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In August 2014, our club had the honour of having Grandmaster Chiu Chi Ling with us in Singapore. Travelling the world frequently spreading the name of our Kung Fu style, Grandmaster Chiu decided to stop by Singapore to meet promising young Hung Gar practitioners. Our club’s instructor Leroy Kwok together with his students and affiliates had made Grandmaster Chiu’s stay in Singapore a memorable one.

During Grandmaster Chiu Chi Ling's stay, we had conducted martial arts seminars, met the fans, met martial art elders, promote Hung Gar Kung Fu and interviewed by the media on numerous occasions. We were featured on our local Chinese TV Channel 8, as well as appearing on Good Morning! Singapore, a morning lifestyle news program Singaporeans will wake up to every morning. We also had interview with Singapore's Chinese newspaper, Wanbao. It was a rare occasion for our local media to meet someone who’s been active in the Kung Fu movie industry since the 70s.

Grandmaster Chiu is indeed well known, while we were walking along the streets, the passers-by would recognize him. However, Grandmaster Chiu does not put on airs like what we usually expect of celebrities and Kung Fu masters of high status. Instead he will greet the amused passers-by warmly and invite them to take photographs with him.

His purpose of visiting Singapore is to connect with our Kung Fu associations and their members in Singapore, as well as to promote Chinese Kung Fu activity in the region. He also wishes to use this opportunity to ‘wake the citizens of Singapore up’ to the existence of our amazing Kung Fu style, Hung Gar Kung Fu. He would say: "Our Kung Fu style is in so many of the movies, how can they not know us?"

That is true, the people from the other continents greatly admire our traditional physical art, Kung Fu’s physical grace and its spirit. Having watched the classic Kung Fu action movies from timezones away, they felt it was heaven’s blessing that Grandmaster Chiu will actually reach out to them and help them realize their dream of learning Kung Fu.

Teaching Kung Fu for more than half a century, Grandmaster Chiu has a very established network of Hung Gar schools in the US and Europe. He told us that recently Kung Fu lovers in South America and Africa has been very passionate in our style. During his visit in Singapore, he’d take photographs at iconic locations such as our airport, Marina Bay Sands and Gardens by the Bay. People all over the world would see that our Kung Fu style brings us across continents, bringing people of different cultures together.

International Hung Gar Grandmaster, Chiu Chi Ling.

Unlike in the United States, Singapore makes Grandmaster Chiu feel right at home. As Chinese people we speak the same language, Cantonese, Mandarin and Fujian dialect. Overseas Chinese can surely relate to us as well as in Hong Kong or Taiwan. During the trip we brought Grandmaster Chiu to some of our heritage sites, such as the streets of Joo Chiat, Jalan Besar and Tiong Bahru. Compared to Hong Kong, these heritage sites are well preserved.

When we were touring Singapore, Grandmaster Chiu would tell us stories of his late father, Chiu Kao. Stories of his father's early days in Singapore and Malaysia before he went back to settle down in Hong Kong. Chiu Kao came to Malaysia when he was a teenager to work as a rubber plantation worker, and eventually came to Singapore to work odd jobs, staying here for over a decade. For a world renowned Great Grandmaster, Chiu Kao had adapted to the local culture and cuisines here. Chiu Kao was able to speak Malay and cook our traditional Nanyang dishes, such as Nasi Padang and Rendang Chicken. When we took Grandmaster Chiu to have lunch at a Malay restaurant, he told us that the food brought back fond memories of his late father.

Grandmaster Chiu also told us that life for the Diaspora Chinese was not easy back in the old days, they had to fight for their own rights and make a stand in the community. With skill and courage, Kung Fu men would be the ones who stand up and protect the rights of their own kinsmen. That would be our Grand Masters, including Sung Siu Bo who brought Hung Gar Kung Fu to Singapore. Leroy Kwok’s lineage is also from Sung Siu Bo. When Grandmaster Chiu's father, Chiu Kao started learning Kung Fu, Sung Siu Bo was one of his martial brothers. Chiu Kao would then return to Hong Kong to carry on learning from the great Lam Sai Wing.

Hung Gar Grandmaster Chiu Chi Ling with Coach Leroy Kwok

Although these times of hardship are forgotten by most people born after the the 70s, many still bear it close to their heart, their past, their identity.

Grandmaster Chiu is not just a Kung Fu master, he is also a movie actor and action choreographer. His most famous work being Kung Fu hustle, a comedy by Stephen Chow. Using iron rings on his arms, he displayed great martial prowess in hand to hand combat by defending Pig Sty Alley from the Axe Gang. In our opinion, Grandmaster Chiu’s fight scenes were the most outstanding in technical aspect. He would fight with the real Hung Gar skills instead of CG effects. This is what Kung Fu lovers are looking for and is getting more and more rare in movies of the 21st century.

While movie makers are seeking more and more methods to thrill the audience, the benchmark set by the ‘no wires, no special effects’ hand to hand combat choreography in the last century will last forever.

In the recent years Grandmaster Chiu has been acting in a Chinese movie called ‘Adventure of The King’, Chinese title ‘龙凤店’. The movie stars Taiwanese Singer Richie Jen and Barbie Hsu. In this movie Grandmaster Chiu acts as the head chef in the female lead’s restaurant, ‘龙凤店’. Although it’s not been aired in Singapore, we’d watch it because our dear Grandmaster Chiu is in it, we know it’d be a great movie to watch. In early 2015, Grandmaster Chiu’s new movie, Kick Ball ‘蹴鞠’ will be aired in theatres.

We Hung Gar Kung Fu teachers and students in Singapore are grateful to Grandmaster Chiu’s many contributions to our Kung Fu style, from making movies to tirelessly promoting our martial art to so many countries worldwide.

Our club will continue to have close ties with Grandmaster Chiu Chi Ling, inviting him back to Singapore whenever he is available and attending his international events. Please log on to our facebbok page aand website often for more amazing news to come!

Hung Gar Grandmaster Chiu Chi Ling with Coach Leroy Kwok in Singapore