table for a lovely breakfast. By now, it was 11 am, and Cikgu Sani had another wedding concert to perform. He laughed and promised me that I wouldn’t have to perform Silat at this wedding!

So my travel partners and I packed our things, said goodbye to the other students and Cikgu Sani’s family and followed Cikgu Sani to the wedding concert.

We all sat down and watched him and his band play. I was videotaping.

And at that very moment, somewhere off of the coast of Sumatra, only a couple of hundred miles away, there was something happening that went unnoticed by all of us...

We watched Cikgu Sani and his band play for about 40 or so minutes. By then, it was 1 pm and we had to hit the road. We said goodbye to Cikgu Sani and went on our way.

We headed south from Kedah toward the town of Kuala Kangsar to meet with a famous keris maker. I wanted to order several custom blades from him. We spent about three hours with him as he explained the keris making process to us. This is the man who makes the keris for four of the nine Malaysian royal families. I placed my order with him and we left Kuala Kangsar and headed toward Kuala Lumpur.

As we hit the traffic jam of Christmas weekend travelers returning home, we turned on the car radio.

There was an urgent news story, something about a tsunami…

On Meeting Cikgu Sani and Missing the Tsunami… Part I

My story begins on the afternoon of Friday December 24th in Kuala Lumpur. I was meeting with Dato Omar Din, the Mahaguru of the Silat Lincah Malaysia Association. Omar Din is a big deal in Malaysia, since Silat Lincah is recognized as the largest association – of any kind - in Malaysia, with a peak membership count of 700,000 members and a total of over one million members since 1962. Omar Din and I discussed a movie that he made in 1982 depicting some of the Tenaga Dalam (Inner Power) training effects of Silat Lincah. It’s a documentary that’s over 90 minutes long that the famous Shaw Brothers of Hong Kong made. To call this movie amazing is an understatement. The film shows among other things Silat practitioners diving out of a third storey window – right through the glass (!) - onto an open field and then just getting up and walking away. No wires, no pads, no gimmicks – this is the real McCoy.

I contacted Omar Din because I’m planning on launching a website called “Silat.TV” that features DVDs and merchandise from what I hope will eventually be dozens of unique Silat systems. I wanted to license the Lincah movie – called “One Step into the Beyond” for sale on my website. He has agreed in principle and we are now working out the details.

After our meeting, I met with my three traveling companions (two Silat Kuntau Tekpi instructors and one senior student) for my trip to Kedah. We ended up leaving Kuala Lumpur around 6:30 pm to begin our 6 hour journey to Baling, Kedah where Cikgu Sani lives (here’s a map: http://www.emmes.net/malaysia/regions/kedah/map.asp , and here’s some background info: http://www.myfareast.org/Malaysia/kedah/ ). Baling is about 40 km from the coast, and what appears to be walking distance from the border with Thailand ( http://allmalaysia.info/news/story.asp?file=/2003/9/6/state/6218349&sec=mi_kedah ). This will become an important fact shortly…

Our six-hour journey ended up taking about eight hours once we factored in Christmas Eve traffic, meal and bathroom breaks. We arrived at Cikgu Sani’s home at about 2:30 am. We knocked on his front door for about 15 minutes with no answer. This was surprising, since he was aware that we were coming and that we’d be arriving very late.

We decide to go find a hotel room in Baling. Well, there’s only one hotel in Baling, and it was packed with people who were traveling for the Christmas holiday.

One interesting sideline about Malaysia – since they are a multicultural society, they officially honor and recognize all of the major religious and cultural holidays of their Malay (Muslim), Indian (Hindu, Muslim) and Chinese (Buddhist, Muslim and Christian) citizens. This means that the Malaysians may have more official holidays than any other country on Earth! So when it’s Christmas, everyone is off work and celebrating, even though only about 2% or 3% of the population is Christian!

Anyway, it’s Christmas Eve and there’s no room at the Baling Inn. We were directed to a small bed & breakfast, but they were also full. By now it’s 3:30 am and there’s nowhere to go. My traveling companions then suggested that we go sleep in one of the many mosques in Baling. The mosques in Baling have no walls and are not locked, since it’s a tropical environment year-round. When were arrived at one of the larger mosques, I was surprised to see no less than 20 or 30 people who were already there, spread out and sleeping on the floor. My mates and I picked one corner and we prepared ourselves for sleep, using clothes from our luggage as pillows and our sarongs as blankets.

My friends promptly fell asleep. I – on the other hand – had a problem. Mosquitoes. They didn’t seem to be bothering anyone else, but I was being eaten alive. I tossed and turned on the floor for about 30 minutes before I finally gave up. I got up and started to walk the streets of downtown Baling. This is a tiny town and I was able to cover a large part of it in just half an hour. It was now about 5 am, and the early morning roadside coffee shops were beginning to open. I went to one and enjoyed a nice cup of Teh Tarik (http://202.186.86.35/special/online/usjweb/usjteh.htm ) while seated in front of a small fan that served to keep my many new small friends at bay.

I then saw a fascinating sight – a Padi (rice) farmer drove up to the coffee shop on his scooter to drop off some fresh rice pastries for sale. This guy was a monster! He had the build of an Olympic light-heavyweight wrestler. The guy was huge and shredded. You could see every muscle in his forearms as he unloaded the pastries. I had to chuckle, since he resembled a cross between the Warner Brothers Tasmanian Devil and a bullet (since he kept his helmet on his head and he was wearing a sarong that hid his legs and gave him a cylindrical look). I found out later that many of these Kedah Padi farmers look like that. They still use manually powered mills and plows and other equipment on their farms. Apparently, they are well known for being incredibly strong and fit. If the guy I saw is a Silat practitioner – and the odds are very good that he is – then the Silat in Kedah is even more formidable than I thought!

I went back to the mosque at about 6 am to meet my friends (who were just waking) and to do our morning prayers. We then stopped for breakfast at another roadside café before heading over to Cikgu Sani’s house.

Silat Kuntau Tekpi Origins & Syllabus

Seni Silat Kuntau Tekpi was founded by Panglima Taib (General Taib Bin Wan Hussein). He is Cikgu Sani's great-grandfather. I'm still trying to determine the exact date of origin, but it appears to be around 1890. I'm going to Kedah next week to meet with Cikgu Sani, and I'll get precise answers then.

Panglima Taib learned various forms of Silat Kedah (Silat from the Kedah region), including the Silat from Panglima Ismail, which is the root of Silat Cekak and Silat Kalimah. This is why Cekak, Kalimah and Kuntau Tekpi have a strong resemblance to one another. Panglima Taib added the use of the Tekpi to this Silat (as well as other elements) and created Silat Kuntau Tekpi (although at that time it was simply called Silat Tekpi). Since Panglima Taib was a General in Kedah, he put the 7 wave Keris in the Silat Tekpi logo.

Panglima Taib organized his original syllabus into 360 Buah, which taught and covered all of the basic principles and pecahan (variations) of the Silat system. He taught his daugter (Siti Aminah) and passed the system on to her. Siti Aminah is the old woman in the photograph in an earlier posting. She taught her son (Pak Guru) who taught his son, Cikgu Sani.

The modern syllabus was organized by Cikgu Sani. He studied the art from his father and six other relatives who knew the art in order to insure that he had a clear understanding of the entire original syllabus. All seven of his teachers agreed upon the basic 360 Buah, but they had their own interpretations as to the details.

Here is the modern syllabus for Seni Silat Kuntau Tekpi:

Level One:
21 Buah (Basic) - Teaches fundamental footwork, entries, throws and locks

Level Two:
21 Buah (Intermediate) - More "direct" combative Buah that draw upon the lessons and mastery of the first level

The material in Levels One & Two are broken into thirds. In other words, the first seven buah constitute a rank. After you learn the first seven buah, you must pass a test before you learn the next seven buah. They are actually using belts now in Kuntau Tekpi (they openly admit to taking the idea from TKD). Level One is a white belt. After you pass the test on the first seven buah, you get a yellow stripe on your belt.

You have to get all three yellow stripes before you're allowed to take a test on all 21 Buah. Upon passing the test, you get your yellow belt which means that you're studying the Level Two material. The Level Two material is also taught and tested in groups of seven, which earn you a red stripe upon passing the tests. When a student has completed Level Two and has passed the comprehensive test on all of the Level Two buah, he or she is qualified to be an instructor (a red belt).

Level Three:
Senaman Tekpi - Tekpi exercises for conditioning and combat
Counters for all 42 Buah (from Level One & Level Two)
Seven Buah Pukulan - These are counter-offensive responses to an attack that depend only upon striking, and not entering or locking
Five Buah - These are five advanced Buah only taught to Level Three students
21 Buah Tekpi - These are the Buah that teach how to strike and fight with the Tekpi

Level Four (by invitation only):
Variations of 42 Buah - This is the pecahan for the Level One & Level Two Buah
Level Four Buah (unknown number)

Level Five (by invitation only):
Spiritual Training & Religious Teachings

Silat Kuntau Tekpi Logo Comments

I've been doing some research on the Silat Kuntau Tekpi logo. I'm fascinated by some of the symbolism and meanings attributed to the logo's elements:

Colors – The logo is made up of three colors: white, red, black. The White stands for purity and Islamic values. The Red stands for bravery & brotherhood. The Black stands for secrecy, for this has historically been a secret art.

Weapons - There are four weapons represented in the logo. These are the weapons of Silat Kuntau Tekpi. The weapons are:

Rantai (Chain) - Two chains are shown with 13 links each. Each link symbolizes one of the 13 Federal States that make up the country of Malaysia.
Cindai (Cloth) - The word TEKPI is written on a long thin cloth sash called a cindai. The cindai is used in Malaysia as a belt or sash worn with traditional clothing.
Tekpi - The tekpi (a.k.a. sai) is the primary weapon of Kuntau Tekpi, giving the art its name. This is because the tekpi is not a Malay weapon - it is of Chinese origin, so it is considered unusual for a Malaysian form of Silat to use the tekpi.
Keris (Kris) - This is a 7 lok (wave) keris which is what is worn and used by the Malay Panglima (Generals). Seven waves is the most that a keris can have for someone who is not of royal blood. That's why Seni Silat Lok Sembilan (9) has a keris with 9 waves - it is a Royal form of Silat for Princes. The Keris of a Sultan can have up to 13 or 15 lok.



Please note that the keris in the above logo has a Malay peninsular handle and 7 loks.

Silat Kuntau Tekpi Historical Photos

Here's a photo of Cikgu Sani, the current Guru Utama of Seni Silat Kuntau Tekpi. This photo was taken in 1969 just after the national riots:



Here is a historical photo of Pak Guru - Cikgu Sani's father and the former Guru Utama:



Here's a photo of Pak Guru from several month's ago (in mid-2004). The photo was taken in Kedah:



If you look closely, you will notice that he has had his legs amputated. This was due to a very bad case of diabetes. Sadly, he just passed away only three months ago...

Here is a picture of Siti Aminah - Cikgu Sani's Grandmother. She was the key Silat Kuntau Tekpi instructor in this system. She taught Cikgu Sani's father and she also taught him! This photo was taken in the 1960s. She is 97 years old in the photo. She died when she was 100 years old! They say that at the time that the photo was taken, she could throw a large piece of firewood incredibily far with only one hand!



Here's a photo taken earlier this year just before Pak Guru passed away. The man on the far left is my Kuntau Tekpi instructor, Cikgu Norazlan. The man standing in the back (second from the right) is Cikgu Nadzrin, my Silat Kalimah training partner. This picture was taken at the main gellanggang for Seni Silat Kuntau Tekpi in Kedah. This is ground zero for Kuntau Tekpi!

Pukulan Tujo Hari Targeting

Here's what's interesting about Pukulan Tujo Hari's (PTH) hitting system. They apparently have seven key targets. These targets are optimized for empty-handed striking as well as for striking with the three PTH weapons. These targets also have a specific time of day associated with them. So at any one time of the day, you will emphasize one target over all others.

When I asked a bit more about this, I was told that the time of the day wasn't so much based upon the clock, but upon the opponent's breathing. I'm learning that many Silat systems focus upon the breathing patterns through the nostrils. Like in Yoga, these systems know that throughout the day our breathing shifts from one nostril to the other. I - of course - asked how in the world am I supposed to know which nostril my opponent is breathing from!?!? I was told that I simply notice which nostril I'm breathing from and assume that it is the same with my opponent.

I have to do a lot more research to do in order to determine whether or not someone is pulling my leg. Perhaps this is the Malaysian equivalent of a "snipe hunt"...

Some Early Thoughts on Pukulan Tujo Hari

Pukulan Tujo Hari (7 Day Hitting) is a well-known system from Malacca (West coast of Malaysia). Another is Pukulan Buah Malacca (the Fruit of Malacca Hitting). Both trace their roots back to the Bugis invasions of Malaysia. They are cousins of Silat Sendang (sideways). The Bugis-based Pukulan and Silat systems assume that you have a weapon hand and a shield hand, so they fight sideways to maximize the utility of their shield and to bring their weapon hand closer to their opponent. This sideways profile also makes for very effective group and military tactics, since the Bugis warriors would line up on the battlefield or on their boats side-to-side. By standing sideways, you can have more warriors "per foot" if you will.

Pukulan Tujo Hari is an empty-handed and small weapon system based upon the Bugis methodology that is designed to be taught in 7 days (7 days X 8 hours = 56 hours). The system has four "modes" - empty-handed, kerambit, adak badik (son of badik) and the buku lima (five books - or brass knuckles). All of the weapons utilization and the empty-handed application are exactly the same. The key to the art is in their careful selection of targets that are fight-ending when struck properly (empty-handed or weapons). Tujo Hari assumes the same sideways posture of its cousin Silat Sendang, but its emphasis is on bela diri (self defense) and not on being a complete system for war. They train so that no matter what is launched at them, they can respond with a single debilitating hit. They do teach a manner of flow and counter-for-counter, but only so they can deliver their one hit. Isn't that interesting?

My teacher has said that Tujo Hari is "open", but I'm not sure if that is a Malay "yes means no" or a "yes means yes". I will continue to explore this. It is my intention to be able to package the curriculum and teach it over four weekend seminars.