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ANNEMARIE LEIPPERT
As a child, I was fascinated by the series Kung Fu with David Carradine, less because of the fight scenes than because of the dialogue between master and student and the underlying philosophy.
In the small town of Meersburg where I live, there was no opportunity to learn a martial art, and as I got older I had long since put the idea aside. I played volleyball in the district league, but my enthusiasm for training and my talent were limited.
The subject of martial arts was probably still dormant in my subconscious, and so in my early twenties I took the opportunity to learn karate in a club. After some initial enthusiasm, my enthusiasm for training waned at some point, somehow it wasn't the right thing for me. I stopped training when I got my green belt. I didn't do any sport at all for two years and this had a negative effect, I realised that my body was starting to get rusty.
During those two years, a friend of mine had been persuading me with great enthusiasm to go along to his martial arts teacher Dietmar Stubenbaum in Friedrichshafen and take a trial lesson. I ignored this for two years, and today I regret those two wasted years when I could have been learning instead of doing nothing.
So one day I went to a trial training session with my mate, in April 1998, in a dusty room under the roof of the old French barracks in Fallenbrunnen.
As there was a Xingyiquan training session that day and then a Taijiquan class, I took part in both. I didn't know either of them, I had no idea what I was training. I will always remember the burning thighs that I got after a short time of training the basic exercises, and which I had to struggle with every time I trained for many months afterwards.
What can I say, after this first training session, my gut feeling told me that I should do it, and that I should do both martial arts. Although the school fees for both disciplines were many times more expensive than the karate club, I didn't hesitate for long and signed up that same evening. I said to myself > you're going to do this for yourself <, and today I have to say it was the best decision of my life.
Since then, I have been learning these fascinating martial and movement arts with unbroken fascination, working on understanding and realising them more and more profoundly; it has become my way of life, which is also an anchor that you can always hold on to when life's crises shake you
.
Incidentally, the 'old' pagoda or training room had a very special flair.
The steel door into the training room had a small dent, which had probably been caused by a shot. On the opposite side was a kind of small temple/altar. To the left of it was an old desk, on the walls various training weapons and pictures of masters, acupuncture boards, benches, a shelf with martial arts books, an old cupboard, protective masks and samurai armour. The floor consisted of stone slabs with the yin and yang symbol painted in the centre. All in all, the room made a bold impression, old, dusty, with fascinating furnishings, simply cool.
There were only 4 small radiators in the large room, it was cold in winter and scorching hot in summer.
In the changing room there was a bar counter and an old cupboard, low tables with benches, and the two changing rooms were separated by curtains and screens. This room had no heating, so changing cloths in winter was a very cold affair.
We later spent many happy hours here drinking after training and celebrating many a party.
In 2010, my teacher cancelled the lease for the premises in Fallenbrunnen, which is now home to Zeppelin University. We were left homeless and trained for a few years in a room rented by the hour in a gym, until finally my classmate Ralf Merk built a building for his craft business and planned a training room for us in it. And so Die Pagode, my teacher Dietmar Stubenbaum's school, is now located at Albert-Maier-Str. 12 in Friedrichshafen.
I am licensed as a teacher 'GAOJI 高级级辅导员, 準指導員' by Master Dietmar Stubenbaum, and thus in the 'Gesellschaft zur Erforschung und Praxis des Kleinen Rahmen Chen Clan Taijiquan e. V.' and also in our world association of the 'International Society of Chen Taijiquan (ISCT) e. V.'