EN - Maui Qi Fest

The very first annual Maui Qi Fest was held in June.

My good friend Jonath Padilla who has been my valuable massage therapist for the past 6 years organized it with his teacher, Master Marilyn Cooper (founder of Pushing for Peace).

It was held at the beautiful Camp Keanae (half way to Hana).



Here is the Keanae Peninsula.



Leading into Nua'ailua Bay

Some people stayed in tents.

Some people stayed in the buildings (there are bunk beds).

There were clean bathrooms and showers.

One of our guest teachers, Master Zhao Guohung demonstrated Push Hands.

Here is a cute picture of Doug Floto and his wife, Mary.

Both of them taught us the principles and applications of Dim Mak.

Mary was showing the movement.

Matt and Sheldon were having fun.

Jonath demonstrated how he developed “moving bodywork” from techniques and principles of martial arts, bodywork, movement and somatics.  

Participants were practicing Push Hands.

Push Hands is not only for adults.

In fact, Marilyn teaches it to children.

She started Pushing for Peace, which is a program that teaches T’ai Chi movements and philosophy to prevent violence and to increase mental and physical health.

And big people practice it, too.

All genders practice it, too.

Many people wanted to try doing Push Hands with Zhao.

Zhao's first lesson

We all watched and learned.

We also stood up and moved around to learn.

(In this photo, Marylin was demonstrating movements.)

This was a fun game.

This ball hung off a long elastic string connected to the ceiling, and we made a circle to surround the ball. Then, we hit it at each other. (It doesn't hurt when it hits us.) It was a game to train our timing, patient, and understanding of physics :)

I performed Yosakoi, and Sheldon wanted to learn some moves from Yosakoi.

He was a fast learner. In exchange, he showed me some martial arts movement, (which I don't remember today. Sorry, Sheldon!)

After the Qi Fest, Marilyn stayed on Maui for extra days and taught us some more classes.

It was my first time to expose myself to martial arts, and I loved the philosophy even though I know I only touched its surface. Both martial arts and dancing use our bodies, so participating in this camp enhanced my understanding of body movements.

Pushing for Peace!!