Episode 866 - Sifu Restita DeJesus
Today's episode is a chat with Sifu Restita DeJesus from Seattle Wushu.Sifu Restita DeJesus - Episode 866
Jeremy sat down with Sifu Restita DeJesus after Free Training Day Pacific Northwest. 2 weeks ago we released an episode with her and legendary kickboxer Kathy Long. Today, Sifu DeJesus shares her journey as a martial artist, starting with various styles and eventually focusing on Chinese Wushu. Listen along and enjoy the journey!
Show Notes
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Show Transcript
Jeremy (00:00.746)
Hey, what's up everybody? Welcome to another episode of Whistlekick martial arts radio. I'm joined by Sifu Restita de Jesus Hello, thanks for having me. Really good. Awesome. Awesome We'll start chatting in a moment just to let everybody know to remind most of you Whistlekick.com for all the things that we do the events the products that we make the all that good stuff all the other content Whistlekick martial arts radio comm for this stuff specifically
about these episodes, show notes, transcripts, and all that good stuff. Yay. Hi. Just met you yesterday. Yeah, and I feel like I've known you for years. I think we both have that kind of a personality. Yeah. Right? You seem like you make friends easily. Well, it's kind of weird. I have to feel out, you know, events and stuff, like yesterday's event. And which camera am I looking at? This one. This one. There's only one. If you're seeing other cameras, then.
Well, then there's that one. Okay, there is that one. I was thinking maybe CJ had something hidden that we... Yeah, so for those of you that haven't heard of the Whistlekick Free Training Day, if there's one in your area, go to it. Didn't pay you to say that. I know, nope, didn't pay me, didn't pay me. Neither, you know, the teachers, and I just kind of want to shout out on this because, you know, this is the first type of, I guess, like Academy Day, for lack of a better term of putting it.
This is the first Academy Day that I went to that didn't have any kind of, like where people didn't come that had agendas or egos or whatever. And I absolutely loved it. Free of charge to anyone, any martial artist that wanted to come in. And I had a blast. And we got to take as many classes as we wanted. I died halfway in though. I'm like, I'm so done. But still, it was so much fun. So anyway.
Just shout out on that. I'm glad you had fun. You know, it's, the agenda piece is something that I just, I'm so sick of. I'm so sick of people.
Jeremy (02:09.166)
feeling like they have to carve out their space in the world, in the martial arts world, by leading with an agenda. It makes me sad. Because most of the time it's people that actually have a lot of skill and I would want to learn from or talk to. Exactly, exactly. My students and I, well a couple students and I were talking about this the other day about agendas because there were...
So a lot of my students wanted to go to free training day, but there was always like, you know, the daycare the pet care, you know the stuff that prevented him to come and I said so this is your first time coming to a seminar or a workshop or an open Academy That kind of thing Um, you know meet people don't stay within
within our class because you see these guys like every day, you know, meet other people, you know, get flavors of other styles, you know, make new friends, that kind of thing. But you know, also, you know, just be wary of the people that you know, that seem, I don't know, for lack of a better term, you know, egotistical. And if you're partnered up with them, just be just be open. Just
come in with the training with an open mind. And if you need help, then ask the instructor. Don't engage anyone that's trying to impose their will. It sounds like you've been to some events where some wills were imposed. Yeah, I have. Then I've been partnered with the people that would impose their will. And it's kind of like, I just want to learn, right? And then one of my students said,
impose their well. I'm like, yeah, they might get a little bossy or they might steer, you know, steer a technique in a different way. Well, I would do this. Yeah, yeah. You know, in my school, we would do something like this or, or here, try this when, when obviously it's not the technique that the seminar instructor taught. And, and I said, just go in with an open mind and then just stick with what the instructor taught you because there's nothing they can argue.
Jeremy (04:25.93)
with you about it with like, why aren't you doing this like me? You know, if they want to keep doing what they want to do, then let them do it. But if you want to learn what the instructor taught, just do it. Don't engage. Just keep an open mind. Just keep going. Find a new partner next time. But then, you know, we didn't really see much of that. I don't look, if any, you know, I've had, there was very little, I mean, like. Maybe one, but other than that, I, I have no complaints. I loved it.
Dota whistle kick free training day if there's one in your area, do it. Thank you. We might have to carve that out and make a commercial. Do it. I need the little red, white and blue hat. Uncle Sam, we can do it. There's a stars and straights in the corner. Maybe we can make a hat out of it. There we go. There's a Bill Wallace key right there. When did you start?
martial arts. I started in 1978 in an art called butoku-kan karate and it's a lesser-known style a lot of people go butoku-kan karate is sort of an offshoot of shiito-ryu and from that well actually shiito-ryu and then from that came an offshoot called shinpuren and shinpuren had a
had a kind of a weird reputation in Okinawa, because it seemed that people thought that Shin Puran was like saying, oh, like mafia almost, not quite mafia, but like, you know, just a nerd to do.
Was that about the people involved or was that about the word itself? About the organization. Yeah, because like Shinpudin itself was more along the lines of like, I think if I remember correctly, God's wind and strength, that kind of thing. So another way of saying like kamikaze, that kind of thing. And while the art itself was solid, you know, based off of, you know, shi-to-ju and other styles, when
Jeremy (06:46.19)
Grandmaster Yoichi Nakachi, who was a practitioner of Shinto, of Shinto, the Shimpuren, when he came to the United States, he's like, you know, some people that know about Shimpuren might think that this is kind of like a, like a weird, you know, assassination group or something like that. So I'm going to change the name. So he took the name Butoku-Kan.
from the Butokukai Military College in Tokyo, Japan. So, our kata as it was passed down have a lot of influence from Shitoru, but changed a little bit because of Iwichi Nakachi's and Shihan Robert Hill, who was his first student. Their influence in Wing Chun kinda came into the mix. So, it changed the kata a little bit.
But other than that, I started in that and did that. Why? You know, this is kind of funny. I wanted to be like Kuaishan Kane from the old Kung Fu TV series. When I was a kid, and I'm sure all of you out there that are around this age, right, if you remember the Kung Fu TV series, I would watch it with my dad.
Thursdays, I think, and then it moved to Sundays. But we would watch it every Thursday. Let me stay up and watch it with him so we'd watch. And there was a lot of the philosophy that Master Po and the other master, I forgot the other master's name, but there was a lot of philosophy that I really resonated with. And I thought it was, you know, I thought it was really cool, even as like a six-year-old, you know, at that time.
I was like, wow, this is really cool. And I wanted to have that life, you know, not necessarily like walking around in old west and getting into fights for no reason, but I wanted to know what that was like to be able to, you know, work that hard at Shalin Temple and to have a master like that. Well, one day my sister and I were, we were just being like little hellions. This was during a summer vacation during.
Jeremy (09:11.102)
in 1978 and we were just like fighting all the time and being just disruptive and my mom found out after coming back from the store that there was a karate class down the road at a community center and it was free. Yeah, go figure. It was free because I found out later that my sensei got a grant from the city of Seattle for
doing the class and I think the grant was for like two years or something. And every student got like free uniforms, free testing, free this, free that, that kind of thing. What we had to pay was the community centers basically use. So it was like $20 every three months or something like that. What? Okay, so my mom would pay for karate classes and stuff, but never had to pay.
for the geese. Never had to pay for like when we got to like- How old were you? I was, well I was around 1970, and I think it was like 11, 12, something like that, 11, 12. You and your sister. Mm-hmm, my sister was two years younger. She made it to Brown Belt, but then like high school happened, and everything became high school related, which is understandable, right? It's still a common occurrence. It is, you know. She had a boyfriend, she was on the cheer team.
the debate team and stuff like that. So there was a lot of stuff that took her attention away. I, on the other hand, stayed with it and got my black belt in that, made it up to Nidan, a second degree, until I discovered Kajakenbo. And then I started studying Kajakenbo, still teach it at my school. And throughout, and...
during that time, my interest kind of like widened out a little bit. I wanted to expand my horizons into arts where I thought my skills could need improvement on or where I thought it was lacking. So I want to go back. I want to talk about this discovery of Kaji Kembo because, you know, here we are. We're on the west coast and, you know, we're talking about the 80s and the experience that any of us are going to have on the east coast.
Jeremy (11:34.882)
has.
I have no context for those early days of Kajukembo coming to the mainland. And so that coupled with the fact that you reached Nidon and then veered tells me there's something there. Well, in the Kajukembo, don't get me wrong, I love my Botokukan groups. As my Botokukan brethren and sisters, they're like, what's going on? No, they know the story. When I was coming up,
As much as I loved the art, for me personally, I felt that my personal skills in self-defense were not there. I was great at kumite, I was great at sparring, but one day I literally was walking downtown and I walked by this guy that looked kind of shady and I thought, would I be able to defend myself against this guy if he lunged out and tried to grab me and pull me to the floor? And I literally went, I don't.
No. I don't know. Because like I said, I was great at kumite. I know that if I was in a tournament, I'd probably be able to score or defend against being scored. But still there's rules. You know, so it's kind of like, and you know, it's coming. Yeah. And I know it's coming. I know that, okay, we bow. Okay, now we go. But if this guy walks three steps past me and then clocks me on the back of the head, what am I going to do? I didn't have that. I didn't have that.
training, that mindset. So I saw an article on Kaji Kenbo in Black Belt Magazine of all things, right? And it so happened that there was a photo spread of Grand Master Eric Lee, who's known as the King of Kata from the Kaji Kenbo days, doing drills with my now teacher, right? And I thought,
Jeremy (13:36.29)
Kajikam was right here in Washington State. It's only a little bit away. At the time, I lived in Seattle, and the classes that Grandmaster Terry Faircloth had were in Federal Way, which was kind of like the same amount of time to get from here to where I live now. It's about half an hour. And I said, that's not far. I'm gonna drive, right? And it so happened also that where I worked at the time, I worked at a Shakey's Pizza restaurant as management.
someone from a local, someone from the local dominoes chain decided to quit dominoes and then come to Shakey's as management. And it was my duty to train this new manager, or this new management candidate. So Cheryl Johnson comes in and then I found out she, she learns Kajikama with the same guy that I wanted to go study with.
So I went, ding, this is a sign. Yeah, that's, yeah. I don't know how we calculate the math on that. I know, right? Yeah, you know, just, oh, here, here's somebody coming from, you know, Domino's Pizza. I thought it was gonna turn into a pizza fight. Yeah. Some kind of rivalry. Throwing dough. No, you know, she came in and I'm like, well, what had happened was, my bag was sitting in the office and my bag was open and like part of my OB was hanging out. It was, you know, you know, and she's like.
Is that a black belt and may I? And she like pulls it. She's like, Oh my God, what do you do? And I go, I do Patoka kind of that. And I said, yeah, you know, I'm looking at studying another art. I want to study Kaji Kambo out in federal way. And she's like, well, who are you looking for? I said, seafood terrier, pair of clothes. She's like, no way, that's my teacher. And I'm like, ooh, we are, do do. So I'm like, okay, you can have to introduce me to your teacher, which she did.
about a week later, she met me there and introduced me to my teacher. And he's like, okay, get suited up and go, right? And that first day, oh my gosh, I was like, I felt like I was ran through the wringer for like 90 minutes. It was tough and different than what I was used to in karate, but it was like tough in the sense that,
Jeremy (16:01.182)
you got run through the wringer, like just within the first half hour. It wasn't, I felt like there was no warmup. It was just like, boom, 100 miles an hour, go. And I'm like, I could get used to this. This is kind of cool. You liked it for record, you get to go. Yeah, I liked the fact that it was like, okay, challenge yourself now, because this is what happens in the street. You don't get to take your shoes off, because I said, well, what do I wear? Well, you can wear, you know.
wrestling shoes, you can wear cross-training shoes that are clean, you can go barefoot, but there's like, we're on concrete and we don't want you to hurt your feet or whatever. So I'm like, I can't wear shoes. Cool. So, you know, I wore a pair of tennis shoes and it was, yeah, it was just dope. And we were taught by a seahing, a black belt, not the Sifu. So it was kind of like, I was wondering, is this one of those things where you have to go through the...
under black belts first, and then the Sifu teaches you. I didn't care because number one, it was new. I liked being able to come into something with a white belt mind. I liked that it was like, this is how street is, go! Right? You know? And yeah, and I was hooked on that from the get-go. Do you think you would have appreciated it as much without the contrast?
of the other training? If you had started that, yeah. You mean like if I had started with Kajikambo? You know, that's a good question because as with anything, you know, like with kids, so to speak, if you're only exposed to one thing, you know, how would you compare that to anything else? So that's a great question. I mean, I look at, you know, in hindsight, I look at both now and I think, well, they were both difficult.
Right? And I'm not gonna say that one was better than the other. I think it was the mindset, right? That was different. Because you pose that question to yourself of would I be able to defend myself? Exactly. And would you have asked that question without the other training? Well, yeah, I was, yeah. And I think that the importance of that question is it gives you the reason to endure that sort of training. Exactly. If you had started
Jeremy (18:27.39)
11, 12, 13 years old in Kajukenbo, would you have found what you needed at that time and persisted? Yeah, and that's a good question because when I started in karate, it was hard also. I mean, like, just on a different level as far as like, you know, the traditional Okinawan in Japanese way and the terminology and stuff.
Whereas in Kachikambo, the Kachikambo class I was in, it was all English and stuff like that. And you didn't necessarily have to wear a gi. You could wear a t-shirt and your belt. And it was, a lot of the cultural things were different. In a way, there was a little culture shock, a little bit for me. Like, what do you mean I don't wear a gi? You know, I have to wear a sash. This is weird, right? But if I had probably started in Kachikambo,
I probably would have gained that skill of self-defense. And it would probably be going the other way. Like I would need something more. I'd probably go, I want something like, I don't know, Tai Chi. You know what I mean? Or need something like Aikido, something, you know. Yeah, I'm just guessing it would probably go the other way. Which is funny though, because I...
I've done those. I've tried Aikido. I've studied Tai Chi and I'm teaching it. And mainly because I thought that there was something that I could add or something that I was weak in that I was hoping that another art could fill the gap with. So you start training Kajikambo and you're digging it from the get-go, it sounds like. Yep. And...
What's the next point on the timeline look like there? Um, the next point on the timeline is wushu Yeah when I was doing you got so infatuated with the sashes you said Yeah, I need to embrace this. Yeah. Well what it happened was in shiny and the Chinese uniforms Well, what had happened was? When I got my black belt in Kaji Kenbo dirt Well during that time from the time I was I'd say maybe orange belt
Jeremy (20:51.182)
to black belt, a lot of our influence came from Grand Master Alda Coscos, who, for those of you that don't know, founded the One Hop Kendo system of Kaji Kambo. And his forms were just so beautiful, you know, just very beautiful. And there was a workshop that we had gone to in Portland where one of his black belts, I think it was...
Emmanuel Bittencourt, I don't remember which one of his black belts was teaching it, but he was teaching movements that were very similar to Wushu. And I'm like, wow, you know, the elegance part now, right? The elegance and looking powerful and strong without looking powerful and strong. That's what kind of caught my eye to Wushu, both the northern and southern styles. And, um...
And I was like, oh, this is kind of cool. So I would look up stuff, you know, at the video stores when we had them, you know, blockbuster and stuff like that, to look up stuff on kung fu, wushu. And I found a few videos that were very interesting in regards to snake fist, eagle, eagle claw, wushu long fist. And I showed them to Grandmaster Faircloth. And I'm like,
isn't this cool? And he said, well, next time we put together a tournament form for you, let's, you know, let's add this up. He was open. Yeah. Oh, that's not where I thought this was going to go. Yeah, he was open to it. So my tournament forms during my black belt, during my early black belt period were a mixture of the Kaji Kembo forms that I learned, peppered with some snake fist, peppered with
some of Grandmaster Faircloth's method of kajikenbo, because he had changed the forms a bit to reflect his experience in Aikido. So the movement started to like start to flow already. And so, you know, along with his method of kajikenbo and along with my haze and this cool snake mist, you know, he choreographed a form that was...
Jeremy (23:15.05)
you know, winning tournaments, that kind of thing. So it was like, oh, okay. And then I went, I really want to try Wushu, but you know, a lot of the schools at that time were in California. And I just kept saying, I really want to try Wushu. If I'm remembering correctly, Wushu's a relatively new art, right? It was created primarily for competition, right? It was, yeah, it was created primarily to, like around the 50s. Yeah, originally around the 50s.
Jeremy (23:47.039)
it was created specifically to still practice the martial arts, but without, how should we say, without showing that you're learning how to use weapons. Because at that time, during the Mao Tse Tung era, if you, and people out there are going to have to correct me if I'm wrong, but if you were like practicing, you know,
the real martial arts, you know, you could have been imprisoned. So it was kind of like, but at the time- It's like the story of Capuleta. Yeah, yeah. And, you know, at the time the government realized, well, we can't just outlaw it, it's part of our culture. So they kind of said, well, you can practice martial arts, but these are the stipulations. Okay. Art, you know, the art part. So that's where a lot of the-
influence from like let's say Chinese opera and stuff like that came into play. A lot of the acrobatics you know from Chinese opera came into the traditional tangquan, nanchuan, long fist, southern fist, bajiquan. A lot of it was focusing more on the art both in the solo forms and in the
Jeremy (25:08.618)
what we would consider modern wushu is, I guess, how should I put it? If we say modern wushu, it would be more along the performance line. However, nowadays, since that ban has been lifted, stuff like sansho, sanda, now coming more to the forefront within the last 20 years, sansho, sanda being the...
kind of like the wushu style of UFC. So it's like kickboxing. The difference being that in Sancho, you compete on a leitai, which is a stage, and you get points if you throw someone off the leitai. So it's like not only do you get- How far do you fall? It's only maybe about this far. Are there sharks? Yeah, sharks. Instant, instant.
It's a top tier rating. We put sharks in a moat around the pedestal. Yeah, it's only maybe about this high, a little bit lower than a standard boxing ring. Some are as high as a standard boxing ring because it's a lot easier here in America to do that rather than finding a late high, that kind of thing. But you get points for that as well, and depending on how you throw people. So yeah, very similar to UFC style, mixed martial arts and stuff like that.
But yeah, it originally was more for the art. So you're getting interested in that and you start looking around. You said it was in California. So I was trying to do math because it gives us context. Are we talking early 90s? Yeah, well, like closer to the mid 90s, so about 94, 95. And one day in 1995, I was walking with a friend.
in Chinatown and literally saying, you know, wouldn't it be cool if I could just come to Chinatown and learn wushu and kai chi? Was Chinatown here in Seattle? Yeah, in Seattle, the International District as it's called now, here in Seattle. And I was walking, I happened to look over and went, wow, something smells good. And there's a restaurant and next to it is a little doorway. And I looked in the doorway and it said wushu on a little piece of paper, right, in the window.
Jeremy (27:30.75)
And I stopped, I'm like, wait. And I looked and it said Chinese Wushu Tai Chi Academy. And my- It's like someone's like pulling the Marianette strings on your martial arts career here. Exactly, right? And I'm like, let's see what's going on. And I checked the door and I could hear noise upstairs. I'm like, come on. So I come, we walk up the stairs and there's, it opens out into this big room. And there's-
I think there's about like eight people there, like two adults and the rest are teenagers. And there's my teacher teaching, I forgot what she was teaching, but I saw her do a butterfly kick and it was absolutely beautiful. And I literally pulled out my checkbook right then and there and begged, please teach me. I think the checkbook part is more of a sign of the times. Times. Anything else. It was the last time we walked around with checkbooks. I know, right? You know.
And it's funny because I still write checks to our studio landlord because that's how she prefers it. And I'm like, that's fine. I know how to write a check. But a lot of the teenagers don't. It's kind of like, you don't know how to write a check. What's a memo line? Yeah, exactly. What if we write here? Yeah. So she talked with us and my friend and I, Cheryl and I both ended up taking Wushu for a while.
And then she had to drop off for, I think, because we were running a school together. So it was like, oh, we can't do this at the same time for like cost. And someone's got to run the school, that kind of thing. So I was the chosen one to go through the study and stuff like that. And yeah, I did that for years, got certified to teach under Master Yi Jiao Hong and Wu Xu, Yang style Tai Chi and Chen style Tai Chi.
And that was a different kind of heart. It was a, you know, it was a different kind of eat bitter kind of phase for that, like 10, 15 years. Because it involved physical pain that lasted for like two or three years, right? The stretching and, you know, I don't wanna scare anybody away from Wushu, but it was like, you know, Master Hong.
Jeremy (29:55.954)
started with 13 people in the instructorship program and only two of us graduated. And it was hard. And there were times where I wanted to call in on days during the instructorship program, which was like 6 a.m. to 12 p.m. And say, I'm sick. But then I knew I would have to catch up the next day. So I just dragged my butt in and go for it and stuff. What was it you found in Mushu that...
you were willing to put in that kind of time. That's not just an intense physical commitment, but an intense time commitment. And I would imagine if you're doing 6 a.m. to noon, probably not doing a lot of other things at the end after that. No, in fact, during that time is what I would call the 101 ways to do top ramen type of time for our school because we had enough money to pay for our rent and.
overhead for our school, but that left kind of little for me and my business partner at that time. So it was a lot of how many ways can you do top ramen? And I, we both assured ourselves that after the instructorship period is over in wushu, things will get better because I can add wushu to the curriculum. I can add tai chi to the curriculum. Things will, things will get better, which it did. But you know, during that like
two, three year period, it was kind of up and down. Like, it's kind of hard to like go, oh, hey, okay, we're paying overhead this, overhead that, overhead this, overhead that, and we only get like maybe $500 a month, if that. We managed to pay our mortgage because we live together in the same house. We live together in the house with several roommates. So we managed to pull the rent together or the mortgage together for the house that Cheryl owned.
Thank God, thank God it worked out that way. Because I know that if I was living in an apartment by myself that there'd be no way. That's not enough money. Yeah, so, but yeah, like you said, there had to have been somebody pulling strings to make all this happen. But what attracted me to it was, it was the cultural aspect because, yeah, karate was hard, kajikamba was hard, but this type of training, Master Hong asked,
Jeremy (32:22.218)
all of us do when we paid for the instructor ship program. Do you want to train the way that I trained in China or do you want to just train? And sounds like a trick question. Yeah, it was. And basically she was saying, do you want to train like how I would have to train people here, you know, in America, or do you want to train the way that I trained? And most everyone said.
let's do it, let's train the way that you trained in China. Which involved like crazy physical stuff, running around and just crazy stuff, right? And the stretching and the, go as far as you can without puking. And there would be times where we were taking turns doing our routines where we'd be in the corner going,
Jeremy (33:20.254)
Rusty, are you ready? Yes, ma'am. Okay, and then you would go, and then you'd go back in the car, and you'd be dry heaving just from the effort. Every one of us would be like, yeah, good, right? How long was this period of time? It was a two year period. Two year, you did this, how many days a week? It started off seven days a week, and then Grandmaster, Grandmaster Yichao said, okay, Sunday's off. So I'm guessing Sundays were spent in bed. Yeah, pretty much.
And then that was, it was about six months of seven days and then another six months of, okay, Sunday's off. And then when the second year started, it was like, okay, weekend's off. Because we'd literally limp in that kind of thing. And then we'd have to really warm up, only kicking maybe about this high. And then, okay, now everything's ripped again. So now we're, now we can kick higher, right?
And you know, she was very gentle yet very firm and she always made, always referred to eat bitter, right? Must learn to eat bitter to taste the sweet. And then she asked me one time, do you want to compete? Do you want to be a champion? And this was of course during the stretching period where we're like crying.
Do you want to be a champion? I'm imagining there's like five gallon buckets of the dip da jow in the corner. Cause I can't imagine how you're getting through this without copious. There was a, there was, we called Tylenol kung fu candy. Tylenol was kung fu candy. And so yeah, I took Tylenol for like daily. And I realized I'm not doing my liver any good. So. Especially if you're getting rid of the food from the. Yeah, exactly.
Oh my gosh, so I stayed away from the Tylenol and just decided, okay, I can still train hard, but I don't have to destroy myself. Unfortunately, a lot of all that is catching up with me nowadays. I can feel it in my hips, I can feel it in my neck, my knees. So, you know, it's just a matter of just making sure that I.
Jeremy (35:39.894)
take care of myself now, instead of trying to keep doing what I did when I was like 25 going on 30, 25 to 30. When I did Wushu, it was toward turning 30. That's when a lot of Wushu people retired, kind of like people in Muay Thai. People retired at that age, but I decided to do it anyway, because I still had the physicality to do it.
but you know, there was- Did you compete? Yes, I did. I competed in primarily in the USAWKF, the USA Wushu Kung Fu Federation, and I have three grand championships with that. Had you competed prior? Yeah, yeah, I competed in Kajukenbo, in local tournaments, and in California, and in Canada, in karate, primarily local tournaments. But when I started Wushu, that was when my sights-
got set on national competition and eventually world competition. And then why? It was something that I wanted to see if my body and mind could go through the challenge of national and world competition. Because I looked at the videos of world competitors in Wushu and I was like, man, that's crazy. You know, the acrobatics and stuff.
I want to be able to do that. I want to be able to do an aerial car wheel without landing on my head You know, I want to be able to do a butterfly twist and you know, of course There's a lot of falling when you're doing that kind of stuff But like in we call it old-school mats, right old-school mats old-school protection for acrobatics didn't exist back then it's you fell you got back up or we would put down mats and stuff, but
That didn't help if you landed on your feet wrong and broke your ankle or something like that. There were no harnesses. So- There was no foam pit, you weren't going to the gymnastics facilities. There was no foam pit, no. Exactly, there was no foam pit. If you wanted to learn to do a butterfly kick, your Sifu would run with you and then literally pick you up and throw you, that kind of thing. Or if you wanted to learn how to do a aerial cartwheel, there would literally be a coach on the floor with his foot up.
Jeremy (38:03.346)
and you would have to time your cartwheel to go over his foot. And he would make sure that his foot would go right on your hip and just kind of pull you up a little bit. And then you'd hear master Hong going, kick, sit up, kick, sit up. That's a, that's what she would always say. Kick and sit up. That's what would get you around in an aerial cartwheel. And yeah, and there were times where the coach would just
push people straight up and you'd be 10 feet in the air going, no, this is not a car wheel. So, oh man, I still look back at that and go, that's crazy. That's probably a good thing we didn't have cell phones back then. Exactly. There were some great videos. Yeah. Oh my gosh. But anyway, it was just something that I wanted.
to do to another challenge from my mind. Not so much that I wanted the prestige of national championships is I wanted to know if I was good enough to pit myself against the best of the best in the nation or in the world. And I managed to, my specialty ended up being Nanchuan, the Southern boxing. I love the Northern style long fist, but there was still something about Southern fist that really
brought me back to my karate roots, where it was low stances and kiai and stuff. It was something that really drew me to that. So I got my three grand championships in that. And then I and then my teacher said, you know what? You should try Tai Chi. You should compete Tai Chi. I'm like Tai Chi. OK, had you been doing Tai Chi? Yeah. In order to become an instructor under Master Yi Zhehong, you had to learn the Northern.
the northern tangquan systems, straight sword, spear, staff, broad sword, that kind of thing. And then you had to learn the southern styles, straight swords, you know, all the weapons within that. And then you had to learn basic yang style, basic chen style, intermediate chen style, intermediate yang style. So in order to become an instructor under here, you had to learn all that, right?
Jeremy (40:27.638)
And I was drawn toward Chen style, Tai Chi. And during that time, Master Hong started learning with Grand Master Chen Zheng Lei from Chen Village in China, became a disciple under him. I'm hearing the word Chen in both of those things and assuming they're connected. Yeah, so Grand Master Chen Zheng Lei hails from Chen Jia Go, which...
loosely translates into Chen village in China, where literally it's a big family. The Chen family, the huge Chen family. Anyway, Grandmaster Hong became a disciple under Grandmaster Chen, and he started coming to the United States to teach seminars and to teach private lessons with people. So.
You know, I got to learn privately under Grandmaster Chen, as well as learn under my own Sifu and do seminars. And it brought a whole new world of the Tai Chi world to my practice because now here's someone from Chen Village itself. And I'm assuming, because I'm sure not the entire audience knows this, that Tai Chi does have combative applications, just that the majority of folks practicing it
in Western culture, that piece isn't there. Yeah, exactly. I'm assuming in this context, you are getting all of that. Yeah, yeah. It was taught as a martial art through Grand Master Chen Zhenglei. And it's true, you know, a lot of people here in the United States or in the Western world when we practice Tai Chi, it's for the health benefits. And that's great. However, originally, as I remind my own students, that Tai Chi, first and foremost, is a martial art.
The only thing that differs between, let's say, Tai Chi and karate is the speed at which the kata are performed. But regardless of what art you do and what katas you do, all the arts will go to the same place, right? Whether it's you start out here, whatever, they'll go to the same place. I like the visual of the mountain, right? Yeah. The further up we go, the closer we get to it. Exactly, exactly. And that's exactly it. We all come to the same skill at one point.
Jeremy (42:47.798)
But yeah, and that was different too, because to feel a different kind of power, so to speak, not power like, but like more like the issuance of power, like if you get hit with a punch or get hit with a palm strike, you know, to feel just a different sense of the fullness of a strike or the sense of a presence.
if someone's going to take you down. That was another thing that I had no idea about. And it really helped my ability in how to sweep and take down people and stuff. So, but yeah, the getting back to the competition thing. After I did that, I got into Tai Chi and started competing in Tai Chi. And I have...
I had two national championships under Tai Chi, but then Master Hong said, you know, time to go to China. Compete there. Scared, crapless, right? But there was an event called the World Tai Chi Health Conference, and it was all Tai Chi and it was held in Hainan, China, little island off the coast of mainland China. And this event took up that whole.
island. That's how important it was for Hainan at that time. This was 2001. And gosh, you know, we went there and everywhere you looked, it was Tai Chi paraphernalia. Tai Chi this, Tai Chi that. Ten thousand people that practiced Tai Chi crammed on one little island. I'm just imagining like, you know, getting out, stepping out the door of a hotel and just looking around and everybody's just...
in the streets and it just feels like the most low risk kind of zombie invasion you could ever perceive. Yeah. Well, you know what's funny about that event was that there was a day during that weekend where they wanted all of the people that were there and there were close to 10,000 practitioners. They wanted everyone on the beach of Hainan doing...
Jeremy (45:11.466)
what's called the Young Style 24 Forum to music five times. And it would be filmed in there by helicopters going by. And that's exactly what happened. Every group had a specific place on the beach and had a specific, were assigned a specific leader and there were, I don't know how much this cost the island, but there were big woofered Twitter.
you know, speakers every like 50 yards or something like that. And there was a there was a piece of music that was actually composed for this. It was pretty and I had no idea any of this was happening until we got out there. And then me being short, of course, all I could see was just a little bit into the horizon, but there was people everywhere.
Everywhere it took it took only 45 minutes for everyone to get to their places and on the on the Speakers it said okay. We're gonna do 24 form five times The leaders will give you the pace Please follow your leaders, right? So Oh my gosh, you know, I only saw some of the footage that night in the local news but I remember looking up one time and there was a
helicopter and a guy strapped to the railing on a computer and he's leaning out with a camera and I'm like please don't fall. But the footage that we saw on this big screen TV when we were out to dinner, it was amazing that the helicopters flying over the beach and all you see are like different colored
And it was like color coordinated, different color, different color people. And the arms are moving like at the same time. And, oh, it was beautiful. Like, like just seeing that just made me tear up. I've done forums in groups, you know, and in groups where staying together is important, you know, more of my karate history than anything else. And I've watched synchronized forums and competition, usually three people.
Jeremy (47:41.426)
And it's a cool experience. It's a powerful experience to be in the same place at the same time doing the same thing with other people. I can't even wrap my head around that experience in the midst of 10,000 people. Oh man, it was absolutely amazing. It sounds almost religious or spiritual. It was very spiritual for me. I think it was during the third or fourth performance of the...
24 from, because it just kept going and going and going. I realized the gravity of all this. And I looked at my classmates and everyone's crying. Right? And I'm like, oh my gosh, this is amazing. And like I said, I don't know if anyone believes in this, but when you feel that buzz of the energy of like, not even just the people around you, but feeling the energy of that many people, it was something.
that I'll always remember. It was just amazing. Who is that footage of the film? I was looking and I don't know where, I looked, Hainan First World Tai Chi Health Conference, and it'll have information about it, but it's kinda like, give me some video. Somebody somewhere has that video. Someone has to have it somewhere. The guy on the helicopter. Assuming he didn't fall out. Exactly, assuming he didn't fall out. But then again, I haven't spent a day.
digging into layers to see if I can find anything. But in today's, you can find anything, and now it's gotta be out there. So now, I think I'm gonna go home and search. Yeah, if you find it, let me know. Yeah, I will, definitely. Oh my gosh, it was great.
Jeremy (49:32.766)
It almost seems like there's this path for you. And if I look at, you know, your karate there is, kajikamba, wushu, and it sounds like Tai Chi gets its own spot. Yeah, Tai Chi gets its own spot. The arc seems like, I would call it rounding off the corners. Softening the edges. Yeah, yeah. Is that something you noticed as you were going? Is it something that you look at in hindsight? Is it something that I'm...
putting information there that doesn't exist? It was something that I noticed because there was another art I got into in the early 2000s at the same time that I was like starting to teach and compete in Wushu and that was Kyudo. I got into Japanese archery. Yeah, I got into Japanese archery. And what I was attracted to was, you know, not necessarily the big bows because it's kind of like
boy, that stuff's expensive. And it's hard to maintain a hobby when everything's so expensive, right? So during that time, I studied kyudo and iaido, expensive stuff, right? But what I was attracted to was a different type of quiet power. So with the wushu, I was looking for the quiet elegance, a quiet sense of power.
But there was something behind kyudo and iaido that at the time I couldn't place. There was something that I felt I needed. And like you said, this path was, there's something that you need. Like from karate, I need self-defense because I don't feel comfortable with the self-defense. Now I need to soften up a little bit because I was full of piss and vinegar during that time. So I need this tai chi, I need a softer kind of yushu.
But with Kudo and Iaido, that woke me up and life changing in its own way. Because there was a whole new respect for the weapons, quote unquote, a whole new respect for the sword, a whole new respect for the bow. It's not, at that time, I thought, oh, this is a cool way to shoot a bow. But then as I started learning, I learned.
Jeremy (51:59.554)
We don't shoot the bow, really. It shoots the bow. My incredibly simplistic understanding of Kyoto, we had one guest on the show that was his primary art. It sounds more like you spend the majority of the time in almost meditation. Pretty much, pretty much. Yeah, there's a exercise that we call hasetsu and it's the eight stages of shooting. And it's not.
hitting the target that's important. What's important is making sure your hasetsu is correct. And if it's correct, you should be able to shoot blindfolded and hit the target. And there were several times in our classes where we would experiment with that, where we would blindfold ourselves and someone would lead us to the shooting line. And then we would just have to concentrate on everything being perfect and as perfect as we could. And yeah, there were times where we were very successful.
hitting the target, even some of us with bullseyes, blindfolded, and other times not. Oops, sorry, kind of, yeah, you know, community center walls, you know. But yeah, and that's where it came around full circle, both in Kido and Iaido, where your kihon is the most important, the basics are very important, because...
you know, during that time, I started noticing that people were forms collectors. Give me the next form, give me the next form, give me the next form. How many arts can I study all at once type of thing? And during that time, it was like, yep, practice your basics, basics. That's the most important thing. So, yeah. So Tai Chi, you come back from that experience, your...
If I've heard you correctly, you're teaching consistently. Like this is your full-time job? At that time, yeah. At that time. I also forgot to include, during the Kaji Kambo time, I started studying dose paris, eskima, which in and of itself was a different kind of wake-up call because you get hit with a stick that's about as real as you can get. And that's, you know, obviously you folks on the West Coast got...
Jeremy (54:25.846)
the Kaji Kembo stuff and the Filipino martial arts stuff, for the most part, from my vantage, earlier than it showed up on the East Coast, which makes sense due to proximity. Yeah, right. Right? Mm-hmm.
How was that fitting in with all these other things that you were doing? Or were you compartmentalizing? Or were you finding the similarities and putting it all in the pot? Yeah, well, I was finding the similarities. And there were times where I would have to set some stuff aside in order to learn something different. When I started learning with my STIX instructor, Chris Petrilli, he did a blend of Innosanto, Kali, and C-lot, as well.
And he also studied under the Datoar brothers in Silat and learned from a myriad of other Filipino martial arts people, and he put together his method. And he also had learned under Kakoy Kanyete of the Kakoy Doce Pares line of Escrima. So he took Kakoy Doce Pares, blended it in with his Innosanto, Kali, and Silat, and his other Silat and other studies. And he didn't even.
know that he created his own system. He was just teaching what he knew, right? But for the most part, I'm going to call it the Petrilli system. But then we got introduced to Kakoy Kenyette himself from the Philippines. And so here I am studying with Chris and also kind of like, oh, wow, studying with Grand Master Kenyette at the same time. And, you know, Grand Master Kenyette was already aging at that point in the...
mid-90s. So it was like, okay, you know, let's learn as much as we can, right? And that was a different kind of like wake-up call. But what had happened was I would study with Chris on Thursdays. That was the only day I had free. Thursday nights. But the workouts started like at 6 and it would just go until everyone went home.
Jeremy (56:34.946)
It wasn't like, oh, OK, 90 minute class or whatever. Just, OK, just go. Some people would, I'll be right back. And then they'd come back with food for everybody. And we'd sit around and eat and train some more. It was kind of fluid and organic like that. And then when Grandmaster Kenyette would come to Seattle for seminars, then we would go and study with him. But then there were times where my business
partner and students and I would travel to the Philippines to study directly there. Kako idos hepat, isn't it? And that's different, culture shock. Even though I'm Filipino, I don't speak the language. And I'm glad you bring this up because one of the things that comes up for a lot of our guests of Asian descent is that there is a familial desire to connect. I guess is the best way I can put it. Was that at all an influence for you?
Yes, mainly because my father's great, what, my father's grandfather? Would that be my great grandfather? Yeah, my great grandfather. My father's grandfather was Santiago Toledo, which is a known person in the Filipino martial arts community from generations ago. We're talking like late 1800s, early 1900s, that kind of thing. And he's known as a well-known master. However,
When I was little, my dad would tell us stories about Santiago Toledo. We would be like, OK, whatever. Right. You know, and then later when I got older and did research, oh, my God, this guy exists. You know, but at that time, you know, being just out of college, I had no resources on how to contact any practitioners. And as it was tough before the Internet, it was. Yeah, it was.
You know, and you don't know how good you have it these days, kids. I know. Yeah. Now you guys have everything at your fingertips. YouTube. I know. And then I wrote to Guru Dan and Osanto one time asking if he could help me with some information. But I don't know that it looks like that. That didn't go through. But I did. I did meet Guru Dan later on and asked him about it. But we never connected on that. But anyway, with that being said.
Jeremy (58:58.154)
I felt like I wanted to pursue that because now I'm hearing that Santiago Toledo, well-known Filipino martial arts master, could we pass this on? Well, I couldn't find anyone that practiced it. And for all I know now, every master that studied under him are dead. That lineage is gone. That lineage is probably gone. There might be someone out there that still practices, but as far as I know, the lineage is gone.
Which is sad because I figured if I could find somebody and at least Learn the basics or whatever to kind of like still pass it on in a probably If I don't know a lot of my Filipino history But if I'm remembering if we're talking late 1800s It was likely that the stuff that was being practiced then wasn't that far from being actually battle-tested Yeah, that's right. It's like Santiago Toledo was known for taking challenges and duels and he was
And it said that during his whole career, he was only beaten once. And it wasn't a death duel. It was more like, it was like, okay, you beat me. I concede, right? He was only beaten once. And, you know, and any Filipino martial art during that time, you know, even up until the 1960s, battle tested, you know, with people with the old manongs, as we would say, having scars on their arms and on their legs and stuff like that to show.
the fights that they've been in, which is kind of wild, yeah, because it's like nowadays we would think challenge? What? You know, challenge matches? Yeah, to the death, that type of thing, which is something that many young people wouldn't be able to fathom nowadays. But that was a thing up until even the 1960s, 70s even. So weird.
So let's come to today. You've got all of these backgrounds and I watched what you taught yesterday. So you haven't focused on one thing, it seems. It seems like you're teaching at least some of these different pieces. What does the class structure look like?
Jeremy (01:01:22.482)
at your school if I was to look at the schedule and how you had all that arranged and everything? Well, we teach primarily kajikenbo. Kajikenbo, wushu, tai chi, and then Kathy Wang's kickboxing and kung fu sansu. The kajikenbo itself, being a mixed martial art in and of itself, allows me to take the stuff from my tai chi and my Filipino martial arts background and integrate it into kajikenbo.
And looking at many other Kajikambo schools, depending on each master's credentials, you'll see that each method is a little bit different that way, because they add their own flavor to it while still keeping the base. And that's, of course, the most important thing that I'd like to pass on is the base. This is what the base looks like. So, you know, in my Kajikambo curriculum, I'll say, okay, so this was the original grab set number one.
know the bass and then this is how you can try to figure out how to expand upon it. Know the bass, know the bass, never come away from the bass. That way it still keeps going. Otherwise, we see arts come and go that completely change from its base and it's no longer that art anymore. It becomes so-and-so's thing. So that's how the Kandukama works.
Chen style and yang style tai chi are taught the way that it was taught to me in a very traditional manner, with the yang style being primarily the health benefit one because of the older people that are in it, chen style being taught as the martial art that it is. How many of the folks in the chen style also train other things with you? Three, only three. Yeah, I've got about 20 people in our chen style class. I would have imagined the opposite.
No, it's like if anything, some of the Chen style people cross-training Yang style. They, yeah, they wanted to see the differences between Yang style and Chen style. Not necessarily the differences, I guess, per se, but rather how Yang style was influenced by Chen style. So they wanted to see that. But yeah, I've got about three people that cross-train in both kickboxing with Cathy Long and Kajikambo. And that's it, everyone else sticks with.
Jeremy (01:03:50.006)
the Chen style or sticks with the yang style. And then within Kaji Kambo, there are people that cross train with Kaji Wong and Kung Fu Sansu and her kickboxing. And then the Filipino martial arts is its own separate thing. I mean, people learn it in the Kaji Kambo, but it's not the focal point. My Filipino martial arts program, that's strictly the Petrilling method and the...
Togo Dossoparis method. You've mentioned Cathy a few times. She's waiting in the other room. In the green room. I don't think it's green. White? It's white. Gray. In the gray room. If we weren't going to record in a little bit, I would ask you some questions about her, but just to the audience, no, I'm not skipping over that, that there will be a separate episode of the three of us. So if you want to, like the most obvious question, how did you two meet? There's a little bit of a cliffhanger. You can check out that episode. Ta-da!
So what's next? What's next for you? What's down the line? The way I often ask this question is, if we got back together in a few years, what would you hope we were talking about that, you know? Well, my hope is that we outgrow our current space. Our school has, you know, as with any school, any school goes through this kind of thing, right?
And you know, we started down here with the 101 ways to do tuk ramen. And then we went and we, when we had a couple of spaces that was 3000 square feet. And then I made, let's just say I made a business decision that didn't work out. So it kind of, how dare you be the only person ever to make a poor business decision? I've never made a poor business decision, right? You know, and I would have liked to think that every business decision that I'd made would have been for the good of the school.
Um, and that one wasn't so it was kind of like I literally had to start over again. Sure. Um, so it was like back down here and now we're back up here. COVID luckily though, didn't give us a big hit like some other schools I've heard of that having to close and stuff like that. How and in let me ask you because we talked about this once in a while I made a very bold prediction about what would happen with various schools and how they handled it. How did you handle?
Jeremy (01:06:11.47)
we went directly to Zoom. I had a feeling about this because that year, January, I was sick and the sick wouldn't go away for like almost a month. Yeah, I got sick in January or late December and I was sick all through January. And this is when everyone's like, oh my gosh, COVID on the East Coast. And ah, COVID here in Washington, it started here or whatever they said. And...
It was weird because I went to the doctor and I'm trying not to cough because everyone said, if you're coughing, you have COVID. So I'm trying not to cough and freak out the doctor. And the doctor, I started coughing. The doctor said, nope, sorry, you're gonna go home. And if you need anything, I was like, are you serious? So I had to deal with, I don't know what it was as far as I know it could have been COVID, but there was no test for it. I was sick for a month, went back to work in mid February. And then it was at that time.
time we learned that the governor had closed Washington down. Literally my first day back from work. But I had an idea that this might happen because people were kind of like, oh, we might close down. So I already had set up a Zoom account. I had already set up a Zoom class meetings. I had already sent out emails saying, if we need to shut down, this is what we do. So all of my students already knew that if we need to shut down.
This is the information you need to come to classes on Zoom. So the second that the governor said, Washington shut down, I emailed everyone and that night everyone was on Zoom. Now through that several month period of that, probably lost a few students. Probably didn't pick up new students. Right, right. But if we get to say a year out from that, what did it look like?
people that didn't quit. We only had a few people that were special needs quit, because it was just hard for them to learn in that way. And other people definitely, you know, we lost a couple of adults and that's about it, but we still had a good crew of like, okay, we have 70 people, this will get us through. And a year later, we still had those same 70 people.
Jeremy (01:08:35.602)
And there were times where I agreed to do, okay, let's do distant private lessons. Like you stand on one side of your porch, I'll stand on this side. Let's practice jacotta, that kind of thing. But for the most part, everyone, I think, especially the kids, the kids clamored and kept asking their parents, turn on Zoom, turn on Zoom, and they would get into their uniform even though they were at home.
It was just so nice and I'm sure all of you that had schools and were doing Zoom, to see your kids getting into uniform and to see your adult students getting into uniform, even though they're at home. Yeah. It just shows that they needed something for that period of time. And I'm going to guess that your student count started to do this. It started to do this after we opened up again. After the state opened up, literally...
I was like, what's going on? We picked up, like, I had to like go through like, like literally a hundred contact forms, asking about classes. This is what I found. Yeah, everybody in all the martial arts schools in Seattle had at least a hundred inquiries from around their neighborhood. Cause I'd like, hey, did you get, how are you doing now that we're open? And it was the ones that didn't give up. Yeah.
The ones that didn't give up saw a massive influx. And that was the prediction that I made. Yeah, and it was true because we had about 70. And then when we opened up again, it started with one of my colleagues moving to Eastern Washington. Chris Wilder, love ya. Anyway, he pretty much told.
the parents of all his kids, if you want to continue martial arts, it doesn't matter which you do, which martial art you do, but if you're going to do it, go with Rustida. And boom, 30 kids. And I'm like, okay, so now we have 100. We have 100 people, you know? And but since then, you know, my Tai Chi class has only had maybe two people in it or whatever. But then those grew to like, you know, 20 in a class.
Jeremy (01:10:56.558)
20 in each class and then Kat's kickboxing class grew from like three people to like 15, that kind of thing. And we still keep Zoom as an option because we, yeah, we actually had people out of state join our classes because they heard of us through somebody, through somebody. And they were afraid that when the states opened that we would shut it down. And you know,
a couple of the students had already earned their purple belts during that time, two years. And I'm like, I can't shut it down now. But you know, it just made the requirements for them change. It's kind of like if you can make it up here every three months, you know, and we'll put up a we'll try to put up some kind of a fund or something like that to get you up here every three months. You know, then your ranking will be legit. Because you know,
We know how that is about online only belts, right? I think that hybrid method is something that's just awesome. I think we're at such an exciting time for martial arts. You know, a lot of what we've talked about today has been, you know, oh, there's wushu in there, right? Yeah. Like these really fortunate, unlikely occurrences for you. And I still see, you know, it's like almost this, you know.
Marionette. It's like, oh, go over here now. Yeah, here so she can see that. Yeah.
But that's not what most people get. Most people...
Jeremy (01:12:35.254)
don't have the opportunities and the more opportunities we can put in front of them and the more choice, the better for everybody. I think it's great. I really do. I think that online hybrid is such a wonderful... Yeah, and I've found that it gives the students like the options of, oh, you know, I was sick and I'm still kind of, but I want to go to class. I'm going to attend on Zoom.
And if there's something that I can't do, there's something that I don't understand, I'm sure Sifu will give me something to work on here. That kind of thing. And I- Or I'm going on vacation. Yeah. And it's a long vacation. And I don't wanna miss two weeks of classes. Exactly. Or maybe there's a rank promotion that I can see over there and I feel like if I could fully disconnect for a couple of weeks, that I'm not gonna be ready. Yeah, yeah. And that's exactly what happens during-
even like kids ranked promotions, if they're adults, you know, that are either out of town or in town, they'll like tune in and watch, and then they'll, you know, clap for the kids and stuff like that. I mean, we've had kids like be in Greece, you know, on vacation, and then they'll tune in and I'm like, what's Luke just doing on here? Then you see a hotel room. The Parthenon's in the background. Yeah, you'll see them in a hotel room and they're practicing and stuff like that.
the parents will come in afterwards. Lucas was just so intent on having to attend class. I know there's a time difference. And he's like, I don't care. I don't care. I want to go to class. And just to remain connected. You know, it's just, yeah, you're right. We live in such a time that unfortunately, you know, a pandemic had brought this technology.
to the forefront, it's not just for meetings anymore. So. If people want to learn more about you and what you've got going on, website, social media, and you have a show, right? Mm-hmm. Three of us are going to talk about that. Yeah. I'm sure. How do they find all your stuff? SeattleWushu at gmail.com. That's me. And on Facebook, just look up my name, Restita De Jesus, and I have a second.
Jeremy (01:14:56.362)
I don't know why I'm looking there, it should be this camera. I have a second profile on Facebook, Sifu Restita De Jesus, and I'm also on Instagram, Restita De Jesus. What is that, underscore? Restita underscore De Jesus. And Seattle Wushu Center on Instagram also. And what's the name of the podcast? Dynamic Dojo Talk TV. And it's a...
I used to do Dynamic Dojo Talk TV with a gentleman named Robert Deal, started in 2012. And we used to do weekly podcasts. And now- It's early in the world to podcast it. Yeah, it was early. That was when blog talk radio was a thing. And that's what we did, only audio blog talk radio where people had to call in. And then we decided to transfer to video, live video. So we started using-
Oh my gosh, what's it called? Not StreamYard, not B-Live, but it was an actual app. And I'm trying to remember. Oh. Open Broadcast or something like that. The open source one. Oh, yeah. The open source one. What is that? Open Broadcaster or something like that. OBS. OBS, thank you. So I used OBS for a long time, learning how to like. Yeah.
get with Facebook and then when I realized that there were apps that you don't have to do all that and you don't have to do anything special to your computer or whatever, yeah, StreamYard, VLive.tv, those were godsends. So we're using that now, just not as often as we used to because life happens. So whenever we get guests, we just kind of come on like maybe once a month, twice a month, kind of depends.
I hope you all check out what you've got going on. Thank you. We're going to talk with Cathy in a moment. It won't be a moment to you, but remember if you want to see what we've got going on, it's whistlekick.com, it's whistlekickmartialartsradio.com. But I always pass it back to the guests to end the show. So what do you want to tell the audience? How do you want to leave this? Well, keep training, find your passion.
Jeremy (01:17:17.366)
that I felt was missing. And if you feel that there's something that you need, don't be afraid to go for it. Because you are your own best advocate for your success and for what you need. So get out there and do it. Thank you.
Jeremy (01:17:41.23)
Thank you.