Legends of the Martial Arts Masters (5 page)

The first time Kojo saw Ankoh Itosu was one of those weekends. He and his friends had gone down to the waterfront to meet a ship that had just come in. An old man was standing on the dock talking to one of the sailors.

“If you want a challenge, try him,” Kojo’s friend said to him, pointing to the old man.

“Why?” Kojo asked. “He doesn’t look so tough to me.” “That’s Itosu,” his friend said.

“Itosu the karate master?” Kojo could hardly believe his ears. The man had a long gray beard and deep wrinkles in the corners of his eyes. He was at least thirty years older than the oldest of Kojo’s gang, and he was several inches shorter and several pounds lighter than Kojo himself. “He doesn’t look so tough,” Kojo said.

“Try him,” the friend said, a dare in his eyes.

“It would be good for bragging rights,” Kojo thought, for at that time he was still thinking like a bully. “I could say that I beat the great Ankoh Itosu. Even if I couldn’t beat him, if I could just get one good punch in on him, it would make me respected, admired among my friends.” The bully watched Itosu point to a nearby restaurant and bow to the person he had been talking to.

“Wait over there,” Kojo said to his friends, motioning to a spot across the street. “Watch closely. You may learn something.” They grinned and trotted off.

The bully figured that his best bet was to catch Itosu by surprise. He walked quietly around the corner of the restaurant, flattened himself against the front of the building, waited for Itosu to come around to the entrance. Soon he heard footsteps on the gravel. Itosu was going to walk right past Kojo’s corner. Kojo rubbed his knuckles and smiled to himself.

Itosu rounded the corner. Without warning, the bully sprang out from the shadows. With a loud cry, he wound up and threw his best punch. Itosu’s head snapped around as he saw the punch coming. But rather than block he just let out a noise that sounded a little like “Ummph.” The bully had his full weight behind the punch and landed it on Itosu’s ribs just in front of his left arm. It landed hard, but simply bounced off. With a movement so quick he didn’t even see it, Itosu grabbed the bully’s punching hand and tucked it under his left arm. The pain shot up the bully’s arm like a lightning bolt.

“And who might you be?” Itosu asked.

“I’m—I’m Kojo,” the bully replied, gasping for breath against the pain. “Actually, Kojiro. My friends call me Kojo.” His friends. Where were his friends? Out of the corner of his eye, he saw them across the street watching everything. They made no move to come to Kojo’s rescue.

“Well, Kojo,” Itosu said, “why don’t you join me? I think we have a few things to talk about.”

Kojo was in no position to say no. Itosu had his arm tucked under his. He tweaked the wrist every now and then just to let the young man know who was in charge. Yet most of the persuasion came from his grip. Kojo felt like his hand was in a vise. It throbbed to the beat of his pulse.

The two of them, Itosu and the bully, walked into the restaurant like that, to all appearances two good friends walking arm in arm. Itosu pulled up two chairs with his other hand, and they sat, the bully’s hand still in the vise. His fingers were going numb.

“So, Kojo,” Itosu said as the server brought sake and two cups, “do I know you? Why is it you felt that you needed to attack me?” He sipped his sake casually with his unoccupied arm.

“Well, sir,” Kojo said, “it was a dare. My friends dared me. And I thought . . .” He paused. Given a few moments to reflect, he wasn’t really sure what he had been thinking.

“I see,” Itosu replied. “Your friends were the young men I saw across the street?”

He’d seen them! It was pretty clear that Itosu didn’t miss much. “Yes,” Kojo said. “Sometimes we come into town, go down to the docks or to the restaurant district. We, um, we fight, sir. We practice our karate.” Kojo suddenly realized how silly that sounded.

“I see,” Itosu said. He tweaked Kojo’s wrist again as he reached to refill his sake cup. The pain streaked from the wrist up through the elbow to the shoulder. “And what does your karate teacher say about this?”

“Well,” Kojo said through gritted teeth, “We don’t really have one.” “Ah,” Itosu said with a big smile. “So that’s the problem.” He released Kojo’s arm. The young man rubbed his hand trying to erase the dents Itosu’s finger had made. The hand throbbed and prickled as the blood returned to the fingers. Itosu filled a sake cup and pushed it toward his companion. “What you need is a teacher. You will study with me.”

“Sir?” Kojo replied. “Study with you, sir?”

“That’s what I said, isn’t it?” Itosu finished his second cup of sake and pushed it and the pitcher away. “We need to work on your speed and your kiai. Your punch isn’t too bad, but you’ll have to relearn your hip movement to make it stronger. And of course, you’ll have to stop fighting down by the docks.”

“Yes, sir,” Kojo said.

“And you will have to stop trying to frighten old men.” Itosu grinned at the young man gingerly grasping a sake cup with his reddened hand. “You never know,” Itosu said, “when you do that sort of thing, someone could get hurt.”

T
he story of Mu-lan comes from
a poem written in northern China in the
sixth century. It is probably not a t
rue story. But it has been
told over and o
ver again for fourteen centuries because it reflects a courage and a devotion to
family that inspires people no matter their time or place. Filmmakers in China,
Taiwan, Hong Kong, and the United States have all made movies about this
remarkable young woman.

 
The Ballad of Mu-lan

Mu-lan was fifteen years old. She lived in a China that expected her to marry, to raise a family, and to care for her parents in their old age. It most certainly did not expect her become a soldier and march off to war. In fact, waging war would have been the last thing Mu-lan herself expected to do with her life—until the day the soldiers arrived.

It was a quiet afternoon, and Mu-lan was weaving in the front room when the soldiers arrived with draft posters. Quietly, she left her work to look out the door and watch them trot into the yard atop their powerful horses. Her father stepped out into the courtyard to meet them. One of the soldiers handed him a rolled up scroll, a draft poster.

“Your family,” the leader announced, “will be required to provide one man for the Khan’s army. The fight against the invaders in the north has grown much worse. We must have soldiers to repel them, or our homes will be overrun.”

“I understand,” her father said. “Yet I have only three children, two girls who are seventeen and fifteen, and a son who is six years old. I would consider it an honor to serve the Khan myself, but I am no longer young, and my health is failing. I doubt I could serve well.”

“That is not my concern,” the soldier said. “And it shouldn’t be yours either. Your duty is not to question the Khan’s orders. Your duty is simply to obey. Within three days, you must send a member of your family to the army camp near the Yellow River. When he has left, tack this poster to your front gate. It will tell us that you have done your duty.”

“Of course,” Mu-lan’s father said. “It will be an honor to serve.” The soldiers wheeled their horses around and headed down the road to the next house. Mu-lan’s father turned slowly, clutching the poster in his hand. From her hiding place just inside the front door, Mu-lan could see his face. It was the color of ashes.

All that night Mu-lan tossed and turned, sleeping fitfully, seeing her father’s ashen face in her dreams. When she awoke the next morning, she knew what she had to do. Her father was not well enough to join the army. He would not last even a month of riding hard, sleeping on the ground, eating the poor rations of a soldier. If she wanted to save her father’s life, she would have to go to war herself.

So that morning, Mu-lan got up and put on her best clothes. Her mother, sister, and brother were outside feeding the animals. Her father was sitting on the front step staring into space. Quietly she lifted the floorboard under which Father kept his money. She pulled out the small sack and counted out a few coins. Gathering up some of her weaving, she told Mother she was going to go to the market to sell it.

Mu-lan went to the East Market and sold the weaving. A man there was selling a horse, a beautiful, spirited chestnut mare. She was the perfect horse, but Mu-lan knew if she went to purchase her, the man would wonder why a young girl was buying a horse. Mu-lan wandered the market until she found one of the draft-age boys who had come up from the camp. She hired him to purchase the horse for her. The boy was suspicious too, but he didn’t turn down the pocket money she offered for his services.

Mu-lan led the horse to the West Market, where she bought a saddle, then to the South Market to buy a bridle, and the North Market to buy a whip. She didn’t want anyone to suspect that she was outfitting herself for military duty. A few clerks raised eyebrows at Mu-lan’s purchases. She told them she was buying equipment for her father. In a sense it was true. What she did, she did for him.

Satisfied that she had everything she needed, Mu-lan returned home. She tied the horse in the woods. She hid the saddle and bridle under the house. Then she snuck into her father’s closet and took a change of clothes and hid it under her blankets. She would be ready to go in the morning.

That evening was unlike any Mu-lan had ever experienced in her life. For the first time, she looked and really saw her family. Her mother was cooking supper. Her sister was playing with her brother in the corner. Her father sat quietly, sharpening his sword, a look of deep sadness on his face. Mu-lan tried to etch their faces into her memory, to remember always what they looked like on that evening. More than anything, she wanted to gather them all into her arms and tell them how much she would miss them. But they couldn’t know. Not yet.

The next morning Mu-lan rose early, long before even the first glimmer of light appeared on the horizon. She put on her father’s clothes, shifting within them, trying to make them feel natural. No matter how she adjusted them, they still felt strange. She took her father’s sword from its place and lashed the scabbard to her belt. Then she took the draft poster from the shelf. As she went out the front gate, she tacked it to the gatepost. The poster and the missing sword would be enough to tell her parents what she had done.

A lump rose in her throat as she gathered her saddle and bridle. With a great act of will, she turned her head and left behind the only home she had ever known.

The army camp by the Yellow River was already humming with activity when Mu-lan got there. The soldiers were a disorganized, ragged lot. Some of the older men had fought invaders the last time they had swarmed through the land. They were taking the younger soldiers aside and giving them advice about what to bring and what to leave behind. Some of the younger men wandered about, their faces sometimes beaming with bravado, sometimes clouded with dread. The youngest among them were little more than boys, thirteen, fourteen, or fifteen years old. Mu-lan was relieved to see that she was by no means the smallest one there.