Cheung Lai-chuen was a Chinese martial artist. He was born in 1882 during the

Qing dynasty The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing,, was a Manchu-led imperial dynasty of China and the last orthodox dynasty in Chinese history. It emerged from the Later Jin dynasty founded by the Jianzhou Jurchens, a Tungusic-speak ...

. He was a student of many great

Kung Fu Chinese martial arts, often called by the umbrella terms kung fu (; ), kuoshu () or wushu (), are multiple fighting styles that have developed over the centuries in Greater China. These fighting styles are often classified according to common ...

masters and mastered the Lei Ga (李家, Lee Style),

Southern Dragon Kung Fu The movements of the Southern Dragon style (traditional name Lung Ying) () of Shaolin Boxing are based on the mythical Chinese dragon. The Dragon style is an imitative-style that was developed based on the imagined characteristics of the mythic ...

, Lau Man Gaau (流民教, Vagabond or Wanderer's Style), and

Bak Mei Bak Mei () is said to have been one of the legendary Five Elders — survivors of the destruction of the Shaolin Monastery by the Qing dynasty (1644–1912) — who, according to some accounts, betrayed Shaolin to the imperial gov ...

(White Eyebrow Style). He was responsible for codifying the latter. He began his study of the martial arts at the age of 7 with the

traditional Chinese medicine Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) is an alternative medical practice drawn from traditional medicine in China. It has been described as "fraught with pseudoscience", with the majority of its treatments having no logical mechanism of action ...

practitioner Sek Lam, who taught him the vagrant style. Jeung would later learn Li Style from Li Mung, (founded by Li Yi, 李義) who taught Jeung his family style. While he was studying martial arts with the Lam family, he became close friends with their son Lam Yiu-gwai, with whom he had much in common, and eventually studied under Yiu Gwai's uncle. Lam would later become known for disseminating

Dragon Kung Fu The movements of the Southern Dragon style (traditional name Lung Ying) () of Shaolin Boxing are based on the mythical Chinese dragon. The Dragon style is an imitative-style that was developed based on the imagined characteristics of the mythic ...

much as Jeung would later become known for disseminating

. Both were born in

Huiyang District Huiyang District ( postal: Waiyeung; is a district of Huizhou, Guangdong province, People's Republic of China. It was renamed in 2003 amid the restructuring of districts and counties in Huizhou. Formerly named Huiyang city (county level), its si ...

Huizhou Huizhou ( zh, c= ) is a city in central-east Guangdong Province, China, forty-three miles north of Hong Kong. Huizhou borders the provincial capital of Guangzhou to the west, Shenzhen and Dongguan to the southwest, Shaoguan to the north, Heyua ...

Guangdong Guangdong (, ), alternatively romanized as Canton or Kwangtung, is a coastal province in South China on the north shore of the South China Sea. The capital of the province is Guangzhou. With a population of 126.01 million (as of 2020) ...

province. and a marriage between their families would eventually make them cousins. They both left Huizhou to build their futures in

Guangzhou Guangzhou (, ; ; or ; ), also known as Canton () and alternatively romanized as Kwongchow or Kwangchow, is the capital and largest city of Guangdong province in southern China. Located on the Pearl River about north-northwest of Hong Kon ...

and did so by opening several schools together. After moving to Guangzhou, Jeung was defeated by the monk Lin Sang. The monk then referred Jeung to his own teacher Juk Faat-wan, who taught Jeung the art of Bak Mei over the next two or three years. Jeung had a background in the martial arts of the

Hakka people The Hakka (), sometimes also referred to as Hakka Han, or Hakka Chinese, or Hakkas are a Han Chinese subgroup whose ancestral homes are chiefly in the Hakka-speaking provincial areas of Guangdong, Fujian, Jiangxi, Guangxi, Sichuan, Hunan, Zhe ...

, from his study of Li Mung's family style and the vagrant style. Because of this, Jeung's style of Bak Mei is associated the dragon style of Lam Yiu-gwai due to the many years Jeung and Lam spent training together.

References

1882 births 1964 deaths Chinese martial artists Sportspeople from Guangdong People from Huiyang {{PRChina-martialart-bio-stub