GETTING TO KNOW BRUCE'S BEST FRIEND by PETE SILAS

I first began studying written materials about Bruce Lee in 1988. Until then, I was only aware of his movies and his reputation being as I grew up on his movies. There was and is a martial arts store in Seattle's Chinatown owned by Lee contemporary, John Leong. That is where I found a variety of Bruce Lee books that I wouldn't have been able to find in most bookstores. In several of these books there were portions, pictures and interviews mentioning Bruce's best friend, Taky Kimura, Lee's most senior instructor.

I decided that year that I would seek Taky out someday in the near future and join his school. Taky owned two stores in Seattle at the time, one, coincidentally was across the street from where I lived as a child on 15th. That was the one where I decided to seek the man out. However, I was pretty nervous about meeting someone who was so close to the greatness I aspired to. The very first time I sought him out, I had to sneak past the "Employees Only" sign at the back of his store, snuck upstairs and peered into a break room where I saw and heard Taky for the first time. He was discussing some business issue with a manager. That was enough for me, I chickened out and left.

I came back, sometime in early '91, and spoke to the receptionist and Taky agreed to meet with me. This man gave me a couple hours out of his day, when he had a million other things that had to weigh on his mind. He was screening me, but I didn't know it then. After this "interview" he agreed to have me come down and learn at his other store. Only then, at the end of our conversation, he casually mentioned that he was Bruce Lee's friend and an instructor of his. I told him I was aware of that. He also got up to briefly demonstrate how a Wing Chun punch would be different from the boxing I already knew. Vertical fist as opposed to horizontal but that was about it as far as any sort of physical instruction during our first interaction.

The following Monday, I went down to his school on 8th and Madison and got a couple hour workout. Unfortunately, even though the workout wasn't that intense, I was out of shape and also had a full time job. I couldn't handle anything more than I already was. It was only after I found myself unemployed and out of college that I had the time to devote fanatically to JUN FAN.

I returned to the class about a year and a half later, needing guidance badly. My sister was drinking herself to death and I wasn't dealing with it well. My anger was out of control, and I knew I had to funnel it in a positive direction, or I would just be another young hothead in trouble with the law. So…I went back, that's where my real martial arts journey begun.

I should mention that I snuck into that Monday’s class, knowing that I wasn't exactly invited, that invitation was a year and a half prior. I still remember Taky coming in, as I waited for class to begin, I could swear that for a moment, he looked over the class and his eyes stuck on mine for a moment. I looked down, feeling a bit self-conscious. Later, I came to find out there was discussion over, "where did that guy come from? Who invited him?" Even Taky intervened one night and asked who I was and what I was doing there, he'd totally forgotten first meeting me! Well, I assumed it was his age or maybe just the fact that he met so many people. Whatever the case, he allowed me to stay and warned me not to use any of this stuff in the streets. Over the years, our relationship would broaden and deepen.

We learned Chain Punches and "Bil Jees" (shooting fingers) in our first group as well as the low kicks that Bruce had taught as the most important to his art. We learned the same moves that Bruce did in many of his movies and we did a lot from the same exact stance that Bruce and Bob Wall did in Enter The Dragon and the same exact manoeuvres, we drilled those a lot.

Class was broken into 3 groups, there was some overlap, but the middle group was more of a variety of kicks and more chi sao.

From what I know, Classical Wing Chun had the participants stand body and face parallel to each other, not with one foot ahead of the other. Bruce apparently was already deep into his relentless tinkering with Wing Chun and adding different techniques. Much of the footwork was from fencing, which we know Bruce picked up from his brother, Peter. The lead hand was used as the major foil and the forward and backward movement was from fencing and didn't really involve much lateral movement like boxing.

This portion of my life was very important, and I think may have saved me from a much worse fate. Just the looking forward to something to do when I had nothing, the work ethic I developed, much of it on my own during the week when I'd drill all the new moves, and also the friendship with my mentor Taky would be enough to save me.