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If I say that the past 15 years have been eventful, I risk being quite economical with the truth.

After starting my Wing Tsun journey in January 2011, I quickly fell in love with the art, and by the end of the year it was clear and obvious that this was what I wanted to do full-time.

The six hours of weekly training jumped up to 25–30 hours in my second year, leaving me no time or energy to do anything else but work, train and sleep.

A very stressful full-time job in the building industry, often requiring 60–70 hours a week, plus the training and other school-related events, put me in a state of full commitment and focus.

After 1.5 years of training, I started teaching a youth class in Bromley. Commuting from North London, my schedule looked something like this:

Monday – 3 hours of training and assisting in Bromley.

Tuesday and Thursday – 3 hours of training in Victoria.

Wednesday – 1 hour teaching the teen class in Bromley, followed by 3 hours of training.

Friday was a day off, but twice a month I went to train 3 hours in Bromley.

Saturday and Sunday – teacher training in Bromley from 10am–5pm, often overrunning, sometimes until 10pm.

On top of this, we had intensive seminars nearly every month, which were all mandatory to attend.

When I talk to people who say, “Oh, I’ve been doing Wing Tsun for 10 years,” my first question is: how many times per week? Once? Twice?

I must say, though, that although this type of intensive training is fantastic, it can never replicate the slow, steady training of years. I’ve seen many of my classmates break down, burn out and stop Wing Tsun forever. Over three years, about a hundred members took part in such training, of whom only four of us remained active.

During this period, I took part in teaching all kinds of groups, from abused refugees at a women’s shelter and school kids in East London to parachute regiments of the British Army.

Around 2013, I sustained a serious chest injury due to training with a broken chest guard, which took me about a year to recover from. (Never cut corners when it comes to protective equipment.)

I also took part in a Guinness World Record attempt involving 36 hours of continuous training, and ran the Torbay Half Marathon with my fellow students, where we won the prize for “Best Team”.

In 2013, I attained 1st Level Technician, and in early 2014, 2nd Level Technician. However, I never truly accepted the validity of these grades, given the short amount of time it took to achieve them. I lacked finesse, depth of understanding and structure. I would describe myself as a monkey copying motions without purpose.

Around 2004, when I first felt Wing Tsun through the arms of my little brother (a student of Dai-Si-Hing Szabó Ferenc), I experienced heavy, suffocating pressure that left me feeling helpless. Impossible to forget.

Unfortunately, where I practised, I never experienced the same feeling. However, I kept believing, loving and learning, even though I knew something was missing.

In 2011, I attended my first summer camp in Hungary, where I experienced that same feeling through the arms of one of the best masters of the EEWTO. The unbelievable discipline, depth of knowledge, sheer number of high-level masters and their kindness amazed me.

A third-level student, like me, knowing just a tiny bit more than nothing, was learning wooden dummy Chi Sau. Several high-level masters took the time to try to help me understand techniques that were nearly impossible to grasp for someone with only six months of experience. Yet they were patient and kind, and with their wonderful approach, they engraved themselves in my heart forever.

(Si-Hing Csaba Szabó, Si-Hing Csaba Kerekes and Si-Fu Jaroslav Buc.)

This amazing journey lit a light in me and gave me a dream: not just to become as good a Wing Tsun fighter as they were, but to create the same environment in London.

Sadly, these intentions were incompatible with the structure of the schools I was part of.

My belief was that to create a strong Wing Tsun community, we need time, knowledge and structure. It’s impossible to achieve an authentic community by pushing too hard and forcing progress through relentless grading.

Around 2013, I met Si-Fu Feri, and as fellow Hungarians, we quickly understood that we were on the same page. We both wanted to train and grow – nothing else.

We kept in touch, had tea a number of times, talked about Wing Tsun, but never once trained together due to some “conflict of interest” that was unbeknownst to me at the time.

This was the perfect example of “ignorance is bliss”. I asked Si-Fu Feri to teach me half a dozen times – no success. I tried again and again for well over a year until it finally happened.

These sessions were real eye-openers. A lot of the gaps in my knowledge got filled in, and everything started to make sense. Although I was a second-level master, my basics were far from where they needed to be. Simple details and countless applications were missing, my footwork was non-existent, and the list went on.

Thanks to his patience and kind approach, he helped me understand Wing Tsun on a much deeper level.

In 2015, our dream came true, and with a small group, we attended our first international summer camp in Hungary.

The summer camp is always run in two groups: beginners/intermediates and a masters group.

A quick side note: you want to get to a level where you are allowed into the masters group! It will change your life!

As my grades had been achieved in a different school, we did not know which group I should be in. So I left my black-and-red uniform in London, put on a white T-shirt and trained as a Grade 0 on the first day, ready to restart my gradings from scratch.

At the end of the day, Si-Fu Feri asked Si-Kung’s permission, and from day two, I was allowed into the masters group.

A truly unbelievable experience.

I remember watching some of the Hungarian and Polish students and masters drilling with beautiful fluidity, thinking: “One day, I want to move like them!”

On the fifth day, I was selected by Si-Kung to join the masters grading and achieved 1st Level Technician.

It was a two-hour-long exam, one of the hardest things I had ever done to that date. Finally, I felt that the work invested and the result were in balance.

One could think that this was a step backwards, given that I was already a second-level master in another association, but for me, this was the most important step in the right direction.

Friday evening concluded with a dinner with all 300 participants of the seminar, with the top masters of the EEWTO, presenting the freshly graded masters with their newly achieved diplomas.

I was hoping that my name would not be called, feeling far more nervous than proud of my achievement.

For full dramatic effect, my name was called last.

Legs shaking, I walked up to the masters’ table and stood in front of Si-Kung, who sat calmly. I bowed and stepped closer to take the diploma, but he suddenly stood up and offered his hand to shake.

With his firm grip, he pulled me across the table and gave me a huge hug, welcoming me into the most amazing family of Wing Tsun Kung Fu.