Of Weapons and the Empty Hand

Back when I still had no training in eskrima, I had a very low opinion of swordsmen or of any martial artist who fought with weapons; thus, also eskrimadors.  I held in higher regard the skills of those who learned to fight with empty hands and kept exclusively to it.  I acknowledged it as the more difficult and greater mastery.  For how hard is it, really, to fight with weapons?

Through the years as an eskrima practitioner, however, I have had a reversal in my opinion.  For me, it still holds true that empty hand fighting techniques are more difficult to learn and are the greater mastery.  But now I also say that only those martial artists who have had training and experience with weapons can truly become masters of empty hand fighting.

You will note that there is some truth in what I say if you take into account how many of the old grandmasters of jujitsu, judo, karate, and aikido also trained with the staff, spear, sword, or other forms of weaponry.  In most the various styles of kung fu, or wushu, as others would want it to be called, those students who have advanced to a certain level of proficiency are then taught techniques with weapons.  It would indeed seem that weapons training is necessary for mastery.

Eskrima may adopt a reverse methodology from other martial arts by introducing weapons first and teaching empty hand techniques later but the principle still applies that weapons training complements and improves one’s effectiveness in empty hand techniques.

For one, this is because those who have trained and who do use weapons know more fully the dangers of being attacked with such weapons, what a skilled practitioner may accomplish with them, and also what to do to evade them or minimize the harm they may cause.

Also, most weapons travel faster than the hand.  And so, someone who has trained with weapons is better able to keep track of his opponent’s movements and has a better chance of evading or countering an attack, more so when the attacker is unarmed.

Even more important than the foregoing is how eskrima conditions the eskrimador. 

It is the stick handling in eskrima which trains, prepares, and teaches the practitioner the necessary quickness of action, proper strength of grip, flexibility of the wrist, and the torque necessary for the empty hand applications of wrist locking and grappling.

Further, the techniques of striking, thrusting, and blocking with either stick, sword, or knife may be readily interpolated into empty hand strikes, punches, parries, blocks, and breaking.

Because the eskrima practitioner is trained not only to strike with force but also to hold the stick tightly enough so that it does not fly from his hand but also lightly enough so as not to restrict his own movement, the practitioner, though unaware, is trained how to apply sufficient force in restraining or trapping the opponent’s hands.  In empty hand fighting, this sensitivity then becomes reflex or second nature to the eskrimador.

Eskrima may begin with teaching one how to use weapons, but the supreme mastery of it is still, and always, towards how to use one’s empty hands as weapons.

Not One Way

There is one thing that I’ve noticed about how I am presenting the traditional ways of training in eskrima or FMA through this blog.  It is that I seem to be stressing that there is only one way.  I would like to correct this impression, if, in case, I have led others to believe so.

If anything, it is informality that governs the traditional approach of training in eskrima.  There is no system or process.  Even the measure of one’s weapons is not fixed to a standard length, but always according to one’s own proportions and fighting style.
 
There is no one way of traditional training in eskrima.  There are as many ways as there are islands of our archipelago, not that each of our more than seven thousand islands has a style, although many islands, provinces, or regions do historically identify with certain styles.  (I merely said that for emphasis.)
 
My experience is only one of the many ways that one can be taught eskrima traditionally.  And, if you want to be truly steeped in tradition, you may with some masters even take up oracions, habaks, anting-antings, and similar or analogous modes of training or augmenting skill.
 
From my experience, if there is anything that characterizes traditional eskrima, it is a lack of system.  One master, in teaching, say, five students, may have as many ways for teaching each student.   And, most of the time, it is dictated by what he sees as the student’s aptitude and level of skill.  Sometimes, the lesson will depend on what the master recalls from seeing his pupils move.
 
There were those who would start them off with banana or coconut stalks.  Setting twelve stalks or twelve pairs of stalks for the student to use and go through in each practice session.  The session would be over when none of the stalks can be of use.
 
There were those who would only teach solo olisi, with the stick no longer than the distance from one’s armpit to the closed fist.  And there were those who’d always begin with doble baston.  There were those who would only teach you on nights when there is no moon.  There were others who would teach in broad daylight, so long as both master and pupil were in seclusion.
 
Still there were others who taught nothing but went right on to telling their pupil to do their best and hit them.  And also others who would leave their pupils beating a stick hanging at chest level from a branch or stepping on a triangle of coconuts or endlessly going forward and backward on a fallen tree trunk.
 
There were styles where the measure of mastery was being able to do the redonda in the middle of a doorway and not hitting any of the jambs on the doorframe; or being able to run the gauntlet of a pre-industrial age sugar mill unscathed (which is the legend ascribed to the de cuerdas style); or standing in the middle of a banig while twelve grains of corn are thrown all at once at you, but not letting a single grain fall on the banig; or being able to finally take on one’s master in open contest as an equal.

Seeing that I already had twelve strikes, my teacher did not take the time to teach me his sequence or style of doing the twelve strikes.  He went straight on to teach me about how to defend from them.  Seeing that I already knew some sinawali (basically those which are popularly known as single and double sinawali), he went right on to teach me how to break the rhythm when playing in sinawali.  He also taught me other techniques that didn’t have names or that he didn’t name.
 
Another student of my teacher, who was a foot taller than me and who worked at a junk shop which mainly dealt in scrap iron (ergo, massively strong) was trained more on power strikes, much like a larga mano fighter.  Although I would say that I was faster than him, sparring was an unpleasant experience.  I did not enjoy being in his sphere of destruction.  No abaniko can defend against a full-powered strike to the head.  Another student was so blindingly fast with the stick that sparring with him was the first time that I felt fear in training.
 
An acquaintance who is a ranked practitioner of modern arnis, prior to this formal FMA training was also trained traditionally.  And his experience in tradition was very different.  He was taught to hold the stick with the thumb extended, not as I and many others were taught (with the thumb closed on the fore-knuckles). 
 
Now you may dismiss this as a backward style, but I’ve found that it is not so.  There is a reason for holding it that way.  And in case some of you might think that this style is weak, it isn’t so.  It has been battle-tested, if not by my acquaintance then by those who went before him.  This was a style where a pupil graduated by taking on the master with live blades.  Certainly not a style for the faint of heart.
 
As I said, there is no one way of training traditionally in eskrima.
 
So now you might ask, if there is no one way; if it all seems so random; how is any or all of this traditional?  

My position is simply this: that so long as these were the ways our forefathers learned eskrima before the age of formalized instruction, then it is an eskrima tradition.

What’s Your Stick?

In eskrima, there are many kinds of sticks used.  There are some practitioners who use the hardy bamboo species that we in the Visayas call gu-od.  There are some who use the dark heartwood or bahi of various palm trees, such as the buli, patikan, sagisi, or even coconut tree, which can be fashioned into certain shapes, such as a blade-like espada or a round and slender daga.  There are some who make their fighting sticks from the near-hardwood trunk of the biabas or guava tree.  And many more practitioners may have as many more kinds of sticks. 

For some, the choice is made not because of preference for the kind of wood, but merely because of the availability of the material.

And then there is the matter of reach or length of the stick.  Some styles, like those which favor close range fighting, prefer shorter sticks because a shorter stick is easier to maneuver, less likely to break, much more versatile, and much more useful in tight spaces than a longer stick.  A longer stick, however, has greater reach and has greater weight behind every strike, which means that one can hit harder with it than with a shorter stick and one who is skilled in using a long stick can hit without being hit. 

This matter, however, would be better discussed in an essay on the qualities of weapons where one may compare using a knife as against a staff as against a sword and so on and so forth.  For this reason, I will leave this out of the discussion here.

There are some for whom the choice is a matter of what quality a practitioner values more or what one’s fighting style requires, such as power, or speed.  Although, perhaps, not to the exclusion of other qualities or requirements.

Between sticks, though, that which is harder will last.  And that which is lighter will be fast.  If you bang two sticks together hard enough that which is weaker will break or give way.  And that stick which is lighter will be quicker.  But if you know your stick, then you know what you should do and not do with it. 

I have a good stick made from the wood of the guava tree, of good weight and durable too, but I would not risk it in force-to-force blows against a stick of kamagong.  Rather, I would parry or evade with it.  As with using swords, you would try not to meet blade with blade.  And if the blade must be used, as much as possible it must cut flesh, not clash against steel.

With some people I’ve interviewed, all of them senior citizens who’ve observed some eskrimadors from their town, but not all of whom are practitioners, the impression I have had is that one usually begins learning eskrima using light sticks.  Some even begin with the stalks of banana leaves or the woody midrib of the lukay or the frond of the coconut tree.  Most, however, use a rattan stick or, in Visayan, uway.  Although there is another species of rattan too, called olisi, which is comparable in weight and hardness to a hardwood and has the nodes very close together. 

For this essay, though, uway will refer to the light rattan training stick which is commercially available.

As an eskrima practitioner, you can choose to have a hardwood stick.  And you have several to choose from.  There is the Philippine mahogany called bayong or balayong or the molave, called tugas in Visayan, and a score of other native hardwoods.  And then there’s the magkuno and the kamagong, both of which are called ironwood.  Although the latter is better known.

Of the many kinds of sticks used in eskrima, the uway and the kamagong may be said to be the most popular and, thereby, representative of two extremes of the art.

Speed is exemplified by the uway training stick, which one can wield with lightning dexterity, almost as invisible as a plane’s propeller in the hands of a master.  Power, on the other hand, is represented by the kamagong fighting stick, which bludgeons and breaks the enemy with heavy, fatal blows.

For me, a choice can’t be made between the two values of speed or power.  You cannot abandon either.  I will have to say that in a fight where lives matter, speed alone accomplishes nothing and power alone accomplishes nothing.

The word “become” is sometimes used in a context to mean that one thing is appropriate to or suits another thing, as when one says that grace becomes beauty.  In this same sense of the word, we can say that in eskrima true power becomes speed.

Let me use Manny Pacquiao as an analogy.  If Manny Pacquiao were all speed and no power, he would not be able to bring down his opponents.  He could hit them and tag them, but he would only sting and bruise them.  And if Manny Pacquiao were all power and no speed, he would not be able to hit his opponents for all his vaunted strength. 

It is when one has both speed and power that one is truly formidable.  Because power should explode with speed.

Since the uway does not have the potential for power that the kamagong has, an advanced practitioner of eskrima must train for speed in handling the kamagong, for while the uway may astonish the enemy with speed, it would just sting him, unless the eskrimador is very strong or uses the uway stick in executing grappling techniques, where the stick becomes far more important because of the leverage it provides and not the heaviness of its blows. 

Learning to use the kamagong fighting stick is like a new stage for the eskrimador.  I would say that it is much like a college graduate proceeding to undertake post-graduate studies.  Certainly, not one for the uninitiated.  Everything seems new again and the student must relearn the basics with a new tool, one which is harder to control because of its weight.  One that has far graver circumstances than a stick of uway, but which he must strive to wield with the same fluidity and precision as the old one.

If a stick is too heavy, you can’t be quick with it.  Which means an eskrimador must be stronger if he uses a kamagong stick. 

For one who has mastered the kamagong, the uway may then seem to be just as slight and flimsy as a twig.  And for them, it may be said that the kamagong is the best kind of stick, because, with it, every blow would be decisive.  In certain cases, I believe it is the best.  But one must never forget that the stick is merely a tool.

 For then, just imagine how, with one skilled in the use of the kamagong, what blinding speed he would have if he wielded an uway.  His stick and his hand would be fast beyond belief.  It would be like fighting with lightning.

But, in truth, this inclination to compare the qualities of sticks, is needless.  In photography, they say that the best kind of camera is the one that’s with you.  In the end, the same can be said in eskrima:  the best kind of fighting stick is the one you have with you.

I and my Tsako

There is only one reason why I became interested in the tsako, and we can sum it in two words: Bruce Lee. 

He made the weapon look so cool and almost invincible.  Notions that many aspiring practitioners find out are qualities achieved only with mastery.

The tsako, as we know it here in the Philippines, more formally known as nunchaku in Okinawa or Japan or, in English, a two-section cudgel or flail (and informally as nunchucks or chucks), may not originally be Filipino, but we have laid our claim to it; even before Bruce Lee made it popular through the Green Hornet series and, later, in his movies. 

Yes.  We did.  Many do not know it, but the style Bruce Lee used in manipulating the nunchaku in his films was not Chinese, Japanese, or Okinawan, but rather Filipino; from eskrima, although he apparently favored greater reach with a longer chain or rope, whereas the usual tsako chain or cord is only about a hand’s width or two long.

It was Dan Inosanto who introduced the tsako to Bruce Lee and started him out on it.  At first, Lee was said not to have liked it, but after a time he grew accustomed to it.  In the end, it has become identifiable only with him, in that people associate or compare anyone who swings a nunchaku with Bruce Lee, which is sometimes unfair to the practitioner and also to Dan Inosanto.

I have had no formal training with the tsako.  The only teacher I’ve ever had in its use is Bruce Lee.  Or, rather, Bruce Lee as he was captured in film flailing, striking, rolling, and snapping with it.  For this reason, my movements are basically copied from what I’ve seen him do and some other techniques transposed from the stick movements of eskrima.  As is my philosophy in wielding it.

As much as I respect Lee Barden for his incredible mastery of the nunchaku and admire his skills, I cannot reconcile my philosophy with his in using the tsako.  I cannot conceive of using foam or light-weight chucks, even in training, because my orientation with the nunchaku is with it as a weapon and any technique which is inconsistent with its use as such, is not something I can be prevailed upon to learn.  And like Bruce Lee, I also favor the greater reach afforded by a longer chain, although this makes the tsako more difficult to handle than conventional ones.

Although I am able to do some fancy twirls and passes with the tsako, I am not particularly skilled at it and I do not want to practice excessively with such techniques because I believe my mindset must be focused on using it as a weapon.  Of course, it won’t do much against a gun-wielding assailant, as Barden wisely points out, but we must also realize that against the argument of the gun, most martial arts (except perhaps if the martial art you practice includes firearms), traditional or otherwise, become useless, yet many still train in them.

However, if faced by an armed but unskilled opponent, I would prefer that he is armed with a tsako than with a stick, a knife, or a gun.  In the hands of one who is not skilled in its use, the tsako is a dangerous weapon for the wielder, and easily beaten by an eskrimador with a stick.  But in the hands of the skilled, one who knows the weapon’s strengths and failings, the tsako is difficult to beat.

All firearms aside, the tsako is an excellent weapon, if you know how to use it.

Mga Mutya, Anting-Anting, Habak, Orasyon, and Other Things I Don't Know About

I have never come across an eskrimador who practices the mystical aspects of traditional eskrima.  Or if I have they never admitted it to me.  My teacher says that he never learned it and that neither did his teacher.  And, personally, I have no interest in those, because from what I've heard, these are not without a corresponding obligation, burden, vow, or condition that one must fulfill for the protection to be effective.

In this, the traditional eskrima that I practice is limited, but it is enough for me that I am learning and practicing only the fighting skills.  I have no desire to be among those who publicly exhibit claims of mystical protection by performing such stunts as firewalking, bending or breaking spears, or having someone hack away at their bodies with swords.

Also it is said that it is forbidden for someone who has a true anting-anting or other analogous thing to talk about its nature to other people.  If he does, he will lose its protection.

My take on the anting-anting, mutya, habak, and orasyon and why legends and belief in them persist to this day is that in "less enlightened times" it was easier for an eskrimador to put on the impression that he was under the protection of a supernatural spirit or power than it was to rely solely on his own skill and training, especially if he had to guard perpetually against jealous rivals or mere novices eager to establish a reputation by taking him out.

One would be less likely to tempt one's fate by setting to ambush or attack an eskrimador, no matter how distracted or unconscious he might seem, who may just have the unnatural invincibility of a crocodile, the strength of an agta (I would translate this as a "night ogre"), or the speed of a lightning bolt.  Only an equally confident or a truly bold eskrimador would attempt to challenge another eskrimador with such a reputation.

As to their effect, a mutya, anting-anting, habak, or orasyon may, in the first instance, have a placebo effect of psychologically boosting one's confidence in his own skill and power or of demoralizing the opponent, while others, especially concoctions which are applied to the body or drunk, may have the effect of performance-enhancing drugs.

So far, that's all I can say about them.

The Logo and the Slogan

What you see here is the logo which I made to remind me of my ideas about traditional eskrima.

The three sticks of different colors represent three popular kinds of sticks used in eskrima.  The White is Uway.  Black is Bahi.  And Red is Kamagong.

The colors and their position in the triangle also carry their own meanings, apart from representing the aforesaid three kinds of wood.

White, as a color, also represents the apparent opening of an eskrimador's fighting guard.  It is an opening which seems to invite attack, but which should ideally be impenetrable because of the eskrimador's skill and quickness.

Black here also represents the near-certainty of defense and powerful strikes from one's strong side, which is that of the dominant hand.  On this side, the eskrimador should establish security.

Red represents how an eskrimador should be most watchful of his back and should be able to defend it.  It requires a constant awareness of one's surroundings, because an unseen strike could be fatal and then blood would flow.

The triangle itself represents the lessons I have learned from triangle stepping.

The gaps between the sticks mean that no matter how good an eskrimador is, there is always the likelihood that the opponent can find a way in to dismantle one's defense.  However, the gaps may also be openings, traps that the eskrimador may put in play to draw an opponent in.

Beneath the logo is the name of this blog and my idealized slogan as an eskrimador, written in my modified baybayin script:  Bunal Bol-anon, and below it, Bahala'g Maigo Ko, Basta Mamatay Ka.  For those who don't speak Visayan, this roughly translates into "I don't care if you hit me, so long as you die."

Fighting words, yes.  And somewhat inconsistent with my having said that not all fights have to happen and that it is a far greater skill not to have to fight because you've already won the fight before it is fought.

I take these words as a personal reminder, because, in truth, I am too much of a pacifist that I sometimes need to remind myself that there are times when one must fight and also that, should there be a need to fight, it must be all or nothing.

The Lesson of the Triangle

In other eskrima styles, they talk about the male or female triangle, drawing it on the ground or on the floor or using sticks to outline it and employing the footwork in drills and other modes of training.

For me, however, there was no one to teach me that way and I probably wouldn’t have wanted to be taught so, given my bias for traditional modes of instruction.  The triangle stepping I have been practicing is not distinguished as to male or female and is mastered by making a triangle of three halves of coconut husks or shells and playing eskrima upon it, or just stepping around without looking at your feet for possibly hours on end.

The husks would be placed on equidistant points, spaced at a pace apart.  Years before I met my teacher, I would do this for several hours at any one session that I did decide to practice, which was not often.  I did this because this was what elders told me was one of the ways of traditional eskrima.  And because I wanted to learn through the old ways.

I had not yet met my teacher then, but I had already learned some eskrima and I would say at that time that I was better than some practitioners and thought myself adequately skilled.  An opinion of myself which I now no longer hold.

What did I learn from working on the triangle?  I learned about balance and my own proportions.  But what I consider the most important lesson from triangle stepping is that there is always a third point.

The lesson of the triangle is that the feet are two points and the third point is that one step forward, backward, or sideward which I take to regain balance, to gain leverage, to evade or redirect an attack, or to close distance.  Whatever the position, that third point is always there and one should never think that he is out of options.

How is this of use to the eskrimador?  Let’s state it this way: Footwork should be second nature to an eskrimador.  It should be something that moves by itself, not something that one has to think actively about while engaged in a fight.  It should not be a reaction through perception, but a reaction through sensation, in much the same way that doing chi sao teaches speed and sensitivity in wing chun.

In eskrima, triangle stepping is the way to mastering footwork.